Trader Joe’s is well known for its frozen pizzas and flatbreads. But what you rarely see on a pizza/flatbread is seafood! What crazy person came up with a flatbread with shrimp on it?!?!? I hereby give you Trader Joe’s Shrimp and Garlic Flatbread! But you might be asking yourself do shrimp and cheese go together? Stick with me…
It’s not really cheese that you are looking at, although, at the end of the day, it sure looked like it. This pizza… I mean flatbread (oh so chichi) is really something called Frutti di Mare or Fruit of the Sea. In Italy, you will many times see pasta called Fruitti di Mare which is just a medley of seafood tossed with pasta and a sauce, usually a tomato based sauce but no reason why you can’t have a cheese sauce.
Actually, the sauce on this flatbread is called Bechamel which is one of the French “mother” sauces. It’s made from a roux and milk and a little nutmeg, but in the case of this Trader Joe’s Shrimp and Garlic Flatbread, they upped the game and made it a garlic butter bechamel. It looks like they added butter, garlic, pepper, chives, parsley, lemon, orange zest, and curry spices to the sauce.
How to Make Trader Joe’s Shrimp and Garlic Flatbread
First, pre-heat your oven to 375 F.
The hardest thing about making Trader Joe’s Shrimp and Garlic Flatbread is getting it out of the damn plastic wrapping. I almost sliced off a finger! That plastic is very tough. I would cut the pizza out of there with scissors instead of a sharp knife.
Once you get it out of the plastic, they say to put it on parchment or foil. I didn’t bother with that and just put it on a baking sheet.
You can see when you pull it out of the packaging it looks like a frozen, raw pizza. Which it is essentially. The dough and the shrimp definitely need to be cooked before you can consume.
I checked on the flatbread several times and right at 18 minutes I took it out because the shrimp was opaque the edges of the dough were turning brown and the sauce was bubbling. I let it sit for the recommended 1-2 minutes then I used a spatula to move it to a cutting board and used a pizza wheel to cut it into strips just like the box picture.
How Does Trader Joe’s Shrimp and Garlic Flatbread Taste?
As you can see from the nutritional information, the whole flatbread has about 420 calories which would be a light meal for me. I can see a couple of uses for this. Either you make it for an appetizer and cut it up into little squares or whatever OR you just eat it as a meal. Maybe with a side salad.
I didn’t have high expectations when I picked this up, to be honest. I can’t count the number of times I’ve bought something like this from Trader Joe’s and was disappointed in the outcome. I expected the crust to be too soft or thin and chewy the sauce to be weird and the shrimp to be rubbery. But none of that happened.
When I was making it, one of my kids wandered into the kitchen (do teenagers live in the kitchen and eat all the time?) and said it smelled like an Italian restaurant in here. The garlicky bechamel sauce really did fill the kitchen with a wonderful aroma.
I could see the crust getting darker and puffing up a bit when it baked. I think this flatbread was essentially all raw stuff and frozen for you to finish off at your house. Essentially like a frozen pizza from the store.
I took it out of the oven and let it rest for a few minutes and sliced as you see above. I have to say the shrimp was not rubbery and was cooked perfectly. The sauce, had a lot of flavor although I did not taste any of the curry spices that are in the ingredients list. I think the other herbs and garlic dominate the flavor profile.
What I thought turned out the best was the crust. It had a crunchy exterior and a slightly chewy interior, just as you would expect. The sauce was not runny at all and was very cheese-like. I really appreciated all the flavors coming together in concert.
This has to be one of the better frozen food items from Trader Joe’s I’ve had recently. I am going to give it a 9 Bell rating!
Ingredients
- FLATBREAD CRUST (UNBLEACHED ENRICHED FLOUR [WHEAT FLOUR, NIACIN, REDUCED IRON, ASCORBIC ACID {DOUGH CONDITIONER}, THIAMINE MONONITRATE, RIBOFLAVIN, ENZYMES, FOLIC ACID], WATER, CANOLA OIL, YEAST, CANE SUGAR, SALT, BAKING POWDER, MALTED WHEAT FLOUR, ENZYMES, ASCORBIC ACID {DOUGH CONDITIONER})
- SHRIMP (SHRIMP, SEA SALT)
- GARLIC BUTTER BECHAMEL SAUCE (MILK, WATER, UNBLEACHED ENRICHED FLOUR [WHEAT FLOUR, ENZYMES, NIACIN, REDUCED IRON, THIAMINE MONONITRATE, RIBOFLAVIN, FOLIC ACID], MUSHROOMS [MUSHROOMS, WATER, SALT, CITRIC ACID {TO PRESERVE}], BUTTER [CREAM, SALT], MINCED GARLIC, DRIED GARLIC, WHITE PEPPER, CHIVES, PARSLEY FLAKES, SALT, SUGAR, LEMON ZEST, ORANGE ZEST, NATURAL FLAVOR, ASCORBIC ACID [TO PRESERVE], CURRY POWDER [CORIANDER, FENUGREEK, TURMERIC, CELERY SEEDS, CUMIN, SALT, CAYENNE PEPPER, CARAWAY, GARLIC POWDER, CINNAMON])
- GRATED PARMESAN CHEESE (MILK, CHEESE CULTURE, SALT, MICROBIAL ENZYMES, CALCIUM CHLORIDE, CELLULOSE POWDER [ANTI-CAKING AGENT])
- PARSLEY.
- CONTAINS MILK, WHEAT, SHRIMP.
- MAY CONTAIN EGG, SOY, POLLOCK, SALMON, LOBSTER.
Excellent. If you like, add some more cheese & crushed pepper flakes. Will purchase again.
I tried it last night and agree the shrimp and crust were great, but found it bland. Unfortunately it was a miss for me–will stick with one of their other flatbreads.