Costco's Frozen Shrimp Fried Rice Has Instagram Divided

Food names don't get much more straightforward than "shrimp fried rice." Those three words give away the whole game, at least in theory. If you order it from a restaurant, you might not know the exact oil used to fry it or every vegetable joining the shrimp in that mix of seafood, seasoning, and those pellet-shaped parcels of starch we call rice. But you might have a general idea. And if you've ever tried out our recipe for fried rice prepared in an instant pot, you might expect to find eggs, soy sauce, garlic, peas, carrots, and other familiar ingredients someone might normally cook with at home. And really, you can select whatever veggies you want and try to buy shrimp sourced from a location you trust when you get all the ingredients yourself.

However, a third option is the sometimes shaky middle ground between restaurant-made and wholly homemade meals: buying a frozen grocery store option and cooking-slash-modifying it. There's less choice, but let's face it – sometimes you just don't want to or don't have time to do all the food prep. Enter Costco. When Instagrammer, @costcobuys noticed Hanoomul's Shrimp Fried Rice with a price tag of $16.79 for seven 10-ounce packets, they decided to share the find with Costco fans. The post sparked division among people on the page, some of whom were not happy about what went into this premade shrimp dish.