Trader Joe’s Roasted Poblano Peppers

Trade Joe's Roasted Peppers

Last night we tried a new product for dinner: Trader Joe’s Roasted Poblano Peppers. They are two to a package, and the peppers are filled with Spanish rice and shrimp.

We heard about this Trader Joe’s product from my Aunt who happened to mention it when we were together last week.  We were talking about how much we all LOVE shopping at Trader Joe’s and some of the products that we constantly fall back on and purchase again and again. My Aunt’s favorite “emergency” items are the frozen guacamole and the Roasted Poblano Peppers.

One of the cool parts of this conversation is that folks were from all over the country, California, Washington DC, Boston, New Mexico and us from Tucson and yet we all shop and just LOVE Trader Joe’s stores. We did feel sorry for the folks from Kansas City, who sat at the table green with envy wishing that Trader Joe’s would open up a store for them (Hint Hint Trader Joe’s- Please expand in the Kansas City area!)

So as the conversation continued, we both became interested in trying the Poblano Peppers. We both love poblanos as they are a nice, medium spicy chili (many times they are used in making chili rellenos) and they just sounded wonderful stuffed with rice and shrimp.  My Aunt lives in Santa Fe, so we were wondering if this item was even available in the Tucson area, as we were not familiar with it at all. I guess we need to spend some more time checking out the frozen items at our Trader Joe’s Store!

So the last time we went shopping at Trader Joe’s we set out to scour the freezer section look for this tasty sounding item. And low and behold, there they were, big as life, right next to the tamales and the burritos.

They have sat in our freezer until last night when we could not stand the suspense any longer. We took them out and followed the directions on the package for the oven baking. While we let the oven heat up, we removed the packaging. Interestingly the peppers were individually wrapped up in plastic to keep them fresh.

Individualy Wrapped Peppers

Before the oven

The package directions said to cover the pan loosely with foil and cook for 25 minutes or until the shrimp were thoroughly cooked and then let stand for 2 minutes before serving. Did I say that the shrimps were raw? Yes! So poke around and make sure that they are fully cooked before letting them stand for those extra 2 minutes.

Also, take care when you prepare this item, as in our oven the shrimp were not fully cooked for another 20 minutes more than the package caused me to expect.  This caused our dinner to be served a bit later than expected…

But they were completely worth the wait. The pepper was spicy, the rice yummy and the shrimps were covered in a delicious red spice.  These peppers were a medium- hot to me and would almost suggest serving them with a salad that had a creamy dressing to sort of “put out the fire” so to speak. We served them with some plain cooked vegetables (Trader Joe’s Organic Foursome) to counter act the spiciness.

Bottom line: we both loved these peppers and would purchase them again.