1:09 a.m.

Providence Journal / Bob Breidenbach
A new Trader Joe's market opened yesterday on Route 2 in Warwick (1000 Bald Hill Rd.). The California-based chain's private label promises "NO artificial flavors, colors or preservatives; NO MSG; and NO added Trans Fats."

If you're heading to the new Trader Joe's for the first time, what to look for? How can you make a list if you don't know what they offer?

Folks on the Web who live near other stores gather at food sites to trade favorites and recipes they've developed using TJ's house-brand and specialty items. One commenter described TJ's as "interesting food at no-name brand prices."

While all the same items may not be available here, the San Diego Yelp site ("Real people. Real reviews.) has a discussion, "What's the best items to buy at Trader Joe's?" Here's one list:

- gnocchi
- naan
- maple brown sugar mini shredded wheat
- milk, eggs, butter, cream
- frozen berries & fruit
- pad prik green beans, frozen
- balsamic roasted vegetables, frozen (these are so bloody good!)
- hummus
- buffalo burgers
- frozen pizza
- frozen haricot verts
- the TJ version of Soy Vey teriyaki sauce
- the packaged marinated meats
- sunflower millet bread
- yogurt
- Kashi crackers
- these little waffle cookie things with caramel inside
- parkerhouse rolls

The San Francisco branch has a similar discussion: Favorite frozen items at Trader Joes?

Serious Eats: Trader Joe's. What are your favorites from this store?

Some of the favorites don't stand alone. What to do with the specialty items? Lots of folks have contributed Recipes made with Trader Joe's products at Trader Joe's Fan, which also collects product reviews.

Chowhound, the online food community, has a forum called Your favorite recipes using Trader Joe's products.

The same site also has threads titled What to buy at Trader Joe's? and What products at Trader Joes to avoid? (From the first one, "it's pretty universally agreed that their produce can be iffy..")

Trader Joe's own Fearless Flyer describes new items and specials, but as I type it's still pointing to the October issue.

A couple of more ideas, from our post here in January, Trader Joe's: Can emails bring grocery chain to R.I.?

For more information, you might check out the ...reviews of the three Boston locations at Yelp .

All three come in at 4.5 out of 5 stars based on dozens of reviews. One reviewer described it as "Whole Foods but cheaper."
Browse the reviews:

-- Cambridge
-- Back Bay
-- Brookline

The Warwick store is open from 9 a.m. ­to 9 p.m. I haven't been there yet -- TJ's lends itself to the confusion of too much choice. I'm going to check out the recipes and try to make a minimal list before I head out.

Later: 10:59 a.m. In the Wall St. Journal today, Jeffrey Trachtenberg has a story (Trying to Cook Up a Hit: Could a self-published cookbook be a big holiday seller?) about the authors of Cooking with All Things Trader Joe's. It begins,

Two women who know their way around the aisles at Trader Joe's have borrowed the supermarket store's name and are making a splash with a cookbook that treats the retailer's offerings as a prep line for working moms who want to serve home-cooked meals.

Few self-published books amount to much commercially, but the authors say "Cooking with All Things Trader Joe's" has already sold 20,000 copies since its first printing in November 2007. Borders Group Inc. helped arrange for national distribution and stocks the title in nearly all of its 522 superstores.

Now the two authors (Deana Gunn and Wona Miniati), who met as undergraduates at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, have restocked another 50,000, of which they have shipped 15,000. They hope to strike it big this holiday season...

Hint...? There's a site to go along with the book, Cooking with All Things Trader Joe's. Deana Gunn blogs there, with recipes.

And...how long till TJ's puts a store on Providence's East Side?

Whole Foods maintains both a small and a giant store that are just 1.4 miles away from each other: The former Bread and Circus at 261 Waterman St., and a megastore in the former University Heights complex at 601 North Main St. At dinnertime this one turns into a buffet restaurant -- it even has a singles night on Wednesdays.

Wags say Whole Foods hangs onto the smaller store simply to keep TJ's out of it, but the always-packed parking lot on North Main suggests a need for an overflow location.

While it shares the lot with a McDonalds and Boston Market, the Waterman Street store is in sight of the independent East Side Marketplace (165 Pitman St.), a grocery store that once was the local IGA. It stocks conventional and specialty items, and -- a jab at its expensive neighbor -- its organic produce is priced the same as its conventional produce.