The Award-Winning Trader Joe's Snack That's Been A Mainstay Since The '90s

Trader Joe's is famous for a lot of good things: Free stickers, adorable mini tote bags, and a fabulous variety of fall items, to name a few. But it is also known for regularly discontinuing products and, in doing so, breaking the hearts of niche product superfans. While this means it always has space for a steady stream of new items, it can be devastating when your favorite item disappears from the shelves. So if you don't want to commit to something that won't commit to you, try making your new fav Trader Joe's snack its Peanut Butter Filled Pretzel Nuggets — they've been around since 1992, and their decades-long prominence as a fan favorite makes it likely they'll stick around for another 30 years.

The concept of the peanut butter pretzel is a bite-sized masterpiece of juxtaposition, from crunchy to creamy and sweet to salty. Trader Joe's certainly isn't the only one to offer these — in fact, shoppers were up in arms when Coscto temporarily removed its peanut butter pretzels from shelves in the fall of 2023. But in addition to their award-winning flavor, Trader Joe's pretzel bites come in at only $2.49 a bag — making them a temptingly cheap pantry staple perfect for kids lunchboxes, an afternoon snack, and more.

Introduced at Trader Joe's in 1992, the peanut butter pretzels were inducted into the Trader Joe's Product Hall of Fame in early 2023 after winning (several times) 'Best Snack' in the annual Trader Joe's Customer Choice awards. But in between, the pretzels had a bit of a rocky road. 

According to an NPR article, the grocery chain was sued by Maxim Marketing in 2014 when Trader Joe's began buying pretzels directly from manufacturer ConAgra rather than using Maxim as a middleman, as had previously been done. The conclusion of the case wasn't widely reported on, but the conversation around the pretzels led a man named Bruce Gutterman to ask for credit for inventing peanut butter pretzels in the first place. In the lawsuit, Maxim claimed to have invented the pretzels. The truth remains unclear, but NPR noted that this filled pretzel treat exists at all thanks to the wonders of modern manufacturing technology. Getting the pretzel/peanut butter mix just right to keep one crisp and the other creamy is not as easy as it seems — so count yourself lucky to live in a post-peanut butter pretzel-invention era.

If reading this made you hungry (same), and you're therefore imminently embarking on a Trader Joe's snack run, here are some other top-tier Trader Joe's snacks that Daily Meal recommends you toss in the basket along with your (high-tech) peanut butter pretzels.