The Best Trader Joe’s Products, According to Trader Joe’s Shoppers

It’s award season and you know what that means? No, I’m not talking about a wildly uncomfortable Golden Globes or a severely underwatched Emmys. I’m here for what really matters: Trader Joe’s Annual Customer Choice Awards. For the 15th year in a row, our beloved Trader Joe’s asked customers to tell them their favorite products. TJ’s collected and compiled this information to highlight the top five products across 10 categories: Beverage, Cheese, Produce, Bath, Body & Home, Appetizer, Breakfast & Brunch, Lunch & Dinner, Snack, and Overall Bests. Let’s break down the winners.

Trader Joe’s Top Beverages

Trader Joe’s fans seemed to lean more towards more punchy, fruity drinks with their seasonal Spiced Apple Cider taking the number one beverage spot. The only outlier to this trend was in the number five spot: their Non-Dairy Brown Sugar Flavored Oat Creamer (which just so happens to have made our best non-dairy creamer list as well!).

Trader Joe’s Top Cheeses

The fan favorite cheeses spanned across a wide range of cheese types, with one of our favorite goat cheeses, Chevre Goat Cheese, being the big cheese of the group. It’s worth mentioning another Sporked staff all time favorite, the Syrah Soaked Toscano Cheese Spread & Dip, came in as the second most popular cheese (though we can’t help but wish its hard cheese twin—our pick for the best TJ’s cheese—would’ve made it up there as well).

Trader Joe’s Top Produce

Trader Joe’s customers kept to the basics when choosing bananas as their favorite produce item, though one of the real stars was the inclusion of the “oh-so-delicious” Lemony Arugula Basil Complete Salad Kit, our personal favorite salad kit from Mr. Joe’s collection.

Trader Joe’s Top Appetizers

As for appetizers, the winners included some of yummiest and cheesiest goods TJ’s has to offer, like the Parmesan Pastry Pups, which we here at Sporked simply can’t get enough of, and the Creamy Spinach & Artichoke Dip, which was crowned most popular TJ’s appetizer.

Trader Joe’s Top Meals

Trader Joe’s consumers chose frozen hashbrowns as the best breakfast item, and TJ’s Butter Chicken with Basmati Rice as the best pick for lunch or dinner. While this is the first time it has been on the top of this list, it has remained in the top of our TJ’s Indian food ranking alongside their Chicken Tikka Masala, which came in as the second most popular lunch/dinner item.

Trader Joe’s Top Sweet Treat

Consumers deemed the Sublime Ice Sandwiches to be their favorite Sweet Treat—which we can’t argue with as it’s our number one ice cream sandwich.

Trader Joe’s Top Snack

And last, but certainly not least, Trader Joe’s consumers placed the Chili & Lime Flavored Rolled Corn Tortilla Chips as not only the most popular snack, but also the most popular overall product, a title it has received now for the second year in a row. While we will always go to bat for the Mee Krob Snackers, these rolled chips are still on our list of must-buy Trader Joe’s snacks. 

Now that the awards have been dished out, it’s time to take to social media to rant about the Super Seedy Cheese Bites that were obviously snubbed and run out to buy these treats before Trader Joe’s cruelly snatches them away. I’m still mourning the loss of the Ube Mochi Pancake mix. Don’t end up like me.