Tyrrell’s Sea Salt & Cider Vinegar

           Tyrrell’s Sea Salt & Cider Vinegar chips have been staring at me from their lofty perch on the store shelves for months since I installed myself in France, sniffing with disdain at my penny-pinching ways.  Each time I glared up at them, my eyes would go red with a mixture of envy and burning class resentment, as befits any proper English story.  The aristocratic Eton graduate (ahem, “English Eccentric”) on the cover, smiling drolly into his cup, is no doubt laughing at my peasant-like ways.

            A friend of mine, however, possessed the unthinkable fortunes necessary to set a bag out on the gaming table one evening, and I was forced to admit that the Tyrell’s chips every bit deserve their elevated price.  It’s as if the nobility were born with magical powers and super-human strength; these chips deserve to rule.

If Christopher Lee were
 the Prince of Wales, you can bet
the paparazzi would be afraid to
photograph him dressed up like a
servant of a totalitarian regime.
Hereditary monarchy would be a much
more persuasive political system if
aristocrats were all born more like
Count Dooku.

            The bag claims the chips are ‘hand cooked’, and the quality of the slices is so impressive, you can be damn well sure that a line full of orphaned children is carefully slicing them at the conveyor belt while Charles Dickens hovers in the background, taking notes for his next novel.  Unlike any other chip I’ve reviewed before, you can still see the brown potato skin rimming each individual round.  The crisps are extra-thick (up to 2 millimeters!), complexly shaped, vary from small to medium-large in size, and are utter delight to crunch.  The visual appeal is only further magnified by the abundance of salt crystals plainly visible on each slice.

But do you really appreciate them being
"hand cooked" when it's their hands
doing the cooking?

            This brings us to the seasoning, which is in a word, magnificent.  The English share with Americans a fondness for all things fried and battered, and these chips clearly draw some inspiration from the vinegar accompanying a traditional fish’n’chips ( 'fries' to use the American term).  The cider vinegar is sweet and pervasive, but a lot less acrid than other vinegar chips; it is complemented beautifully by the large salty crystals artfully sprinkled across each slice, which manage to deliver a piquantly brackish sea-sting that lingers tantalizingly on the tongue without overwhelming the chips as a whole.  (I’m very critical of overly salty chips, but these most definitely cannot be counted among their number.)  In other words, you can distinctly taste the potato, the vinegar, and the salt as separate phenomena with each bite, which makes for a delightfully pluralistic eating experience.  All the while, the blend of seasoning is carefully balanced between the poles of minimalism and excessive saturation.

Spirit Vinegar: the strongest variety
of vinegar (5-20% acid), traditionally
made out of sugar cane.  Also,
possibly, ectoplasm....

            The ingredients list is also so politically correct it should run for office: 100% natural ingredients, including 3 varieties of dried vinegar (cider, spirit (?), and malt), sea salt, apple powder, and rosemary extract.  But these are Tory chips, make no mistake, and properly represent those segments of the society that feel that the Magna Carta was one step too far towards the proletarian abyss.  That’s all right with me, though; chips this good deserve their exaggerated prices, and I must confess I can’t readily think of any American chips which are quite as classy as these- but that’s only proper.

Stars: 4/4

Spiciness Rating: None

Pros:

- Amazing thick-cut kettle cooked crisps that retain their brown potato skins on the edges

- Delightful sweet vinegar flavor which excites the tongue without stinging too much

- Flavorful salt crystals that deliver motes of savory sensation without dominating the flavor

- Natural ingredients, free of Gluten and MSG!

Cons:

- Price?

Pringles Xtreme Screamin’ Dill Pickle



There seems to be a remarkable
number of haters out there.
People be like 'I hate pickles
and these chips taste like goddamn
pickles!" and I be pitying the fools...

I’ve always been a fan of vinegar impregnated pygmy cucumbers, aka pickles.  However, in my youth I principally ate French cornichons- gherkins averaging only 3 inches in length and soaked in tarragon to produce an extra-crunchy hyper-vinegary experience.  The larger American standard, the dill pickle, uses medium sized cucumbers rather than gherkins, resulting in a ‘creamier’ inner texture.  Initially, I felt the American pickles were a little weaksauce in comparison to their miniaturized French cousins, but over time I’ve grown quite fond of them as a traditional accompaniment to deli sandwichs, and I’ve discovered not a few varieties that pack their own uniquely garlicky punch.

The French cornichon: about the size
of your pinky, but with twice the amount
of vinegar.

            My first encounter with some of Lay’s pickle-chips a few years earlier left me distinctly underwhelmed, so my expectations were guarded but hopeful when my partner returned from Christmas vacation in the United States with a tube of Pringle’s Xtreme ‘Screamin’ Dill Pickle’ chips.  In general, I think the Pringles Xtreme line has succeeded in creating the sort of strong flavorings I appreciate, though some of their products have proven more inspired than others.

The American Dill pickle, rather girthy
in the good sort of way.  Many of them
are even longer than this too...

            Screamin’ Dill Pickle chips, however, proved to be a vinegary torpedo blast completely deserving their hyperventilating title, and I immediately and irrevocably swooned to their considerable charms.  The super-sour vinegar flavor pervading each chip never failed to impress with its briny power, and it’s all tied together with an unmistakable aroma of dill seed that powerfully evokes the classic American sandwich spear.  I deliver this praise despite having never been a fan of dill seasoning, (spare me the dill havarti!), but here it so perfectly nails the flavor that it leaves me trembling with a thrill of homesick nostalgia.

Koolickles: pickles mixed with Cool-Aid,
apparently all the rage in the American
South, along with pork braised in Coca
Cola and the like.  I've never liked sweet
pickles, but I'd be lying if I didn't say
I was curious... 

             In short, these chips are a delight to eat and an inspired homage to the dill pickle, and I have little trouble recommending them to anybody who appreciates exotic chip flavors, vinegar, or phallic vegetables in a jar.  For now, I shall have to content myself with the slightly more piquant charms of French cornichons, (traditionally eaten with paté), but I have these to remind me of the larger (as usual) American variety.

Stars: 3½/4

Spiciness Rating: None

This French recipe involving cornichons
looks completely awesome!

Pros:

-          Flavor emulation at its best! Remarkably evocative of actual dill pickles.

-          Excellent and powerful sour vinegar flavor

-          Exquisitely subtle dill seasoning

Cons:

-          As for any Pringle, the quality of the crisps reaches a fairly well established ceiling…

Vico Chips a l’Ancienne saveur Vinaigre à l'Echalote

My experience writing reviews for Vico chips is that they are cursed: the reviews, not the chips.  I stared at the shiny, over-priced bags in stores for a long time before I finally caved in (and found them at a cheaper price), and then wrote two reviews full of praise and love and yearnings for world peace.  Then the computer failed to wake up from sleep (sadly normal) and the Autosave messed up (maddeningly abnormal) and I was left with no evidence of that heady, intense fling.

Yet, along came Vico’s Shallot Vinegar chips to reawaken my passion.  Vico, it must be emphasized, is a special beast- nearly all the other chips I review from French stores are either made by Lay’s or are store brands, but Vico’s appears to be an actual independent French chip company from Picardie with a long and proud tradition of potato based products which do appear to merit their higher prices by virtue of having pretty damn good crunch and texture.

However, it's the flavoring here that shatters frontiers by offering what other chip-makers have lacked the courage and foresight to do: bring vinegar and onion together, at last, like a soap opera coupling you began rooting for five seasons ago.  The vinegar aspect is well done and effectively balanced, each chip evoking a tangy acidity of vinegar without going overboard into Sour Patch kids territory.  More interesting, however, is the echalot (shallot) flavoring, which in its subtlety, wafts breezily onto the tongue like the effervescently glowing presence of an onion-y willow wisp.

"We are truly benevolent energy beings
from a land of light and pure good. Come
closer and- what?  Oh, never mind the
skull.  It just fits in with the decor.
We live in a swamp, y'know?"

Yes, we are talking about shallot, an elongated variety of onion with a sweeter and milder flavor which Wikipedia insists is also “richer andmore complex.”  Think of shallots as the posh and classy diplomats of the onion family (they’re very pleasant when cooked in a wine sauce and eaten whole alongside seared steak), rather than the ‘roll ‘em over and make ‘em cry’ types that we more commonly encounter (and love in our own masochistic way).  Intriguingly, there is also shallot vinegar, which is sweet and mellow, and not nearly as onion-y as you might think it is. As a result, the shallot flavoring on the chips is pleasingly musty and sweet without the acrid overtones we associated with regular onions.

Most of the Vico chips I’ve tried have been baked with an extra thick and crunchy ruffled texture, but these chips proved to be thin, relatively small potato slices.  They demonstrated a slightly greater degree of crunchiness than the average Lay’s chips, but were still cut a little too finely for my taste- an extra quarter of a millimeter can really do wonders.  All in all, though, the slices were still above average and more than adequate at delivering the wonderful flavoring.

Allow me to restate the vital point: vinegar and onion flavoring are awesome when combined, and it’s a wonder nobody thought of it before.  They earn a million extra fancy points for going for shallots rather than regular onions, making this another example of truly excellent idea that deserves to spread beyond France’s normally underdeveloped potato chip market.

Stars: 3 /4

Spiciness Rating: None

Pros:

- Effectively tangy vinegar flavoring is evenly applied across the chips

- Sweet and tasty shallot aromas emerges from the vinegar base with subtlty and class

- Crisps are well baked

Cons:

- Crisps are thin and a little small, which I feel could be improved upon

Lay’s Saveur Ketchup

           Ketchup has got to be the most déclassé condiment of our times, part and parcel of the whole hamburger-eating American stereotype which is alive and well for good reason, but let us concede to the undeniable truth of the matter: ketchup is pretty awesome.  Try eating fries with and then without ketchup; this is not a purely academic exercise, because while French fries (or should I say, Belgian fries?- in fact, the origin story of the fries is far from clear...) are as popular in France as you might imagine, ketchup is not a default table setting, and a restaurant is much more likely to offer you a pot of mustard to accompany your frites (not bad as a dip, but lacking the sweetness which makes ketchup so lovable, forcing Norther Americans to publicly shame themselves into making a special request for a bottle of the red stuff .)  So, while we all have a natural guilty feeling when we consider the gruesome bloody farts ketchup bottles produce, we should realize that without those venerable bottles of Heinz’s finest, we would be truly lost when confronted by yet another mound of flavorless ground beef and lightly seasoned fries.

Actually, there are some exotic theories
as to the origins of ketchup involving
a Malysian pickled fish sauce (koi-chep)
without tomatos brought into England
by explorers in the 18th century.

            That said, my instinctive guilt surrounding this staple of horror movie special effects made me feel rather squeamish about the idea of ketchup chips.  Just as you wouldn’t eat ketchup strait with a spoon, it seems grotesque to propose it as a chip seasoning.  Those who know me well, however, can predict that my sense of duty prevailed and I decided to continue boldly claiming my mantle as the man willing to sample the snacks and reassure the littlefolk whether they are safe to try.

            Fortunately for me, and the rest of you, it turns out Ketchup chips are as hot as a fountain of blood-red vinegary-sweet lava.  They correctly lean a bit on the vinegary side, but add just the right notes of tomato-y sweetness that you’ll swear you have the after taste of Uncle Heinz’s mouth wash.  If it helps, think of them as vinegar chips with a hint of tomato and sugar and you’ll be good to go- I think you will find the seasoning finely balanced between the acid and the sweet, or at least as balanced as the soup of cats.

Catsup.

            Crisp wise, these are your regular Lay’s potato chips, which is to say unimpressive- lacking in crunch factor, but serviceable.  However, that’s kind of beside the point- you buy Ketchup chips for flavoring, not texture, and fortunately, the seasoning is spread lightly and evenly throughout the chips to a generally positive effect.  While I can imagine a few ways they could kicked them up a notch, (a phrase which seems to give not a few culinary observers a sort of post-coital thrill), the truth is Lay’s did an excellent job balancing the seasoning, and your fingers will smell like you just left a messy hamburger grill.

Stars: 3/4

Spiciness Rating: None

Pros:

- Nice but not overpowering vinegary flavor

- Uncannily evocative and subtly sweet tomato aromas

- They smell is just right!

Cons:

- The crisps are average in texture and a little flimsy

- The shame of a guilty pleasure

Wai Lana Yogi Chips Sweet and Sour

I was rather expecting that there would be a certain consistency in my reviews of the Yogi Chips, and like reviewing Doritos, there would come to be little need to make note of the texture of the chips while all the variation would occur in terms of flavoring.  This illusion was pleasantly dispelled when I opened my bag of Sweet and Sour chips and discovered that they not only featured a different shape and consistency, but were also markedly more flavorful than my previous experience.

Asia's answer to chicken McNuggets.

Now, I’ve always been fond of Sweet andSour sauce (and soup!) in Asian cuisine.  Admittedly, if you order sweet and sour chicken, you will end up with chicken drenched in red sauce with perhaps a mild hint of a citrusy tang- what’s not to like?  The sour element tends to be underplayed, so it’s like eating shredded chicken or pork in a swimming pool of red syrup- so basically, sweet and sour chicken is Asia’s answer to McNuggets in ketchup.

Who doesn't like a steamy tart?

By contrast, when you open the bag with the smiling Polynesian looking woman, the odors sumptuously wafting up from its foil confines will inform you that these crisps bring the sour back into sweet and sour.  The tangy lemony smell is evocative of aforementioned gleaming red chicken puffing hot vapor on a plate before you like a steamy girlfriend, and tantalizes the nostrils of any one who enjoys a little tartness in their cuisine (or romantic partners).

The crisps share the same rice and tapioca base as the Sweet Chili & Lime chips I reviewed earlier, but are notably thicker and crunchier (in a good way) and shaped like small circular pototo crisps rather than the curled-rectangle Frito-forms I had expected from the earlier product.  While there was nothing wrong with the earlier type, the additional firmness does crackle more satisfyingly in the mouth and distinguishes the crisps from the soft textures of breakfast cereal, for good or ill.

Trivia question: Have you ever
spilled the Sweet and Sour sauce
in your Chinese take out, making a gory
mess of your Asian fast food?  If your
answer rhymes with 'mess' you're being
honest.

While there is no sparkly coating of spices like on the Sweet Chili and Lime chips, in its place you get a great deal more flavor!  The crisps taste mildly sweet at first, before blossoming on the tongue into a rising tide of tangy citrus like a tsunami wave of lemon juice.  The sourness is by no means overpowering, but does predominate over the sweeter aspects, to the likely disappointment of the sweet-and-sour-sauce-as-ketchup school, but making them more rewarding for those who appreciate citrus and or vinegar in their crispy snacks.  My wife suggested that they tasted like egg rolls dipped in sweet and sour sauce, which actually makes sense if you consider the commonalities between the crispy egg rolls and crunchy chipswith the tangy-sweet flavoring.

All in all, I rather liked these, though like actual sweet and sour sauce, the flavoring isn’t too subtle and doesn’t include many nuances other than that pleasant mouth-trip from mild-sweet to tangy-sour.  The crisps are robust and compliment the flavoring well, and I should emphasize that for all it leans on its citrusy aspects, it is not overpowering

Stars: 2½/4

Spiciness Rating: None

Pros:

- Tangy citrus aroma is not at all shy in announcing it gloriously tart presence

- Mildly sweet flavoring ushers in the sour and compliments it pleasantly

- Crisps are pleasantly crunchy and well shaped

Cons:

- True to the sauce it imitates, lacking in subtle nuances and spices

- Some might prefer a greater weight on the ‘sweet’ aspects of sweet and sour

Monoprix Chips à L’Ancienne Saveur Moutarde

            So, having complained at length about the shortcomings of Leader Price’s mustard-flavored chips, and I couldn’t resist but make a head-to-head comparison with exact same flavor of chips as sold by Monoprix.  Remember, we are talking about grainy old-fashioned mustard, not the smooth and creamy Dijon variety or the glow-in-the-dark American stuff.

            So, the long and the short of it is that basically they got it right where Leader Price held too much back; the flavor is more strongly stated, though by no means overpowering, with nice notes of mustard grain, a more substantial though still restrained use of vinegar, and salt and onion aromas for a good measure.  (Are there onions in actual mustard?  I don’t think so, but it works here.)

            So all’s well that ends well, right? Well, as any auteur will assure you that the ending can’t to be too happy or it will lose credibility.  Sorry Frodo, you may have destroyed the ring and survived, but you will have be so depressed for the rest of your life that you’ll wish you hadn’t.  For starters, while the texture of the chips is still a little above average, it doesn’t rise quite to the level of thick crunchiness of the Leader Price Mustard chips, which is really too bad.  So score one for regrets and sorrowful second thoughts.  Second, while I acknowledge that the mustard they are emulating isn’t remarkably spicy, I still have to whine: the chips aren’t spicy!

Some Europeans regard a fondness for
intense spices as reflecting some vaguely
masochistic shamanic tradition based on
the principle of drawing power from pain.
If thisis true, than I predict India and
Thailand will be the rival magical
superpowers of the 21st Century.

            To be honest, a big part of the issue is that French cuisine in general is not in favor of spiciness.  Sure, maybe a little poivre on the rumsteak here and there, but the sort of nose-running sweat-on-your-brow ultra-picante seasonings typical of Mexican, Indian, or Thai cuisine are deemed barbarically unsubtle.  Real-life French mustard is genuinely spicy of course, but it doesn’t seem to be an element they really want on their domestically produced chips, and so nearly all the spicy flavored items are foreign in origin (most notably in regards to chips: Pringles.)

            How important are these shortcomings?  Not very, the mustard flavor on these is improved and unambiguous, (mustard should never be ambiguous), and though the texture is ‘adequate’ rather than ‘great’, I can whole heartedly recommend these for regular munching if grainy mustard is your cup of tea.

Stars: 2 ½

Spiciness Rating: Very Mild

Pros:

- Effectively evokes the flavor of old-fashioned mustard

- Flavoring is well distributed

Cons:

- Texture is adequate, but not at same level of quality as the LeaderPrice chips

- Not going to satisfy anybody craving the spice.

Monoprix Saveur Vinaigre Balsamique

Chips, too, have the right to be refined

Casting an eye about for another uniquely European delicacy, I dredged up another unlikely candidate from the store shelves, thereby prolonging the terrible war for our loyalties between Franprix (the one that sells ‘LeaderPrice’ goods) and Monoprix (the pricier French version of Walmart.)  Monoprix’s ‘Balsamic Vinaiger Flavor’ provided just the hook- who else’s vinegar chips are made with the veritable Balsamic!

Now, you must understand that in my Franco-Italian family upbringing, thick burgundy brown balsamic vinegar has pretty much subsumed the ordinary red wine vinegar that is the standard in American daily life.  Everything comes out denser, more flavorful, more lusty in balsamic- just try it out in a tomato and mozzarella salad, or mix it in a vinaigrette with Dijon mustard, oil, and salt.  It is certifiably superior to the thin red or white stuff you usually bathe your vegetables in to make them less healthy.  Instead of being made from wine, balsamic vinegar is formed from fresh trebbiano grapes that are boiled down to 30% of their original volume, then stored in a succession of wooden casks for 12 full years, each cask made out of a different type of wood to impart a different flavor.  That's right, this vinegar is so elite it's got more pedigree than your average dog.  (Okay, to be honest, the sort of balsamic vinegar we actually buy in the grocery store hasn't been subjected to the full 12 years.)

People in the middle ages used to
believe that balsamic vinegar had
magical powers-and apparently they
were right.  Granting long life,
unbreakable bones, fast metabolism,
numbing pain, fortifying against
disease, thereby transforming
you into the goddamned Batman.

So, I was hoping for wonderful things as promised by the suggestively dark-brown bag, and its delightfully impertinent sub-title: chips, too, have the right to be refined!  (This is not my prose run a wild, you can read them for your self!)  Came the night at the end of a stressful day where our evening plans had fallen in flames and we were left to discuss religion, sex, and politics with our flat mates and I produced my piece de resistance for a trial by fire.

Unfortunately, if you’re asking yourself, how will balsamic vinegar chips taste different from the regular sort?, I still can’t help you because sadly I could not divine any distinction.  I think it didn’t help that the chips were the standard bright-light-yellow color of vinegar chips in the states (the flavoring powder indistinguishable in color)- I honestly believe that if they had used a burgundy brown coloration- like that of actual balsamic vinegar- I would have reacted very differently to them.  Come on, I’m practically giving free tips away on how to psychologically manipulate me, I hope somebody is listening!  But as they were, they looked and tasted like standard vinegar-flavored chips.

Let's be honest, some chips do have
a somewhat 'recombined' texture to
them.

That’s not a bad thing- sometimes they delivered quite a nice acidic surge, perhaps even suggestive of the fuller-bodied flavor of Balsamic vinegar compared to the watery-thin texture of regular vinegar (no, nobody is paying me for the smack talk.)  In fact, the bag assures us that the chips were flavored with real balsamic vinaigrette, so that is awesome.  However, like too many other chips, the crisps suffered from highly inconsistent distribution of the flavoring; about a third of the chips had a generous powerful kick of vinegar flavoring, and the rest frustrated me with the intimation of an aroma that they could not, ultimately deliver.  To top it off, the crisps themselves were on the low end of average, which is to say basically serviceable, but damp enough with oil and hampered by a particle-board like texture that failed to exhibit much thickness or crunch when eaten.



Every time these conversation happen,
another Star Fleet vessel is sucked
into an improbable wormhole, forcing
it's crew to face their inner demons
and wear unlikely but sexy costumes.

I still feel a little bad knocking these in the review, because they at times delivered an excellent vinegar flavor, they were made with actual Balsamic vinegar, and the contents of the bag lasted about 15 minutes before being devoured (but maybe that’s more of a comment of the French penchant for small quantities).  But in the end, they failed to consistently deliver enough flavor or to taste significantly different from other vinegar flavored chips.  Also, the rate at which they were eaten may reflect that my wife chose that evening to discuss the finer points of Catholicism, Judaism, and Hitler with our two German roommates, prompting us all to consume heedlessly in an attempt to suborn the pain of a conversation that rearticulated Godwin’s law so thoroughly a rift in space and time was opened.

Stars: 1½/4

Spiciness: none

Pros:

-Made with authentic balsamic vinegar

-Sometimes deliver strong vinegar flavor

Cons:

-More often, fails to deliver enough flavoring

-Crisps are of less than impressive quality

-Flavor was not really distinct from regular vinegar flavoring