Trader Joe’s Rants & Raves (mostly raves, a few rants)

Ground turkey is something I tend to buy often when I go to Trader Joe’s, maybe like many of you, as I find it so versatile as well as affordable. So besides the fresh stuff in the meat case, I also decided to check out this package of Trader Joe’s frozen turkey burgers. Any advantage of buying this versus buying a package of fresh ground turkey? Normally I would probably just buy fresh ground turkey and form burgers myself. However I can see reasons some might like these frozen turkey burgers instead of fresh. For one thing I imagine some folks (especially singles?) might find this more convenient as if you just wanted one burger you have that ready to go and are not left with extra turkey which you would have to use in a few days or freeze. Or maybe some people don’t like touching meat and forming burgers, or just find this faster and easier to make? Certainly one benefit of these frozen turkey burgers is the frozen burgers are cheaper than fresh ground turkey. These go for $3.49 for a pound (4x 1/4 lb burgers). One pound of TJ’s fresh ground turkey will cost you $3.99 presently. So the frozen ones are good value.

Cooking: Trader Joe’s instructions say to “Cook From Frozen”(as usual for them on frozen stuff). Now I don’t like to cook food from frozen if I don’t have to. So I defrosted these on the counter for about an hour or two, after cutting open the package and putting the pucks on a plate to defrost but in a pinch you can cook from frozen. The cook time will be shorter if defrosted of course.

The cooked turkey burgers were tasty. TIP: Turkey is pretty bland so I really season them before cooking with a real good dusting of the TACO SEASONING spice blend, which really jazzes up turkey burgers. Don’t add salt as there is some salt in the spice mix, and they have some salt already added in the burgers. Also I made them as cheese burgers by putting some grated Unexpected Cheddar on top which works great as it is amazing melted (cover the pan for a minute to help melt the cheese). I put them on toasted Trader Joe’s Whole Wheat Hamburger Buns and dressed them up with some spicy ketchup (mix some Peri-Peri or Bomba into some of the Organic Ketchup) . Our turkey cheese burgers were yummy with toasted buns, lettuce and tomato and we quite enjoyed them and wouldnt even know it was turkey and not beef.