Trader Joe's BBQ Shredded Chicken

November 10, 2007 | Reviewer: Abi

Trader Joe’s BBQ Shredded Chicken Price: $4.99
Serving: 1/4 cup, 2.25oz.
Eight servings per container
Calories: 70 per serving
Fat: 2%, 1g
Cholesterol: 8%, 25mg
Sodium: 13%, 310mg
Protein: 7g
Carbs: 2%, 7g
Fiber: 0%, 0g
Weight Watchers Points: 1 Point per serving

Trader Joe says: All White meat chicken with barbeque sauce

Abi says: I love barbecue. I liked barbecue before I moved to Texas, but once I got to the Lone Star State, my affair with barbecue went into fullblown love mode. I also stopped being a vegetarian. Who can possibly resist meat that’s been cooked for a really, really long time inside an enormous cooking device? Certainly not me. I have two great barbecue loves: brisket (like the kind my grandma made) and Carolina-style pulled pork or chicken, but pork loin is amazingness. It is as though pigs were invented to be turned into pork sandwiches, but I digress.

This love of barbecue was not well sated in Washington, DC. Sure, there were the summer cookouts and the pulled pork sandwiches from Tonic, but for the most part I lived a barbecueless existence, drifting from one supposed barbecue restaurant to another like a lost sould seeking ever-elusive redemption. When I saw pre-made barbecue at Trader Joe’s, I thought that all of my barbecue-needing prayers had been answered. I trusted Trader Joe and I knew that his pre-cooked chicken had been the answers to many a quesadilla’s loneliness. Finally, I would be saved.

Until I learned the difference between pulled meat and shredded meat. Shredded meat is basically meat for people who’ve lost their dentures. It is meat mush, protein without texture, baby food with the slightest hint of tomato sauce.

Meat Purgatory.

The meat you see before you isn’t even the actual shredded meat that I had when I started this sorrowful journey. The original meat was a pale, quivering mass of shredded pink chicken flesh, held together by a taste-free barbecue sauce lacking any of the necessary complexity or depth of real barbecue sauce.

So, while I was heating this sorry excuse for barbecue on the stove, I tossed in a half cup of real barbecue sauce (the embarassingly titled Bone Suckin’ Sauce), simmered the now-mahogany meal for a couple more minutes and called it done.

When purchasing food and buns and imagining side dishes, my original intent was that George and I would each eat two of these larger-than-sliders, smaller-than-burgers barbecue sandwiches, but after finishing the first one and finding that the meat was more appropriate for people who’ve recently had surgery on a fractured jaw than regular well-toothed adults, I was compelled to snack on fresh sugar snap peas and hummus for the rest of the evening.

comments

9 Responses to “Trader Joe's BBQ Shredded Chicken”

Crow on November 10th, 2007

The fact that it’s white chicken meat would also send me running away screaming. White meat cannot taste good. That’s why it’s white meat.
Rose on November 10th, 2007

yeck. BBQ in tubs is not healthy. I mean that as in “disgusting” and “may kill you”
on the BBQ sauce front, though, I suggest you try Sweet Baby Ray’s. it’s the best that I have ever had the pleasure of licking off my fingers. mm.
Abi Jones on November 10th, 2007

@Crow - Marinade works wonders. And what about pork? Isn’t it the other white meat?

@Rose - You’re right, I should stay away from the stuff in tubs. And aside from this error I have succeeded. There have definitely been times when I’ve passed those containers of Lloyd’s BBQ at the grocery store and thought ‘Mmmmm, barbecue.’ But there’s something in my psyche that prevents me from taking one out of the cooler and putting it into my cart.

I use the Sweet Baby Ray’s when I make pulled pork in the crock pot. It is just so insanely cheap that I can resist. But, I really like the vineagary sauces. Those are my favorite.
anonymous on November 10th, 2007

I’ve left a few comments here (tonight and in the past) that talk about “all Abi all the time.”

I’ve been a bit enlightened by a very gracious Abi — who came out with teeth bared, and rightfully so — and I won’t continue.

I really enjoy this blog, and I appreciate the time and effort you all put toward it. I apologize for anyone whose feelings I’ve hurt.
Crow on November 11th, 2007

Abi: Pork is red meat. Don’t believe the marketing.

Sweet Baby Ray’s BBQ sauce is not at all memorable. I can’t even remember why I don’t like it.

Lloyd’s BBQ is delicious.
Rose on November 11th, 2007

Ew, Lloyd’s BBW is disgusting. I’ve eaten it on a few occasions against my will. and each time I vow never to let it enter me again.
Amber on November 15th, 2007

As an Oklahoman who lived in DC for 2 years, I totally agree about the lack of yummy BBQ in DC. Even worse for Mexican food. I guess if I had to choose BBQ there, it’d be Old Glory in Georgetown (I always liked the variety of sauce) or Red Hot & Blue.
Michelle on March 1st, 2008

I like this because it’s low low low in points and coupled with a whole wheat bun and a veggie side dish it’s a four point meal. It may not be to your standards, or any standard for that matter, but it did the trick for me.

I’ll admit, I put BBQ sauce on my husband’s bun as a condiment to try to spruce it up some for him.
Al on June 28th, 2008

had Lloyd’s BBQ chicken tonight…. it was utterly disgusting….the worst ever… i assume there was chicken in the sauce, but i wasn’t quite sure, as it had a baby food type texture…..
again, worst ever…