To get your hands on the best Kroger products, you don’t have to have a Kroger nearby. See, Kroger is a mega chain that has acquired loads of smaller grocery chains across the country over the years. So if you’re in Omaha, you’ll find the best Kroger products at Baker’s. In Portland, Oregon, head to Fred Meyer. Or if you’re in Southern California like we are, make like the Dude and go to Ralphs for the best Kroger brand products.
In addition to its eponymous store brand, there are two Kroger brands in particular to keep an eye out for: Private Selection and Simple Truth Organic. From andouille to canned yams, here’s what to buy at Kroger, according to our taste tests.
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- Private Selection Premium Soy Sauce
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Private Selection Premium Soy Sauce isn’t the best soy sauce we tried in our taste test, but it landed very high on our list. You’ll notice on the bottle that it says it was aged 180 days, and that’s part of what makes it great. Aging makes soy sauce taste interesting and complex, and that’s exactly what this super umami sauce has going on. You can definitely get away with using a cheaper sauce for cooking (in fact, Kroger’s less premium soy sauce was our favorite budget pick), but if you’re making sushi at home and want an exquisite dip to accompany it, spring for a bottle of this.
Read the full ranking of the best soy sauce
Credit: Liv Averett / Instacart
- Private Selection Naturally Hardwood Smoked Andouille Sausage
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When Mardi Gras rolls around and jambalaya is on the menu, Private Selection andouille should be on your shopping list—especially if you like some heat. This Kroger product is the best spicy andouille we tried in our taste test. It’s perfect for gumbo, but it would also be really good in scrambled eggs, too. But, we repeat: Must love heat!
Read the full ranking of the best andouille
Credit: Liv Averett / Ralphs
- Private Selection Select Blend Mixed Nuts with Sea Salt
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Good mixed nuts are worth their weight in gold—and they’re pretty much just as expensive. This deluxe mix from Kroger includes cashews, pecans, and macadamia nuts—no peanuts!—and it’s a pretty good deal for around nine bucks. The best Kroger products are a good value and this one definitely is.
Read the full ranking of the best mixed nuts
Credit: Merc / Ralphs
- Private Selection Dark Chocolate Fudge Dessert Topping
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When’s the last time you treated yourself to a hot fudge sundae at home? We’re gonna guess it’s been too long. Buy a jar of this and a pint of vanilla ice cream and go to town. According to Sporked editor-in-chief Justine Sterling, this tastes almost like hot cocoa mix before you add milk or water—deeply chocolatey. It needs to be heated before you use it and that’s the only thing that kept it from being number one on our list.
Read the full ranking of the best hot fudge
Credit: Merc / Ralphs
- Private Selection Sea Salt Caramel Chocolate Chunk Cookie Dough
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Freshly baked chocolate chip cookies are pretty much always delicious, but this ready-to-bake cookie dough is so, so special. Along with melty chocolate, this dough is laced with creamy, slightly salty caramel and lots of it. It pools on the parchment paper as the cookies bake. This is one of those Kroger products that’s worth going out of your way for.
Read the full ranking of the best chocolate chip cookie dough
Credit: Merc / Ralphs
- Private Selection Old World Pepperoni
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We’re not totally sure what pepperoni was like in the “old world,” but we do know this Private Selection pepperoni is one of the best Kroger products we’ve tried. What makes it great is how thinly it’s sliced. It’s wafer thin, so it crisps up beautifully when you put it on pizza, almost like thinly sliced bacon.
Read the full ranking of the best pepperoni
Credit: Liv Averett / Ralphs
- Simple Truth Organic Himalayan Salted Caramel Mini Rice Cakes
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If sweet rice cakes sound like kind of a bummer dessert, you haven’t tried these Simple Truth Organic mini rice cakes. They’re coated with a caramel flavor dust that’s sweet, buttery, and a little bit salty. These would be really good crushed over a scoop of vanilla ice cream (or salted caramel ice cream if you’re crazy).
Read the full ranking of the best rice cakes
Credit: Liv Averett / Instacart
- Simple Truth Organic Pinto Beans
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You probably assume all canned pinto beans are the same, right? Not true! Only three brands were good enough to make our ranking, and Kroger brand Simple Truth Organic was one of them. They’re super tender and have a flavor that’s clean and pure. Use these as the base in a Chipotle-style bowl and you’ll be stoked.
Read the full ranking of the best canned pinto beans
Credit: Merc / Instacart
- Kroger Canned Cut Yams
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Canned yams get the most play during the holidays (Thanksgiving, in particular), but the Sporked crew decided they’re delicious enough to eat all year long. Kroger brand canned yams come in syrup, so they’re more like a dessert than a savory side, but you can definitely get away with mashing these with butter and salt and serving them with dinner. Keep a few of these in the pantry and you’ll definitely find uses for them that don’t involve mini marshmallows.
Read the full ranking of the best canned yams
Credit: Merc / Instacart
- Simple Truth Thin & Crispy Lemon Cookies
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We love a good dupe, and these Simple Truth lemon cookies are a dead ringer for Tate’s. They’re buttery but still refreshing. If you find yourself in the cookie aisle at your local Ralphs or Baker’s, this is one of the best Kroger products to put in your cart.
Read the full ranking of the best lemon cookies
Credit: Merc / Instacart
- Kroger Low Sodium Vegetable Juice
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Put down that bottle of V-8. It turns out that Kroger’s low sodium vegetable juice is the best vegetable juice blend you can buy. Yep, better than V-8. We think this is one of the best Kroger products because it actually tastes like vegetables—it’s redolent of tomatoes and carrots, sure, but you can taste peppery, pleasant watercress, too. Even though it’s reduced sodium, this juice is still packed with flavor. Add this to your list of what to buy at Kroger if you need a little help getting your kids (or yourself) to consume veggies.
Read the full ranking of the best vegetable juice
Credit: Merc
- Kroger 100% Tomato Juice
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This Kroger tomato juice—which comes in a bottle as well as a big ol’ can—is cheap, salty, and it tastes great. It’s thick and creamy, but it doesn’t cross the line into soup territory. It’s nicely seasoned, too. If you’re looking for a great tomato juice to pair with some vodka on a Sunday morning, this is the stuff. It’s nostalgic and flavorful, and it’s one of the best Kroger products we’ve tried.
Read the full ranking of the best tomato juice
Credit: Merc / Instacart
- Kroger White Hoagie Rolls
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Unless your grocery store has a really good bakery, good hoagie rolls can be hard to come by. These Kroger Hoagie Rolls, which you’ll find in the bread aisle rather than in the bakery, aren’t perfect, but they have a lot of good qualities—and they won’t go stale in 48 hours like bakery hoagie rolls. (Ya gotta give it to preservatives sometimes, right?) They have a lightly sweet flavor that complements savory cold cuts. And if you happen to be making at-home Italian beef sandwiches, these are squishy enough to really soak up some au jus.
Read the full ranking of the best hoagie rolls
Credit: Liv Averett / Instacart
- Kroger Ready to Bake Pizza Crust
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If you make pizza at home, we have important info: You don’t have to make your own crust or figure out who to bribe to get a big blob of it from your favorite pizza shop. This tube of pizza dough from Kroger makes the best pizza we tried in a taste test. The dough in this tube is easy to stretch and roughly the size of a pizza pan. It bakes up nice and crispy with a lovely browned bottom—no sog here. If you make pizza at home, this should be on your list of what to buy at Kroger.
Read the full ranking of the best store bought pizza dough
Credit: Merc / Ralphs
- Kroger Meat Lasagna Party Size
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We’ve done a few frozen lasagna taste tests, and Kroger Meat Lasagna consistently performs well. As our taste tester put it, “The noodles are a bit too thick and there’s not a whole lot of meat to be seen, but the flavor made this some of the best frozen lasagna we tasted.” The tomato sauce is flavorful and tangy, and it’s well seasoned with herbs and spices. Oh, and did we mention how huge this is? It’s huge. This is a big, tasty meal for a crowd.
Read the full ranking of the best frozen lasagna
Credit: Ryan Martin / Kroger
- Kroger Red Wine Vinegar
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We tasted a lot of store-brand red wine vinegar in our red wine vinegar taste test, and this Kroger product was the only one worth ranking. It’s flavorful and actually tastes like fermented wine rather than glorified white vinegar. Need a cheap red wine vinegar to have on hand to splash on mixed green salads or sub sandwiches? You should have a bottle of this in the pantry.
Read the full ranking of the best red wine vinegar
Credit: Merc / Kroger
Best Kroger Soy Sauce
Rating:
9.5/10
Sporks
Best Kroger Andouille
Rating:
9.5/10
Sporks
Best Kroger Mixed Nuts
Rating:
9/10
Sporks
Best Kroger Hot Fudge
Rating:
9.5/10
Sporks
Best Kroger Cookie Dough
Rating:
9.5/10
Sporks
Best Kroger Pepperoni
Rating:
8.5/10
Sporks
Best Kroger Rice Cakes
Rating:
8/10
Sporks
Best Kroger Pinto Beans
Rating:
7.5/10
Sporks
Best Kroger Yams
Rating:
9/10
Sporks
Best Lemon Cookies
Rating:
8/10
Sporks
Best Kroger Vegetable Juice
Rating:
9/10
Sporks
Best Kroger Tomato Juice
Rating:
9.5/10
Sporks
Best Kroger Hoagie Rolls
Rating:
9/10
Sporks
Best Kroger Pizza Crust
Rating:
9/10
Sporks
Best Kroger Frozen Lasagna
Rating:
8.5/10
Sporks
Best Kroger Red Wine Vinegar
Rating:
8/10
Sporks
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