Trader Joe’s HEIRLOOM CHICKEN

Trader Joe’s HEIRLOOM GROUND CHICKEN – “All Natural, Pasture Raised, Slow Growth, Air Chilled, No Added Hormones, No Antibiotics”

What is Trader Joe’s HEIRLOOM CHICKEN you ask? Well here’s what Trader Joe’s says: “Trader Joe’s All Natural Heirloom Chicken is a very special chicken. First, it comes from a recognized breed with a genetic line that traces back multiple generations. And unlike so many other chickens raised very quickly on processed meal and antibiotics, these Heirloom Chickens are slow-growth, pasture-raised birds. This means they are allowed to mature at a natural rate and forage for food in a natural environment. They also have never been given antibiotics.”

That sounds pretty good, right? While they don’t say “free range” they say “pasture raised” which sounds the same? After reading about TJ’s Heirloom Chicken I wanted to try some. I got the ground heirloom chicken to test out and in short I thought it was quite good. Obviously an “heirloom chicken” is going to cost more than TJ’s regular chicken as this is a “super premium” chicken, and to me it actually seems like it Whole Foods item. Though if it was at Whole Foods I can only imagine it would cost more (maybe $10-12lb)? Trader Joe’s sells the Heirloom Ground Chicken for $6.99/lb. By comparison TJ’s regular ground chicken, something I have been getting for years and like very much as well, is $~~3.99/~~lb (now 4.49). One difference I noticed between the two is that the texture of this Heirloom Ground Chicken seems to be better, not quite as finely ground as the regular ground chicken (and this one seems to be less wet?) So this seemed to brown a bit faster. It’s 90% lean with 10% fat.

To cook the ground chicken, I added seasonings and mixed in quite a bit of chopped scallions. I shaped the mixture into patties, sprinkled them generously with the terrific AJIKA blend which is great on chicken and also helps browning. I sautéed them in olive oil for about 4 minutes on both sides until golden brown. I served these burgers/kebabs on warm pita doing kind of a Middle Eastern chicken burger thing. I sauced them with some TJ’s Garlic Dip and some Green Dragon. These chicken kebabs were really tasty; we really enjoyed them. One could of course make something similar and shape them into meatballs or long cylinder kebabs. What I didn’t do, but might in future is compare the two kinds of ground chicken TJ’s sells side by side, cook them up the same to compare. Meanwhile I’ll say yes this “premium” chicken is quite good. I would buy it again. Trader Joe’s also sells boneless breasts of this Heirloom Chicken for the same price as the ground chicken, while whole chickens are $3.99 / lb. (Again, cheaper I think than it would be at Whole Foods?) So you can either try a whole bird (roasted) or the boneless breasts, or this.

There’s more you can read about ALL NATURAL HEIRLOOM CHICKEN on the TJ website (Whole chickens are $3.99/lb)

https://www.traderjoes.com/home/products/pdp/all-natural-heirloom-whole-chicken-067607