Trader Joe’s rarely takes a breather in their new product introductions. If I don’t go in for a few weeks, I might miss its appearance on the New at Trader Joe’s shelves only to stumble on it in the regular rotation. This was the case with the new Trader Joe’s PB&J Milk Chocolate Bar . The bar is found at the check out stands, in my case, mixed in with the Speculoos Bars.
The bar is simply a milk chocolate bar with creamy peanut butter and tart raspberry jelly.
The bar is about 5 inches long and 1.25 inches wide. It’s a nicely sized portion, at 1.75 ounces though the calorie count is a bit high since it’s so fatty - 230 calories for the bar or if you’d like to compare it to others I’ve reviewed, it’s 160 calories per ounce.
There’s no statement about the origin or sourcing of the chocolate, but some of the ingredients are organic like the palm oil in the peanut butter filling and some of the sugar.
The bar looks very simple. There are six segments, each filled with a base of peanut butter and topped with a syrupy raspberry jelly.
The milk chocolate is quite dark and has a smoky flavor to it. It’s smooth and has an excellent silky melt and strong flavor of its own, however, the overriding scent of the bar is peanut butter. Once I bit into a segment, though, the raspberry flavors were far more evident. The whole thing really was like a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.
The peanut butter is smooth, it has a dark roasted flavor with a hint of bitterness to it. There’s also a fair bit of salt, 60 mg for the whole bar, considering how much actual peanut butter is in there, I feel like it’s a lot but not over-salted.The jelly itself is a little runny. The best effect for the bar is to bite the segments, to get the smell of the berries, but that just makes the goo run. The raspberry is smooth, not at all grainy, it’s sweet but has a tartness to it. There are no seeds, but the flavor of the seeds, that woodsy green note is there.
For a buck, it’s a great bar. It’s different from anything else you can get in this price range and the ingredients are top of the line. The profile is less sweet than most other candy bars, which is refreshing.
There are no preservatives or artificial colors/flavors. It contains milk, soy and peanuts and may contain traces of wheat, eggs and/or tree nuts. It’s Kosher and made in Canada.
Related Candies
- Annabelle’s Abba-Zaba Strawberry Peanut Butter
- Baron Milk Chocolate PB&Js
- Trader Joe’s Les Chocolats Belgique (Belgian Bars): Caramel, Chocolate Buttercream & Speculoos
- Trader Joe’s Dark Chocolate Peanut Butter Cups
- Madelaine Duets
- Trader Joe’s Classic Chocolate Bars
- Trader Joe’s PB & J Bar
Another one of those “made in Canada, but not actually sold in Canada” items! Joking aside, it’s nice to hear that this one is more reminiscent of an actual peanut butter & jelly sandwich. I’ve tried the Hammond’s PB&J bar but I found the chocolate to be much too sweet and the PB&J not that prominent. This one looks like it’s got some nice filling in there!
For a stripped down version with less fillers, check out Patric’s OMG PBJ (http://www.patric-chocolate.com/#!/~/product/category=3465448&id=15366767) . It is made with peanuts and chocolate and that’s all but because of the kind of chocolate he uses it tastes like it has jelly.
Or better yet, check out the even more stripped down PNG by A. Morin which is 100% chocolate, and that’s it, no peanuts or fruit or anything else, but I read it tastes like a nutella and jelly sandwich. (http://www.c-spot.com/chocolate-census/bars/bar/?pid=1810)
For an even MORE stripped down version, swallow air that is near a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. It does not contain chocolate, peanut butter, or jelly, but you can kind of smell it.
If you can get your hands on one, try Hagensborg Truffle Pig bars! They have a peanut butter and jam flavor that’s ah-mazing. All of their bars are yummy…I have to watch myself to make sure I don’t eat an entire bar in one go.
Well, for the MOST stripped down version, remove the under armor & pass gas from the lunchtime sandwich.
I recently purchased several of the Trader Joe brand candy bars. The Milk Chocolate PB&J (reviewed above) the Swiss Milk Chocolate, and the Carmel filled Milk Chocolate. With out a doubt the PB&J is more of a Dark/bitter chocolate. I’m more of a mild milk chocolate fan, therefore I would not have purchased this if it was labeled as such.
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