green tea

REVIEW: Trader Joe’s Matcha Joe Joe’s

/ seansskillet / 3 Comments

Green tea is one of the oldest, most comforting, soothing, and healthy warm drinks to seek out when needing a little caffeine or immunity boost. As traditional as the beverage is, that hasn’t stopped all types of innovative uses for the ground up matcha powder that packs a huge antioxidant and energy boost. Green tea ice cream? Awesome. Green tea lattes? Great. Green tea cake? Delicious. The ways in which we can use the grassy flavor knows almost no bounds, and in this day and age of limited-time insanity it’s time for an ultimately portable version of this earthy treat. I’ve always been fond of Trader Joe’s products but they really impressed the hell outta me with their Mocha Joe Joe’s earlier this year, and I’m looking at them to pave the way for the crunchy version of this tea-treat. Continuing their trend of beating Nabisco to the punch with innovative-yet-obvious flavors, they’re back in the drivers seat with Matcha Joe Joe’s, which pair a green tea matcha creme with crunchy vanilla wafer cookies.

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I’m not sure if it’s just the thickness of the wafers themselves, but Joe Joe’s just seem bigger than their big bro Oreo, and these cookies are simply pleasant to look at. Deep white vanilla wafers with lushly green creme make me excited to dig in, and the grassy tea notes waft with ease from the package.

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Biting in this cookie is everything I wanted it to be. A super snappy vanilla cookie gives way to immaculately balanced creme that is a textural delight. The filling is extremely smooth, soft, and creamy with an absolutely spot on balance of earthy matcha notes that don’t get bitter or astringent in the slightest. Green tea is front and center without any of the potential negatives that could pull this flavor down, delivering all the joy of green tea ice cream in a vessel that won’t melt in my pocket. The sweetness is perfectly executed with the vanilla cookie bringing just the right sugary punch to accentuate the matcha flavor without drowning it out, and finishes with a lovely buttery note that puts a lovely green ribbon on the whole experience.

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Once again TJ’s deliver an elevated, delicious, and fun Joe Joe that is just as crave-able as it is unique. The flavors are simple, straight forward, and just sweet enough to go wonderfully with a good cup of coffee, but not so much that they need the coffee to be enjoyed.

Rating: 9/10
Found at: Trader Joe’s ($2.99)

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REVIEW: Green Tea IT’S-IT Ice Cream Sandwich

/ seansskillet / 5 Comments

When thinking of the Bay Area many things come to mind.  The Grateful Dead, Metallica, giant stuffed burritos, fortune cookies, whimsical rainbow flags…but what about ice cream sandwiches?  For me, one of the greatest pieces of San Francisco history is the invention of the ice cream sando as we know it, thanks to George Whitney and his brilliant IT’S-IT, circa 1928.  For those unfamiliar with the creamy concoction, it combines a scoop of ice cream (originally vanilla), in between two oatmeal cookies dunked in chocolate, aka, it’s pure awesome-ness.  August 2016 saw the first new IT’S-IT in years with the debut of their seventh flavor – Green Tea.  It took me a little while to track one down but I made a visit to their factory in Burlingame and walked away a richer man.

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Green tea ice cream falls into one of two camps – awesome and true to the flavor of beautifully steeped tea, or, weird and overly sweet with a strange maple flavor.  Fortunately for IT’S-IT and all of us consuming their killer cream sandwiches, this matcha-based goodness falls into the first category and is a pure step back Steph Curry swish off the dribble.  It’s velvety smooth and fluffy with lovely natural grassy notes throughout – it really tastes just like a cup of perfectly steeped tea smooched with milk and sugar. Like most IT’S-IT ice cream flavors it’s not very sweet, which leaves room for the cookies and chocolate coating to do their job driving the sweetness.

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The cookies are soft and cinnamon-y with that lovely oatmeal texture that compliments the thin layer of dark chocolate perfectly.  One of the only problems with IT’S-IT’s is depending on how frozen they are or how long they’ve been sitting the cookies can sometimes get hard – not the case from this factory-fresh one at all.  Since most of the sweetness is coming from the cookies their spicy undertones and buttery cookie texture really pop against the subtle flavor of the green tea.  For those raisin haters out there that haven’t had an IT’S-IT before, have no fear, ain’t no dried grapes here.

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My favorite IT’S-IT flavors are the ones that provide the most contrast – vanilla, strawberry, and mint, and the green tea one falls right into that same category of a base flavor that stands on its own but blends seamlessly with the sandwich elements.  It’s a great addition to an already fantastic lineup of bay area classics that should be delicious to tea lovers and doubters alike.

Rating: 9/10