Shaw’s expands prepared meals section

By DON FOWLER
Posted 1/22/25

After weeks of rearranging their stores, Shaw’s has added a wide variety of prepared meals, including many cooked by their own chefs, giving Dave’s a run for their money.

While I …

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Shaw’s expands prepared meals section

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After weeks of rearranging their stores, Shaw’s has added a wide variety of prepared meals, including many cooked by their own chefs, giving Dave’s a run for their money.

While I have a long history of eating prepared foods dating back to those horrible TV dinners of the fifties, times have changed, and pre-cooked packaged meals are now found in supermarkets, pop-up stores, on-line and just about anywhere from fast-food joints to gourmet restaurants.

Judging from my positive experience with Dave’s American chop suey and salmon dinners and my recent tasting of a couple of Shaw’s meals, the prepared food industry has arrived.

Shaw’s added a Ready Meals section with lots of chicken and fish offerings. We found a winner: Grilled Shrimp with Vegetables ($7.99). There were at least a dozen and a half medium-size grilled shrimp with carrots, broccoli, snow peas and cauliflower perfectly seasoned and taking only three minutes to heat in the microwave.

There are three separate chicken stations. One has chicken fried three ways, letting you pick and box however many pieces you need. There is a sign suggesting that you do not sample the product. (Where would you put the bones?) Another area offers a variety of seasoned chicken wings. Good size and tasty.

The pre-packaged meals are still there. Stouffer’s, Bertolli, Chang’s and the dozens of other commercial products have their aisle but we’re going to try some more of the innovative store-prepared meals.

We did find one brand we loved: Margaritaville Shrimp Scampi ($7.99-on sale). Over a dozen shrimp coated in a delicious butter sauce. Directions suggest stove-top cooking. The sauce melts and covers the shrimp. The package shows them over spaghetti, but there is no pasta in the package. We boiled two packages of Ramen noodles and mixed in the shrimp and sauce. It was equal to a gourmet meal!

There are entire areas devoted to salads, sandwiches, meats and fish, with many prepared for heating up.

We may never cook again.

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