Jazzing up Trader Joes

Trader Joe's does a good business on me and my room-mates. We all go ever other week or so to get staples and freezer meals for those night when you don't really have the time or motivation to cook. Between the 4 of us we have tried almost every dinner they offer. Items like mac and cheese or frozen pizza are always a good bet for a satisfying meal- but TJ's offers a much wider variety of frozen entrées for the more adventurous eater. While there have been some epic fails( succotash) there have also been some really yummy things. 
What I quickly realized about TJ food is it generally comes with a pretty good base flavour, but can lean towards the slightly bland side. A lot of these frozen dinner can be jazzed up into a really yummy meal pretty easily using things you almost always have around any ways. 

This is one of my best TJ finds to date. Simple roasted butternut squash risotto. It is warm and earthy which is what I am starting to crave at dinner as the temperatures in NYC drop! The first time I had it, I thought it was so-so, but quickly realized I knew what it was missing. Just a few simple additions catapulted this dinner from OK to awesome!

I follow the cooking directions on the bag. Another plus of this meal is it takes about 10 minutes to make! While the stock is thawing and mixing with the water I added a little salt and a generous amount of pepper. Once the rice and squash go in I added two small chucks of brie cheese. I also added a little more pepper as the ingredients were all mixing together! Once the risotto is ready I put it in a bowl and added a little grated parmigiana and a few drops a balsamic vinegar! The vinegar totaly makes the dish, it adds a whole different flavour profile and makes the sweetness of fall squash really come through! Over all I found this to be a huge success and it made me realize I could easily do this to a lot of TJ food. While nothing will ever compare to home-made, a few extra ingredients seem to go a long way!

Sorry this picture is so bad- the yellow bowl was not my best choice! This is the final product and honestly not only did this taste awesome, it looks pretty good too! It would be so good with some roasted brussels sprouts. So next time you are at the grocery store thinking that a frozen dinner looks OK remember you can fix it up and make it fantastic!