Trader Joe's/Whole Foods Market

[ridenread]

If you are a coffee drinker Trader Joe's also has some really awesome whole bean coffee. We stock up on large cans of dark roast whenever we go

[Pedal Wench]

My favorite TJ item: Flattened Bananas. It's like banana jerky - thinly sliced lengthwise, then dehydrated. Yum! Kinda chewy - like raisins - and intensely banana-y.

[GLC1968]

Hmmm, I like Whole Foods 100% better than TJ's. Maybe my local TJ's sucks compared to others...but they had lousy and expensive produce and 98% of their products were prepared items or snack foods. I wanted to buy basics or speciality items for making my own things and they carried none of it (like no rye flour!).

If you like convenince foods, you'll love it. They have rows upon rows of prepared frozen foods to chose from... If you would rather make your own from scratch, head for Whole Foods instead.

Our TJ's doesn't even have a very good wine section and I thought they were supposed to be known for good, inexpensive wines!

[Cataboo]

I guess it depends on what you go for. Whole foods does have a nice bulk section.

I tend to either get my produce at Costco, farmer's markets, or at Korean grocery stores. Usually nothing can beat the selection & prices on the latter. Costco's great if you want 5 lbs of organic spinach for $5.

Whole foods has a ton of packaged prepared foods as well.

I hven't noticed a problem when looking for ingredients from scratch at Trader joe's, but I don't live near one, so I really just pop in when I get a change and buy a bunch of the dried fruit.

[ny biker]

I haven't been to a Whole Foods in a long time, and I've never shopped there regularly, but I think they are bigger than TJ's and carry a wider variety of products.

I like the whole wheat cinnamon British muffins at Trader Joe's. And some of the fresh soups in their refrigerator case. I used to like the pizza bagels, but they don't seem to carry them anymore.

[Biciclista]

At Whole foods you have to be careful or you will spend a lot of money, very true. But you don't HAVE to buy all the expensive stuff, it's just there, the fancy chocolates and cheese, the prepared foods with fancy names, truffles, whatever; you name it. They also carry an incredible amount of gorgeous fresh fruit and veggies and if there's something special you like and have trouble finding elsewhere; they probably have it.

Trader Joe's on the other hand has a much smaller selection of everything
and is def. more working class.
They have a great frozen foods department.

both stores are great for chocolate.

[ny biker]

And at Trader Joe's, they wear Hawaiian shirts.