When it comes to frozen samosas, it’s really hard to compete against the Deep Indian Kitchen (previously Tandoor Chef) samosas, which are one of our favorite frozen foods. Even so, Trader Joe’s has some pretty tasty samosas in their lineup as well. We’ve tasted the Mini Vegetable Samosas already, and we thought they made for a delightful appetizer.
Today we’re checking out a non-vegetarian version of this treat, the Trader Joe’s Mini Chicken Tikka Samosas. We’re especially interested in these, because they’re one of the rare TJ’s Indian foods to get an okay rating from Search India, which tends to be quite picky about their Indian food.
These frozen samosas are easy enough to cook. Simply preheat your oven to 400 degrees fahrenheit, cover a baking sheet with some aluminum foil, then arrange the samosas on the sheet so they aren’t touching at all. Then just pop the whole thing into the oven for about 15 minutes. There’s no chutney or any sort of dipping sauce included, so you won’t have to worry about sauce-thawing at all. (You can read the full cooking instructions by checking out the package scans at the bottom of this review.)
The shells have a slightly greasy feel to them, as well as a flakey consistency. They’re just a little bit crispy, which we find to be quite satisfying. Inside the shells you’ll find some filling, made mostly of chicken, onions, and potato, but there’s also some garlic, ginger, and other spices mixed in. It’s quite a tasty combo.
As we mentioned earlier, there is no sauce or anything included with these samosas, but we think that’s fine here. Chutney fans will disagree with us, of course, but these have plenty of flavor on their own.
According to the box, this has about a 2/5 of a pepper spice rating, and the Trader Joe’s website rates this at a medium spice level. We find both of those descriptions to be a little vague, so let us give our personal opinion here. Now, keep in mind that we’re midwesterners, so our spice tolerance is much different than someone from India (or even the Southern United States). Still, we don’t find these to be terribly spicy. There is some spice to these samosas, and we had our sinuses start to clear by the time we finished eating these, but even “medium” seems like a bit of an exaggeration. These aren’t very spicy.
The serving size according to the package is two samosas, and our package contained a dozen of them. If you eat just two, you’ll be consuming 80 calories (30 from fat) and 100 mg of sodium. If you eat all twelve, that becomes 480 calories (180 from fat) and 600 mg of sodium. That’s actually not that bad, and it makes us feel less guilty for scarfing down the entire box in one sitting.
The Trader Joe’s Mini Chicken Tikka Samosas are a tasty snack. They’re not that filling, but they’re also designed to be an appetizer rather than a full-on meal. We think they’re quite good as an app!
To learn more about the nutrition content, ingredients, or cooking instructions for these frozen Trader Joe’s samosas, check out our package scans below.
Chicken samosas are very good served with TJ’s sweet chili sauce. The two together still would be at medium level spiceness. Bake another 1-2 mins if you want extra crispy bites. Yummo!