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    Sound the Klaxons

    Trader Joe's Speculoos cookie butter shortage plagues nation

    Teresa Gubbins
    Apr 26, 2013 | 9:01 am

    In a disappearance whose urgency ranks right up there with Waldo and the Lindbergh baby, the nation is currently facing a shortage of Speculoos, the addictive, spicy cookie butter sold by Trader Joe's.

     

    Speculoos has been out of stock at Trader Joe's across the country for more than a month, and there's no immediate sign of relief, according to an employee at the Trader Joe's in Plano.

     

    "We've been out for a while, and we're not supposed to get any until mid-May," he said. A staffer at a store in California confirmed the drought, saying that Trader Joe's in-house ordering system showed that the product was out of stock.

     

     

      Where to dip one's salty pretzel? How now to embellish an ordinary oatmeal cookie?

     
     

      Trader Joe's opened in Texas with what seemed like an infinite supply of the magical gingerbread-flavored spread. At the Plano store, one whole end-cap boasted a majestic mountain of meticulously arranged jars containing the tawny, craveable confit.

     

    Cookie butter's popularity was non pareil; it rocketed to the top of Trader Joe's annual "most popular products" list in 2012. Things were so good on the Speculoos scene that by 2013, Trader Joe's expanded the line and released a crunchy version of the smearable ambrosia. When it came to cookie butter, we felt like we were set for life.

     

    The unconscionable thing is that this isn't the first time Trader Joe's has run out of cookie butter. An employee at a store in Los Angeles recalled that the chain endured a similar Speculoos depletion in 2010.

     

    "After they first introduced it, there was a shortage and it was gone for a long time," she said. "Then they made a huge batch; it's made in Belgium, I think."

     

    Adding insult to injury is the mysterious way the story changes from store to store. A staffer at the Fort Worth store claimed that no Trader Joe's could requisition the captivating goo, that all stores placed their orders through the same system, and that she could see on the computer with her very own eyes that none was available.

     

    But stores in California and on the East Coast divulged that they were receiving limited allotments of the spreadable sweetness daily. A store outside Boston exulted in the fact that it was receiving a case every other day. A store in southern California gloated that it had received four cases – "but just the smooth, not the crunchy," said the Trader Joe's staffer gleefully.

     

    A pox on you, southern California Trader Joe's!

     

    Staffers had no advice for how customers should handle the cookie butter famine. What else to spread on a seeded rye cracker? Where to dip one's salty pretzel? How now to embellish an ordinary oatmeal cookie?

     

    Admittedly, an enterprising consumer could simply revert to the old-school (and ahem more nutritionally sound) peanut butter, or buy Speculoos' doppelganger Biscoff spread at Sprouts, or opt for an indulgent dab of gianduia. But that's missing the point. Peanut butter, Biscoff, Nutella — those items are readily available. This is something we cannot get.

     

    Also, there really is something special and uniquely spicy about Trader Joe's particular cookie butter recipe. The company buys its products from other companies and relabels them. Some have speculated that the Speculoos is made by a Danish company called Markant. But that is unavailable in the United States.

     

    Ooooh, sounds tasty.

    Jars of Speculoos cookie butter stacked on Trader Joe's shelves.

    Trader Joe's, Alabama Theater, cookie butter
      
    Photo by Joel Luks
    Jars of Speculoos cookie butter stacked on Trader Joe's shelves.
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    Chef Crime

    Dallas chef Kent Rathbun issues reward for his trusty stolen smoker

    Teresa Gubbins
    Jul 26, 2025 | 3:00 pm
    Kent Rathbun smoker
    Kent Rathbun
    Chef Kent Rathbun's missing smoker

    A revered smoker trailer belonging to Dallas chef Kent Rathbun was stolen, and Rathbun is determined to get it back.

    Rathbun is the Beard Award-nominated chef and restaurateur whose resume includes The Mansion on Turtle Creek, Abacus, Jasper's, and his current company Kent Rathbun Catering.

    The stolen smoker was kept inside a gated parking lot at Rathbun's catering kitchen, located near Irving Boulevard and Mockingbird Lane, in an industrial area west of I-35.

    Rathbun says it was stolen somewhere between July 17 and July 21. The police have been notified and there's an effort underway to locate security footage.

    "I was out of town — we didn't have a lot of catering at the time," Rathbun says. "One of our chefs found the gate open — it looked like it had been damaged. But it wasn't until I went to pick up the trailer on Monday July 21 that we realized it was gone."

    The smoker has a colorful backstory: Rathbun got it as a gift from Baxter Brinkmann, CEO and president of The Brinkmann Corporation, manufacturer of outdoor living products including gas and charcoal grills, smokers, and solar/low-voltage landscape lighting.

    "He gave me this rig as a bithday present on the day of my first Taste of NFL at Abacus," Rathbun says. "The first year that we did the Taste of NFL [the annual tailgate party to support the North Texas Food Bank], I asked Brinker if he would supply smokers and grills for all the celebrity chefs coming in from around the country. I just needed a little grill but he offered the use of this 18-foot-long outfitted smoker."

    "He came to the party, and we were standing by it, appreciating how well it worked when somebody walked up and said 'happy birthday, chef'," Rathbun says. "Baxter said, 'It's your birthday? I want you to have the smoker. And as long as you keep my name on it, I will repair it, fix it, my team will take care of it.' He was like the team captain."

    That was in 2001 and over the years, the rig has received more than its share of custom upgrades, including metal laser-cut ID tags with "Chef Kent Rathbun" affixed to every door.

    "It is so personalized that I can walk up to that trailer and will be able to recognize it, no matter what modifications may be made," Rathbun says.

    That's also why he feels certain the theft is not an inside job, as some have suggested. "Anyone on our team knows what a distinctive smoker it is," he says.

    While not a secret, the location of his catering company is not open to the public and not generally well known. Someone driving by the location could have spotted the trailer in the parking lot, but it's on an industrial side street that does not draw a lot of random motorists. The trailer would have also required a truck to pull it.

    "The thing is 18 feet long, it's giant," he says. "It's not a toy, it's a tool, and we need it to stay in business."

    Rathbun posted a plea on social media offering a $1,000 reward — "and probably a good amount of barbecue," he says — to anyone who can provide information as to its whereabouts and was met with a wave of support, including offers to chip in $500 and even $1000 to the reward pool which is now at $8,500. (You can call Rathbun at 214-704-0907 with tips.)

    "Whether I get the trailer back or not, I've been overwhelmed by how many people have stepped up and offered their support," he says.

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