What Exactly Comes In Aldi's Frozen Seafood Boil Bags?

By combining mussels, shrimp, clams, and crabs, seafood boils are so much fun to enjoy with friends. Simply simmer all your ingredients together in a spiced broth before tumbling them directly onto your dining table so everyone can dig in at their leisure. The only problem is the finicky work of cleaning your seafood and chopping your veggies. Luckily, you can avoid all that hassle by buying Aldi's frozen seafood boil bag, which contains everything you need to make an entire meal in one handy package.

Aldi's seafood boil features a solid range of the typical ingredients that are commonly found in this popular Louisiana dish, including shrimp, corn on the cob, mussels, red skin potatoes, and Andouille sausage. It also contains a cajun seasoning packet, which means you don't need to add any herbs or spices from your own pantry.

However, unlike a classic seafood boil, in which the ingredients are added to the pot in staggered shifts to account for their different cooking times, Aldi's pre-prepped offering is cooked together all at once. According to the cooking instructions, you'll need to bring two quarts of water to the boil in a large pot before adding in the seafood, sausage, and veggies. Next, you'll sprinkle in half of the seasoning packet and cook for 5-6 minutes before draining the broth in a colander. At this stage you can taste your seafood boil and add more seasoning if preferred.

While Aldi's seafood boil is super-convenient, some customers have gripes with the mussel shells, explaining that they break into small, annoying pieces during cooking. One commenter on a Reddit thread wrote, "I don't like the fact that there are little bits of hard mussel shell. I want to eat my food without all of these obstacles," whereas another added, "It's like having eggshells in your scrambled eggs". 

Some commenters had complaints with the saltiness of the final dish; however, this could easily be rectified by adding less of the seasoning packet, which contains spices like celery and paprika (there's no mention of the other specific spices used in the mixture, however Cajun seasoning typically includes cayenne pepper and onion powder, too). Alternatively, you could balance out the salinity of the broth by tossing in a few extras like crawfish and boiled eggs, or a couple more potatoes, but this defeats the purpose of the bag's convenient nature.

Seafood boils are usually accompanied with a buttery sauce that combines some of the cooking broth the seafood is simmered in with melted butter, chopped garlic, and herbs. Having said that, you can omit the dipping sauce completely if preferred, or serve your seafood and sausage with a hunk of homemade garlic bread.