Every Trader Joe's Pasta Sauce, Ranked Worst To Best

Say what you will about Trader Joe's, but at the very least, we must admit that this national grocery chain keeps things fresh. TJ's swaps out products often, with a goal of trying out new flavor combos for the more adventurous eaters; in 2023, some of the store's Frankenstein-esque new products included Hot Cocoa Cream Cheese and Pizza Sprinkles. For that reason, it's hard to pin down the exact list of TJ's pasta sauces, which rotate seasonally and sometimes at complete random — Olive and Basil Pesto Sauce is on its way back soon, according to our local TJ's shelves.

Right now, though, there are 17 different TJ's sauces on the shelves. You've got your marinaras, which are purely tomato-based, then you've got cream-based sauces, like alfredos. There are also a few fancier jars that combine cream and tomato. Then, of course, you also have the more ambitious stragglers, flavors that may not even be classified as a pasta sauce.

The sauces on this list have been evaluated according to three criteria: taste, originality, and how much we would want to actually eat a bowl of pasta covered in it. You'd be surprised — because TJ's plays it fast and loose with the flavor combos, several of these "pasta" sauces would actually go better with some other starchy good, like on pizza, bruschetta, or crackers. Regardless, here's what we found out when testing all 17 jars; act quickly and snag these flavors before they're rotated!

A typical marinara sauce is made with tomatoes that have been pureed, garlic, onion, and a mix of spices, which often include basil, oregano, and parsley. Currently, Trader Joe's has four marinara options on offer, two of which are organic. Surprisingly, despite being similarly basic, they all have very different tastes. This one, the Organic Low-Fat Tomato Basil Marinara, ranks the lowest of them all.

We actively disliked this pasta sauce, which was surprising because it's organic, low-fat, and also incredibly basic. Unfortunately, the sauce just didn't taste right. The basil in it was clearly dried, and there was too much of it. The sauce is also watery because it's low-fat, and it really doesn't come together. We assumed this one would be in the middle of the pack, but unfortunately, we cannot recommend the Organic Tomato Basil Marinara.

Next up, we have the Organic Low-Fat Marinara Sauce, the plainest option in an already plain category. Simply put, this was a very, very bland marinara sauce, although the lack of emphasis on additional spices saved this jar from actively tasting bad. It did taste like marinara, but there's not much else for us to say about it.

This marinara would definitely be elevated in the context of other ingredients, so if you need a solid base for a recipe that involves added chicken and ample veggies, or you want a simple dipping sauce for homemade mozzarella sticks, by all means, buy a jar; unfortunately, in its resting state, the Organic Low-Fat Marinara sauce is better for a child's palate than for an adult's.

Cacio e pepe is an Italian classic made with grated cheese and pepper — "cacio" and "pepe," respectively. In part, this dish became a classic because it's extremely easy to make: The only ingredients you'd need to buy are those in the name of the dish, along with some pasta and pasta water, which transforms the cheese into a silky, delicious sauce. 

We had high hopes for the Trader Joe's Cacio e Pepe Pasta Sauce, but they were let down. Instead of the creamy Italian flavors we expected, this sauce tasted like mac and cheese, in a synthetic, straight-from-the-packet way — it was almost like eating knockoff Annie's. (Perhaps that has something to do with the fact that this rendition of cacio e pepe contains sunflower seed oil, modified cornstarch, sodium citrate, and xanthan gum, none of which the Romans would have approved.) While this sauce wasn't unpleasant, it still tasted very different from a traditional cacio, and for that, it falls in the ranks. You're definitely better off making your own cacio e pepe from scratch — it's really not that hard! 

At this point in the list, we're crossing over to sauces that we would definitely eat again if they were offered to us. The first of those options is the Creamy Tomato Basil Sauce, one of the biggest jars in the collection, with a charmingly rustic label that seems to have been designed separately from the rest of the sauces.

The Creamy Tomato Basil sauce is perfectly fine. It reminded us of the type of pasta you'd be able to get at your college dining hall or at a museum cafeteria — something that is absolutely edible but devoid of all personality and flair. It tasted quite literally like a combination of the alfredo sauce and the tomato basil sauce, which it very well could be. This is the worst of the options that combine cream and tomato — the rest of them reign over the top of the chart, but this one struggles far behind. Very, very run-of-the-mill.

Like many popular Italian-American dishes, alfredo sauce is far from in high demand in the motherland. Italians often sneer at the idea of adding more ingredients than are strictly necessary to make a dish, and a traditional American-style alfredo combines parm with both heavy cream and butter, which makes the sauce a whole lot thicker than Italians are used to.

The Trader Joe's rendition of alfredo sauce was exactly what you'd expect — not a disappointment, but nothing to write home about. It's very thick, which means it would probably be best to cut it with a little pasta water so as to give your taste buds a break. This recipe adds Romano cheese and modified egg yolk to the mix and season the cheese sauce with roasted garlic puree, onion powder, and the slightest hint of nutmeg. It would be great with some broccoli, chicken, and spices added, but we simply can't imagine having a whole plate of pasta with just alfredo.

With all that said about the Roasted Red Pepper Pesto, if you're just going to go for one red pepper sauce, choose the Spicy Chunky Tomato & Pepper Pasta Sauce instead. Spicy sauces like this one are hard to come by on Trader Joe's shelves, which usually err on the side of accessible. The spice here comes from a mix of harissa, paprika, cumin, cayenne, garlic, black pepper, and coriander, and it makes for a marvelous, low-level heat.

This sauce tasted great. We loved the chunkiness (such a well-named sauce!) of the peeled, whole San Marzano tomatoes. It's quite possibly also the base for TJ's pre-made shakshuka, and we're not mad about it — we'd gladly slice up some more red pepper, get it sizzling, knock half the jar of this sauce into the pan, and then crack an egg over the whole thing!

Now, we're passing into the golden zone of this list — i.e., the sauces that we actively would buy again and consume with gusto. The first of these is the Bolognese-style Tomato & Beef Pasta Sauce. Bolognese-style sauce originated in Bologna, a city in the north of Italy where cold winter conditions influenced the Bolognesi people to include meat in as many dishes as possible in order to keep themselves warm.

The meat in this Bolognese knockoff is ground up very finely, so it's almost imperceptible. The taste, though, is strong — in fact, according to TJ's, the company has gone through several iterations of this sauce, and in the newest version, the meat content has been pushed up from 6%, which is industry standard for meat sauce, to 9%. The difference is palpable. As part of this change, the brand has also sourced different tomatoes imported from Italy. Altogether, we found the sauce to be a little sweet — we salted our pasta to counteract it — but we still loved the Bolognese.

Number two on the list has to go to the Three Cheese Pomodoro Pasta Sauce. The three cheeses in question here are Pecorino Romano, Parmesan, and Asiago, which isn't included in pasta sauces as often as the other two — it's only produced in the Veneto and Trentino regions of Italy and is a little more pliable than the other two, with a nuttier, almost yeasty flavor.

You can taste the cheeses in this sauce, and it really works. This sauce works really well on top of ravioli if you want to max out on how many different cheeses you can possibly consume in one bit; it also goes great with some sauteed mushrooms and longer pasta shapes like spaghetti or linguine. No matter how you decide to dress it up, this sauce is super tasty, and we can't get enough of it.