I like Trader Joe’s. The prices for things like milk and eggs aren’t crazy, so I can stop in to browse and still buy the things I actually need. The people working there seem happy. There is free coffee, the kids like hunting for the stuffed armadillo, and even if it is $3 now, Two-Buck-Chuck is a deal.
Then when I’m done, I can leave the parking lot and go in whichever direction I need to. That shouldn’t be a plus, but given how HEBs seem to manage to make that a struggle, I feel like noting it as a positive.
Their ad system is different from other stores, though, and it’s amusing to me. They don’t have a weekly ad, but a monthly one. Products get essays about them, because TJ’s loves their products. Not to mention weird old-timey cartoons:
What’s not to love there? But having me click and load four pages before I can find a thing and know how much it is is more than I can happily deal with, so I’m picking one product a week from them to highlight. If ‘highlight’ means ‘mock in a loving way’.
This week’s product is the Inner Bean, a companion to a product I am unfamiliar with called Inner Peas (Hi-yoooooo! is what DH would say here). It’s a snack, where black bean puree is mixed with rice flour and sunflower oil and baked.
Sounds like a party in a bag, right? A party where there’s likely not a lot of beer and BBQ, but maybe it is your kind of party. If it is, you can get these bean-pod shaped wonders for $1.49 per 3 oz bag.
Of course they’re bean-pod shaped. Otherwise the humor inherent in pretending baking bean dip is a good snack treat is completely lost.
cheepieaustin 