The Trader Joe's Frozen Pasta You Can Leave Off Of Your Shopping List

It's hard to talk about Trader Joe's without mentioning its frozen entrees. Mashed considers it one of the best grocery stores to buy frozen foods from due to its wide variety of options, including a large selection of pasta dishes. Still, despite how convenient these can be on nights when the idea of boiling a pot of water feels like too much work, there's one you shouldn't bother putting in your cart — the ricotta and spinach-filled ravioli, which fell in last place in Mashed's ranking of Trader Joe's frozen pasta.

Consistency, flavor, and originality were on our tasters' minds when they set out to rank 15 of T.J.'s frozen, Italian-style pasta dishes. Unfortunately, the ricotta and spinach-filled ravioli with tomato basil sauce failed in all three categories. After cooking the meal in the microwave according to the directions (which was how the entire field of pasta was prepared), our ranker found that the ravioli was overcooked and had an unpleasant, mushy texture. This was made even worse by a watery sauce that, while decent flavor-wise, didn't stick well to the pasta, leaving the meal wet and difficult to scoop.

However, the news isn't all bad. Our ranker praised this frozen pasta for being well filled. Nevertheless, this highlight ended up being a moot point, as they also found the filling to be bland, determining that a better version could easily be made at home.

Trader Joe's ricotta and spinach-filled ravioli may not have fared well in our ranking of frozen pasta from the grocery chain. However, shoppers haven't completely counted it out. Although some T.J.'s fans agree with our tasters' criticisms of the dish — namely that it's bland and watery — they've also found ways to give it some new life.

Seasonings, fresh herbs, and cheeses are a few simple ways that T.J.'s shoppers on Reddit like to improve this dish. For Reddit user u/EmbroideredTeatowel, Calabrian chili and Cento crushed tomatoes do the trick, while u/LivingHorror5468 shared that they like to doctor the pasta up with Italian sausage, fresh spinach, and cherry tomatoes. Additionally, some patrons have opted to ditch the frozen bricks of tomato basil sauce completely before cooking the dish and replace it with another — such as T.J.'s Italian Hot Pepper Bomba Sauce. You could even make your own basil pesto sauce to give the frozen entree a homemade feel.

That said, having to add ingredients can somewhat defeat the purpose of keeping frozen pastas on hand. If you want to stock your freezer with a frozen ravioli, you might be better off putting the grocer's mushroom ravioli on your shopping list, which came in second in our ranking of T.J.'s frozen pastas.