The Best Trader Joe’s Frozen Meals for Lunch

We’ve taste tested a lot of the best Trader Joe’s frozen food—ice cream, Indians mains and sides, frozen pizzas, and even those bagged frozen pasta meals that allow you to feed the fam without doing so much as boiling a pot of water. The store’s frozen aisle is a treasure trove, but meals for one—the kinds of things you can toss in your bag and nuke in the break room at work—are fewer and farther between. In this taste test, we specifically set out to find the best Trader Joe’s frozen meals that make sense when you need a quick lunch for one. 

What we looked for in the best Trader Joe’s frozen meals for lunch: 

• Serving size: The format wasn’t totally important, but size was. We picked up rice bowls, noodle dishes, and little packs of mini burgers that could (and should) reasonably be consumed in one sitting. No one wants lunch leftovers, nor does anyone want to eat for two so they don’t waste funds or food.
• Flavor: Not to sound like a complainer, but I’ve taste tested a lot of really bad frozen meals. Things that simply shouldn’t exist. Trader Joe’s track record is better than other brands, but if things tasted bad or if their textures were unpleasant to consume out of the microwave, we eliminated them from the running. A midday meal shouldn’t suck just because it’s fast and cheap.

If you’ve ever watched our longform taste test videos on YouTube, you’re aware that marathon tastings of frozen dinners can be…okay, I won’t say hell, but something hell adjacent. This taste test of Trader Joe’s frozen meals was much more pleasant. Here are the best Trader Joe’s frozen meals to have in the freezer when lunchtime rolls around.

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Trader Joe’s Green Chile Chicken Bowl

Rice bowls have become a lunchtime staple and, frankly, that’s unfortunate for people who consume frozen meals, because most frozen rice bowls really suck ass. The rice tends to be mush because it’s cooked in sauce and other slop, and, like, why would you eat a rice bowl if the rice is specifically bad? Don’t do that to yourself! Of all the Trader Joe’s rice bowls we tried, this was the only remotely acceptable one. It’s a little dry, but we all decided we’d rather zhuzh up a dry microwave rice bowl with hot sauce, sour cream, and avocado slices than eat slop. Upgrade idea: Dump this whole thing into a flour tortilla and eat it like a burrito—it’ll benefit from the additional structure.

Credit: Liv Averett

Rating:

6/10

Sporks

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Trader Joe’s Spicy Peanutty Noodle Bowl with Chicken

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There’s a lot to love about this Trader Joe’s frozen meal: the tasty peanut sauce, the springy, chewy noodles, and the ground chicken. Other brands take note: Ground chicken is a nice touch in a frozen meal. It’s way better than the pale, spongy chicken strips you find in a lot of frozen dinners. Plus, you can taste hints of star anise in this meal, which makes the whole bowl give off mala vibes, like Szechuan food. And it really does have a little bit of heat, but not so much that you’ll have heartburn for the rest of the day. It’s still a very appropriate work lunch. 

Credit: Liv Averett

Rating:

7/10

Sporks

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Trader Joe’s Mini Cheeseburgers

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Frozen sliders aren’t for everyone, but I love them. And these Trader Joe’s frozen mini burgers make a pretty dang good lunch. The buns are sweet and squishy and they actually have condiments on them already, so if you’re nuking these for work lunch, you don’t have to worry about adding stuff. The burger sauce that’s slathered on the buns has pretty nicely sized bits of pickle, so it’s kinda like a sauce and a topping in one. The patties are good—they remind me of school lunch cafeteria burgers. I’d probably still prefer White Castle (the sheer thinness of those patties works best for microwave convenience food), but these would make a satisfying lunch.

Credit: Liv Averett

Rating:

7.5/10

Sporks

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Trader Joe’s Japchae

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Okay, let me preface by saying that Trader Joe’s japchae seems a little more like a side dish than a meal unto itself, but we still think it deserves to be mentioned among the best Trader Joe’s frozen meals for lunch. You get sweet potato glass noodles in a light sauce that tastes of sesame oil and something sweet, along with veggies like peppers, spinach, and carrots. They call them “stir fry” vegetables but they’re not remotely stir-fried. But that’s okay. If you made this at home, you could add a scrambled egg for protein. So, hey, maybe it’s one of the best Trader Joe’s frozen meals for lunch if you’re WFH. 

Credit: Liv Averett / Trader Joe’s

Rating:

8.5/10

Sporks

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Trader Joe’s Uncured Pepperoni Pizza Mac & Cheese Bowl

I couldn’t eat this Trader Joe’s frozen meal for lunch. That would be insane for someone with my constitution. It’s frozen mac and cheese with pepperoni slices on top AND pepperoni bits in the sauce. If you’re at all gastrointestinally compromised, it’s like heartburn in a bowl. But it also happens to be one of the best things I’ve ever tasted. Seriously, if you’re stocking up on stoner-y junk food to have around so you don’t order takeout (AGAIN), then you should have a few of these in the freezer. The elbow macaroni has bite and the sauce isn’t too obnoxiously cheesy. And even though they were cooked in the microwave, the pepperoni slices don’t have that weird gamey flavor—they’re chewy and salty and delicious. It’s a sloppy little meal that’s super satisfying and trashy in a good way. It’s the best Trader Joe’s frozen meal to eat for lunch if you have an esophagus of steel (I envy you). 

Credit: Liv Averett

Rating:

8.5/10

Sporks

Trader Joe’s

Trader Joe’s Vegetable Pad Thai

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We tried a bunch of frozen pad thai recently and most of it is atrocious. Really bad. Tangy. Too sweet. Full of waterlogged carrots and/or flavorless red bell pepper bits. TJ’s veggie pad thai —which is vegan like our #1 pick on this list—is full of bean sprouts and green onions. They contribute crunch and an incredible vegetal flavor. The lightly sauced noodles are very satisfying, and the sauce is mostly accurate—savory and a little bit sweet. Would this be better with some egg in the mix and a handful of crushed peanuts on top? Sure. But even as is, it’s a really nice lunch. 

Credit: Liv Averett

Rating:

9/10

Sporks

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Trader Joe’s Vegan Green Curry

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The cashier at my local TJ’s told me this was her favorite of all the meals I was buying, and she has good taste. This is a fantastic lunch. You get tofu sheets (!!) and veggies—fat cubes of carrot and chunks of green eggplant—in an extremely creamy, delicious green curry sauce. The jasmine rice is in a separate compartment when you cook it, which is BRILLIANT. More brands making “bowls” need to do this. If you cooked the rice in the sauce, it would be disgusting mush. This rice is firm and flavorful and fluffy. You mix it all together after the fact (you can kind of bend the container in half like a Chobani Flips and incorporate everything, but I would recommend dumping it all in a bowl rather than eating it out of the tray. The tofu sheets are so unique and the curry really is restaurant quality. We LOVE this meal. It’s the best Trader Joe’s frozen meal for lunch, and probably one of the best frozen lunches we’ve ever tried, period. 

Credit: Liv Averett

Rating:

10/10

Sporks

Other Trader Joe’s frozen meals we tried

Trader Joe’s Spicy Farfalle with Chicken Sausage, Trader Joe’s Mandarin Style Orange Chicken Bowl, Trader Joe’s Riced Cauliflower Bowl, Trader Joe’s Cuban Style Rice Bowl, Trader Joe’s Chicken Shawarma Bowl