Every few months, the internet rediscovers Trader Joe's seasoning blends and loses its collective mind — and honestly, I understand why. Right now, a ranking of 15 of their blends is making the rounds, and my inbox is full of people asking me which ones are actually worth buying. So let me save you the trip down a rabbit hole and tell you what I know after years of cooking with these things.

I've probably gone through more little Trader Joe's spice jars than I care to admit. Some of them live permanently on my counter. Some are buried in the back of my cabinet, opened once, never touched again. Here are the 7 that genuinely earn their shelf space — and why.

1. Everything But the Bagel Sesame Seasoning Blend

If you've cooked with this even once, you already know it deserves the top spot. It's sesame seeds, poppy seeds, dried garlic, dried onion, and salt — and together they create something that tastes like the best part of a New York bagel, distilled into a tiny shaker jar.

I've made this maybe forty times in the last three years. On avocado toast, on soft-boiled eggs, pressed into cream cheese, crusted onto salmon before a quick sear. My friend Marguerite, who is the most skeptical person I know when it comes to food trends, called me after I brought a loaf of homemade focaccia topped with it to her dinner party. She said, "Okay. I get it now." That's the Everything But the Bagel effect.

The thing is, it's not just the flavor — it's the texture. That crunch it adds to something as simple as a fried egg at 7am is the difference between a meal you eat and a meal you actually enjoy.

2. Chili Lime Seasoning Blend

This one is criminally underrated in most rankings I've seen, and I will die on this hill. It's tangy, it's got heat that builds slowly rather than punching you in the face, and the citrus note is bright without being fake. It tastes like something you'd get at a good street taco stand, not a grocery store spice aisle.

I use it on corn — roasted or grilled, doesn't matter — and it transforms into something you'd pay twelve dollars for at a restaurant. Toss it on watermelon with a little flaky salt and you have a summer snack that makes people stare at you like you're a genius. You're not a genius. You just went to Trader Joe's.

And honestly, this is the one I reach for when I want to make something feel more alive without doing any actual work. Roasted chickpeas. Sheet pan shrimp. A bowl of popcorn at 10pm. It does the heavy lifting for you.

3. Umami Seasoning Blend

This jar — mushroom powder, tomato flakes, porcini, nutritional yeast, and a few other things I can never fully identify — is what I add when something tastes flat and I can't figure out why. It doesn't taste like mushrooms. It doesn't taste like anything specific. It just makes everything taste more like itself, which is the whole point of umami.

I learned about umami properly when I was twenty-four, living in a tiny apartment in Chicago, cooking my way through a Japanese cookbook I'd found at a used bookstore on Wicker Park. Before that, I thought it was a buzzword. After that, I understood it as the thing your food is missing when it tastes almost right but not quite.

Stir it into butter before you finish a pasta. Add it to a burger mix. Dust it over roasted mushrooms — yes, more mushrooms — and watch them become something that tastes like they've been slow-cooked for hours. It costs $2.99. It's absurd that it costs $2.99.

4. Green Goddess Seasoning Blend

I know, I know. Green Goddess had its cultural moment a couple years ago and everyone is slightly tired of hearing about it. But this dry blend — tarragon, chives, parsley, lemon peel — is something different from the dressing that took over TikTok. It's subtler, more herby, more versatile than its viral cousin.

You're going to want to use this on roasted vegetables, specifically on anything that benefits from a bright, almost grassy note. Zucchini. Green beans. Asparagus in the spring. Mix it into Greek yogurt with a squeeze of lemon and you have a dip that tastes like you spent thirty minutes making it instead of thirty seconds.

The tarragon is the key. It's a slightly anise-forward herb that most people don't cook with enough, and it makes this blend taste elegant in a way that surprises people. I served it on roasted carrots at Thanksgiving two years ago and my aunt asked if I'd taken a cooking class. I had not.

5. Elote Seasoning Blend

If the Chili Lime blend is the street taco stand, this one is the elote cart outside a summer concert — cotija-flavored, slightly smoky, with a warmth that doesn't quit. It's inspired by Mexican street corn, and it delivers on that promise in a way that makes me genuinely happy every time I open the jar.

I've made this maybe twenty-five times in different applications. On actual corn, obviously — roast your ears at 425°F for about 20 minutes until the kernels start to char at the edges, then hit them with this and a little mayonnaise and lime juice. But also: on popcorn, on roasted potatoes, stirred into sour cream for a quick dip, mixed into cornbread batter.

The thing is, it has a slight sweetness that balances the heat, and that balance is what makes it work in so many places. It doesn't overwhelm. It just makes you want another bite.

6. 21 Seasoning Salute

This is the oldest, most quietly beloved blend in the Trader Joe's lineup, and it's the one my mother has been buying since I was in high school. It's a salt-free blend of 21 herbs and spices — thyme, basil, oregano, black pepper, marjoram, bay leaf, and a dozen others — and it smells like a Mediterranean herb garden that someone lit on fire in the best possible way.

Because it has no salt, you control the seasoning entirely, which makes it more versatile than most of the blends on this list. Rub it on a whole chicken with olive oil and let it sit in the fridge overnight before roasting at 400°F for an hour and fifteen minutes. What comes out will taste like something from a trattoria you visited once in Florence and have been trying to recreate ever since.

My mother keeps a jar of this on her stove. She's been doing it for fifteen years. Some things are classic for a reason, and this is one of them. If you're new to the Trader Joe's spice section and you only buy one thing today, make it this.

7. Mushroom and Company Multipurpose Umami Seasoning

Yes, there are two umami-forward blends on this list. No, I'm not sorry. This one is different from the Umami Seasoning Blend in a specific, important way: it's saltier, more savory, and it has a deeper, earthier mushroom flavor that you can actually taste rather than just feel.

This is the one I reach for when I'm finishing a braise, or when I want to add depth to a soup that's been simmering for an hour and still tastes thin. A half-teaspoon stirred into a pot of lentil soup ten minutes before it's done will make it taste like it cooked all day. You're going to want to do this step slowly — taste as you go, because it's salty and a little goes a long way.

It also makes an extraordinary dry rub for steak or portobello mushrooms if you're cooking for someone who doesn't eat meat. Mix it with a little olive oil, press it into the surface, and let it sit for 20 minutes before hitting a screaming hot pan. The crust that forms smells like a steakhouse and tastes like a reason to cook dinner on a Tuesday night.

The Bottom Line on Trader Joe's Seasoning Blends

The current ranking making the rounds online has some things right and some things wrong — which is how all rankings work, including this one. But what I can tell you is that these 7 blends are the ones that have earned permanent real estate in my kitchen, not because they're trendy, but because they make my food taste better with almost no effort.

If you've been curious about the cultural moment happening in grocery stores right now, Trader Joe's seasoning blends are a perfect entry point. And if you want to see what else is happening in the world of approachable, exciting cooking, check out the frambled egg trend — it pairs beautifully with half the blends on this list.

Food should feel like an invitation, not an obligation. These little jars — most of them under four dollars — are one of the easiest ways I know to make cooking feel like something you want to do instead of something you have to. That's not nothing. That's actually everything.