With an infant and toddler, leaving the house isn’t . . .fun.  The hardest part is just leaving the house.

We did manage to make a quick trip to Costco with the kids in tow. The baby slept the entire time and we entertained the toddler with samples.

This time we felt weak and bought the frozen doodads that tempted us before. Here are our thoughts:

Chicken Ramen Bowls
Around $16 for six

Preparation is easy. Just add water to the frozen bowls and microwave for four minutes. Somehow you will have bouncy ramen noodles and actually decent tasting chicken slices.

The flavor of the broth is very pleasant – savory, balanced with the right amount of sweetness to round it out.

A convenient win.

Kirkland Breaded Panko Shrimp
Around $20, often times on sale for a couple dollars off

We’ve long eyed Costco’s breaded frozen shrimp products but hadn’t splurged yet.

I read positive reviews about these panko shrimp so we added them to our cart.

We cooked the shrimp in our oven on the convection bake setting. They turned out super crispy.

The shrimp have a nice snappy texture and taste fresh. They’re especially good served with the Saint Elmo’s cocktail sauce below.

I will definitely purchase these again.

Saint Elmo’s Steakhouse Cocktail Sauce – Very Spicy
Around $9

We love cocktail sauce. It’s never spicy enough for us.

When I make it at home, it’s practically horseradish thinned out with a little ketchup.

This is the best cocktail sauce we’ve found, besides the one Jake’s mom makes. Hers is amazing. It’s even better than Manny’s which leans pretty heavy on the horseradish.

St. Elmo’s Steakhouse is a real restaurant in Indiana, open since 1902.

They also produce other sauces, seasonings and alcohol from the steakhouse for grocery stores such as steak sauce and steak seasoning.

A small dab of the cocktail sauce will make your nose burn.

Turns out the secret to their very spicy cocktail sauce is a shit-ton of horseradish. If you look at the ingredient list, it lists horseradish first.

Why didn’t I think of that?  Just because it’s a sauce doesn’t mean the first ingredient has to be a sauce.

When I make cocktail sauce at home I boasted a ratio of 50% horseradish to everything else. To think the whole time I could have just added 90% horseradish!

Trident Beer Battered Cod
Around $18

Meh.

The batter does have a floral fruity  note of beer. The cod tastes fine, not the freshest or most tender, but also not worst.

I wish the batter was crisper – maybe an air fryer would do that? It’s crisp enough but can tend to be a little gummy beneath the surface.

I liked the Trader Joe’s panko breaded cod a lot better.

Petite Cuisine Mozzarella Sticks
Around $15

God bless Costco for normalizing small households like us buying  approximately”82-92″ mozzarella sticks at one time. Like I said, this was our first Costco trip since we had our baby and we were feeling weak.

These are actually really good.

The breading is crispy and well seasoned and the cheese inside is stringy and flavorful. When you bite into the stick, the cheeese is almost juicy – must be the milk fat.

The best frozen version we’ve found so far.

Surviving the newborn stage, surviving this winter’s horrible plagues. Begging every god in the universe no one gets sick next. Watching a lot of TV. Life & Beth – fantastic, poignant, funny. Wednesday – entertaining AF. This Fool – Hilarious. Reboot – Also hilarious and hello, July Greer! Community – why didn’t I start this earlier?