One thing we picked up on a recent Costco visit was a package of fajitas de pollo by Del Real. They were $12.99*, which felt like a lot for a single packaged meal when shopping at Costco, but compared to the price of ordering something similar for delivery or the time cost of making it yourself, it really isn't so bad. Note though that it doesn't come with any of the usual restaurant fajita accompaniments, like tortillas or rice or beans or toppings, so tack on another dollar or so for those if you're pricing it out. Inside the box, there's a packet of chicken, one with vegetables, and a third with sauce (which they mark optional in the instructions, probably because it has a fair bit of spice thanks to serrano peppers and chipotle peppers in adobo). You can cook it on the stovetop (the recommended option) or in the microwave, and both take about the same amount of time, around 10 minutes.
* I wrote the majority of this post after we tried the fajitas the first time, and since then, we've made two other visits to Costco, buying three more boxes of fajitas. Part of the reason we picked up two on our last visit though was because they were only $7.97, which is good because less expensive, but bad because the 97 cents plus the star on the price tag meant they were being discontinued. The last visit wasn't at our usual Costco, so we are hoping, hoping, hoping that they are not being discontinued everywhere and only at that Costco.
We weren't sure how we would feel about this ready-to-cook fajita kit, but we were really happy with the results. Sometimes when you get pre-made food like this, it tastes highly processed, but this didn't. This tasted like you made it from scratch in your own kitchen, probably because there isn't a whole lot of excess stuff added in. It's one of those products that passes the "you can recognize and pronounce all the ingredients" test. The chicken is just strips of grilled chicken breast in a marinade that includes pineapple juice, chipotle adobado, orange juice, brown sugar, key lime juice, garlic, and spices, the vegetables (onions and green and red bell peppers) are just seasoned with salt, garlic, and some spices, and the sauce is just roasted tomatoes, serrano peppers, more chipotle adobado, green onions, onions, cilantro, and garlic. Would take some time to put together from scratch at home, but these pre-mixed packets completely worked to deliver the same result. It also didn't taste as buttery or greasy as restaurant fajitas sometimes can.
Comparing the finished product to the picture on the box, it looked pretty similar other than the fact that the box picture had grill marks on the chicken. Not such a big deal in terms of taste. We were pretty impressed by the quality of the product here and would definitely do this again (for as long as Costco's inventory will allow us to!). They don't expire immediately or within a week after purchase either (at least ours didn't), so it's an easy thing to toss into the fridge for a day when you really don't feel like cooking and don't want to spend a lot on yet another delivery order. Del Real also made a carnitas kit that I tried during the Cinco de Mayo sampling, but it wasn't nearly as good as this fajitas kit in my opinion. (Kind of hard to believe they came from the same company, to be honest.) Hoping we can make fajitas for a while!
