Friday, March 16, 2018

Trader Joe's Thai yellow curry sauce contains no curry

Just sayin'.




4 comments:

Peter said...

"spices"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curry_powder#Ingredients

Ron said...

Well, yeah, but none of the defining constituents of curry are actually listed as an ingredient. And "spices" is less than 2% of the total, so under 6 grams. So there is *at most* a teaspoon of curry in that 11 oz bottle.

Unknown said...

Well, you're buying 11oz of sauce, not 11oz of curry powder. So the ingredients list, at least to me, looks fine.

But I believe I know what you're thinking, and I have two better examples, though from the last couple of years so I don't even remember brands, much less have pictures...

(Happening in Poland and regarding Asian foodstuffs)

1. Sesame seed oil

Plain cooking oil in Poland costs around 5 PLN / litre.
Actual roasted sesame seed oil is also available in more "upscale" places, for the price of... around 100 PLN / litre.

And then from time to time there pops up "Sesame seed oil" which is actually... 80% canola oil and 20% cold-pressed sesame seed oil. For the price of 10 PLN / litre.

Now if someone never had the actual sesame seed oil, getting this "twice as expensive and it says on the bottle it's sesame oil!" will result only in very sad faces and "I don't understand the sesame part, it doesn't even smell differently".

2. Wasabi vs Polish chrzan sauce

So horseradish sauces (called "chrzan") have always been popular here (and probably east of here too). You can get a decent jar for about 3 ~ 5 PLN.
Wasabi is indeed horseradish sauce too... but very importantly of the Japanese variety of the vegetable.

My dad loves chrzan and sometime after talking to me about "wasabi being even spicier" told me he got a jar of wasabi, and that it tasted worse and less spicy than the usual stuff. Just a bit greenish and more expensive.

Well, reading the label: 0.7% Japanese horseradish. I believe there was more % of the "natural colouring" to make it green.

The thing that bothers me the most about it is that people who never had the "real thing" will get these "homeopathic versions", never read the label, and thus rightfully conclude that "the other people are idiots/snobs and there is no difference between things".

So yes, reading labels is very much recommended, especially for "foreign" stuff.

Unknown said...

If you think that yellow curry should include 'curry' in ingredients, you probably should read more about what yellow curry is