The Worst Prepared Food At Trader Joe's Is Not What The Label Promises

A poorly worded label on a tub of prepared food can leave you feeling hoodwinked when you open it and find that the content doesn't match the info on the packaging. And while most brand's do their utmost to display the heart of a product in its descriptive name, they can occasionally fall short of encompassing its most forward flavors. Unfortunately, this is the case with Trader Joe's lemon herb macaroni salad, which we found to be less lemon-y than overpoweringly briny in our taste test.

The worst product in our list of 13 Trader Joe's prepared foods, ranked, we could smell the vinegary dressing in the mac salad as soon as we lifted the lid. On first bite, the most overwhelming flavor came from the dill relish in the recipe, which also features other sour ingredients such as pickled capers and tangy buttermilk. The lemon promised on the label was in hanging around in the background, in the form of lemon juice brine and zest, but it was definitely the piquancy of the other acidic flavors which took center stage. While it's perfectly acceptable to pair a mac salad with relish, these tangy flavors simply don't mirror the product's "lemon herb" name. In fact, it would be better off labeled as a dill pickle mac salad. The relish did, however, lend the softness of the elbow pasta some textural crunch and we could taste the dill in the dressing (there's also supposed to be parsley in there somewhere).

On the positive, Trader Joe's lemon herb macaroni salad had a good ratio of noodles to dressing. Made with a combination of mayo and buttermilk, it's supposed to be lighter than a classic mac salad recipe that traditionally features solely mayo. There's also cucumber and celery flecked through the dressing, which gives the tang of the finished dish some vegetal bite.

However, if it's a prepared salad you're looking for then we'd recommend selecting the number one item in our ranking, the Waldorf salad, instead. Full of delightful crunch from the apples and walnuts, this salad comes with an incredible brown sugar maple dressing. The chicken provides plenty of satisfying protein and the grapes lend the leafy greens some moisture and sweetness. Having said that, bear in mind that a green salad will eventually wilt once dressed, whereas a mac salad will retain its structural integrity for longer, making it a safer bet for picnics and cook outs where dishes are kept out for longer and served family style. In that case, Trader Joe's Mediterranean orzo salad is an acceptable alternative to its mac salad, which ranked at No. 10 in our taste test.