Shishito Peppers

This month, Trader Joe's debuted a new item in the produce section - shishito peppers! We were pretty excited to see those, since we love getting them in restaurants, and now we could try to make them at home on our own.

So excited to try these out!

The TJ's bag of peppers is 6 ounces and we ended up with 22 peppers in the bag. For $2.29, that's a pretty good deal compared to ordering them out, even at casual spots. For example, when we got them at the fast casual (closed) Satya, it was $3.95 for about half the amount of peppers (and we thought they were pretty overpriced for that number). Even adding in the olive oil and salt to this TJ's bag, the total is under $2.50.

22 rinsed peppers, ready to go

A lot of people toss the peppers into a heavy cast iron skillet with oil and then cook them until they are soft and blistered, at which point they get topped with salt and served. We opted for our grill pan with some olive oil and let them cook until they looked pretty blistered all over. We're not really sure how else people use shishito peppers, as we've only ever had them this way. Once they're grilled/sauteed, they make for a really great snack or side dish. Simple to make, no real prep involved, and even easier to eat.

Peppers blistering away in the grill pan

We love shishito peppers for their unique sweet taste, which Trader Joe's describes (on the bag) as a "grassy pepper flavor with sweet-hot citrus notes." That sounds about right (and is better than I could ever say it myself.) They also say 1 in 10 peppers is actually hot, but out of our 22, we didn't get any hot peppers, so I guess we were lucky. They were all just pretty tasty.

Finished shishito peppers with salt

Buy Again? Yes. Not really sure where else they sell shishito peppers around here so I can't do a good price comparison with other grocery stores, but this seems like a pretty decent price to us. Such an easy side dish and during the week, we're always looking for simple, yet healthy, shortcuts. This definitely works for us!