Lay’s Strong Chili & Lime

      When I saw in a grocery store in Budapest that Lay’s had released Chili & Lime chips, I recognized the brilliance of the concept immediately.  Who doesn’t adore a nice wedge of lime with their Corona?  (Or less respectably, those lime-flavored beers- I’ll own up to it, someone has to come out and admit it!)  This is a flavoring concept that just needs to have its voice heard by the masses, though for now the masses with the opportunity appear to be exclusively speakers of the Slavic or Magyar tongue.

Limes help fight scurvy!  But not
as well as lemons.  On the other
hand Wikipedia claims that limes
are more sour than lemons, but
science says it's wrong.

       As I’ve previously noted, flavorists have recently begun to appreciate the possibilities of making truly tangy chips, and that zest with which they applied themselves here is commendable.  No, they haven’t made anything even the least bit tongue-curdling or acidic, (nor would I have condemned such a product if they had)- the packaging proclaims these to be LIME flavored, the sweeter, greener, and mild-mannered cousin of the lemon.  Yes, they don’t even have their own name in French (citron vert = ‘green lemon’), but the difference is real.  If you’ve ever squirted a wedge of lime onto some salty tortilla chips or into your beer, you’ll recognize the sensation immediately- sweet and tangy cool, without in any way revisiting the Sour Patch Kids experience.

        Now, these are supposed to be Chili and Lime chips, but the Chili isn’t so dramatic- basically there’s a pleasantly spicy afterburn as you munch on these that contributes to the picante-Tex Mex vibe, but the heat factor is pretty unthreatening and the actual flavor is really all about the hand-grenade fruit.  The crisps themselves are ruffled and about 2 inches in diameter, vaguely orange in color with a decent sprinkling of black pepper.  They are thick and fun to sink your teeth into with a crunch not unlike a cave collapsing, and the bag I acquired in Hungary managed to stay fresh and crispy for a surprisingly long time.  The package proclaims they are ‘best with cold drinks’, and while this might seem like a cocky bit of macho self-promotion, eating them does indeed create a desire for accompanying beer or soda, and the two do complement each other well.

Though Lay's Chili Lime chips are hard to find,
Des at LifesAmbrosia.com has an awesome
recipe to help you convert plain potato chips
to jalapeno-lime godhood.

        In short, I loved these chips and they helped me nostalgically revisit all sorts of tasty Latin/Tex-Mex cooking that is sadly unavailable in Paris.  The additionally tragic/ironic aspect to these chips is that they are apparently being sold all throughout Eastern Europe (the packaging is translated in Estonian, Latvian, Lithuanian, Hungarian, Czech, and Slovak!), but I have seen no hint of these delicacies in France, nor am I certain this variety is available in the United States.  (I am aware of several Chile and Lime chips by Lay’s available in the United States, but none of them appears to be ruffled.  Let me know if I am wrong in the comments!)

Stars: 3½/4 Stars

Spiciness Rating: Moderate

Pros:

- Absolutely nails that tangy-but-mellow sweet-lime on chips flavor

- A pleasant, spicy afterburn

- Wonderfully crunchialicious ruffled crisps

Cons:

- Not especially Chilli flavored

- The spice level is only moderate in intensity

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

Lay’s Smoked Cheese with Pepper

Available in Poland, Czech, Slovakia,
the Baltic states, and Hungary

If the review that follows has a slightly reverential tone, you can thank EasyJ et.   While we avoided paying the numerous EasyJet fines that are the classic stuff of airline horror stories, we were still left hungry on board with a pocketful of foreign currency and empty bellies.  Could I have a Coke please?  4 Euros.  For a can.  Would you like a sandwich with that?  No!   

So we tore into one of the three bags we had snagged at the store before departing Hungary, and I was forced to write this review on the flight back, despite having just written 3 others, because Erin was so eager to finish the bag and I wanted to make sure I still had the lingering smoky flavor in my mouth while I raved like a prophet inscribing into his holy book.

Lay’s Polish branch has hatched another East European Easter Egg, something so tasty I can only wonder why this wasn’t picked up in the United States long ago and marketed to every corner of the earth.  Standard salty cheddar cheese flavoring has been done to death, but somebody at Lay’s realized that rather than revisiting that tired old cliché, smoked Gouda would transform the mundane into the spectacular as surely as taking an turn down the road to Toon Town.

Creamy soft, salty, and smokey,
I cannot sing the praises of Smoked
Gouda enough- go out and try it!  It is
strangely unavailable in French stores.

Gouda cheese is of course available in un-smoked form, in which it tastes rather plain and cheddar-like- but try a smoked Gouda and you will enter a world of smoky-salty character that would rival a Cohen brothers flick.  Smoked Gouda is a Technicolor dream boat, there I said it, and it manages to be every bit as flavorful as French cheese while not coming from France, nor relying on aging and stinkiness to give it flavor.  (The last time the French came close to capturing the Netherlands, the Dutch flooded the dykes.)

The Dutch blowing the Dykes: though this may sounds like a
collective lesbian orgasm so great Obi-Wan would sense a
disturbance in the Force, it instead refers to inundating most
of the surface area of  your country with the waters of the
ocean. Nearly as awesome…

The chemists at Lay’s have recaptured the flavor of Gouda cheese with remarkable precision, and I found my mouth filling with rich smokehouse fumes and could taste the creamy cheese practically melting in my mouth.  If you are unfamiliar with Gouda, the flavor is also somewhat akin to the taste of baked cheese, such as the slightly burnt ends of a toasted cheese sandwich or baked ziti, but I mean that in the best way possible.  Go ahead and try it!

Not all is well in Heaven, so I must report that the crisps themselves are thin and not especially crunchy.  More curiously, however, while the black pepper advertised as part of the title is visible in tiny specks on the chips (though much less densely than portrayed on the packaging), it is not much evident as a component of the flavor.  While a more tangible, and tangibly spicy, pepper statement would certainly have contributed even more to the experience, the flavoring is so tasty that it fortunately stands quite well without it.

These should definitely be on your go-out-and-try list- the flavoring is tasty and fairly unique, and though held back by some sins of omission, remains compelling and flavorful in a way that apparently only Eastern Europe can appreciate (which is odd, as Gouda is a West European cheese.)  I did a web search for the Smoked Cheese chips after returning, and the only site that referenced them was from Lithuania.  Now there's a tragedy I can rectify...

Stars: 3/4

Spiciness: Very Mild

Pros:

- Remarkably evocative and smoked-gouda flavor

- Yummy and unique

Cons:

- Probably not available anywhere near you- unless you live east of Germany

- The texture and crunchiness of the crisps are average

- Pepper-aspect of the flavor is disappointingly minimal

Lay’s Chips à l’Ancienne Saveur Chevre

On the morning of my birthday, a charming young couple of my acquaintance (a fashion designer and an expert on alternative energy, how much more French can you get than that?) bequeathed upon me a nicely wrapped maroon pastry box proclaiming itself to be a present.  Being a member of the not-unwrapping-presents-til-the-appointed-time school of thought, it was not until that evening that I discovered I had just been gifted with a twin set of chili-spiced Nacho chips and of course Goat cheese potato chips, those two knowing my very American affection for junk food. 

I have gushed before about my fondness for all things goat cheese in my review of Belin’s Goat Cheese Croustilles, and right away, the package sports a picture of goat cheese coated in grey ashes, which may seem gross, but the ashy outside is in fact quite as edible as the crust on a brie (not the least bit crunchy or carbonized, I assure you) and intended to keep the interior soft and creamy, giving you a sort of cheese version of the Reece’s Pieces experience, except with more goat.

Goat cheese coated with ashes is the ugly
ducking that when opened up reveals the
sexy swan that gives all the once-popular
girls mid-life crisises.

The chips inside are not actually coated with ash, but this is no shortcoming for what may in fact be the awesomest cheese flavored chips I have yet had.  They convey the experience of cool sweet-and-creamy goat cheese fresh out of the cellar with a fidelity that would please even the most risk-averse tongue.  The seasoning spares the more acrid aspects of the goat cheese experience, making it accessible to the goat-partial or goat-inexperienced, but fortunately without compromising the experience for the goat-savvy (or at least for me.)

Did I mention they are delicious- again, allow me to note this is a far subtler and better balanced blending of salty and sweet than you will find on nearly any kind of cheese flavoring (likely cheddar), and while the refreshingly refrigerated-cool taste as they hit the tongue is likely the product of truly dark alchemy that would do Snape proud (being on the way-subtle side of minty), it’s still a neat enhancement to an already delightful flavor and does not in any way steal its glory.

Lay's informal employment of Dark
Wizards in their flavoring department
is yet another episode of corporate
malfeasance that remains shamefully
under-investigated.

What of the crisps, you ask?  When you identify your product as being ‘old fashioned’ chips, that tends to suggest that they are kettle-cooked and thick, and that they were made by old men wearing aprons as the packaging helpfully illustrates.  Well, on the plus side these chips had a decent crunch, fairly large in size, and were nicely curved and rumpled in all sorts of amusing shapes.  Unfortunately, they were decidedly not thick and were a translucent light-yellow in color, where as I tend to prefer my chips more on the russet brown side of things.  On the health front, these apparently sport 25% less salt than most chips in this product line and are made without palm oil, so that’s nice.  Can’t be sure if they were really made by an elderly apron-wearers, though.

            My slight disappointment with the thickness of the crisps aside, these are pretty much some of the most well executed and innovative chips I’ve had since coming to Europe (along with the Brett’s Steak Flavored chips), and any non-Frenchie’s hitting up the Hexagon for a vacation would be well-advised to pick these, up if you are of a sort dubious enough to buy junk food on your vacation.  When in France, go the way of the goat!

Stars: 3½/4

Spiciness Rating: none

Pros:

- Amazingly realistic goat flavor that perfectly balances sweet and salty

- Clever icy-cool flavor element inserted to make them taste cellar-fresh

- Crisps are decently crunchy and nicely folded and rumpled

- Lower on sodium than other chips in this line

Cons:

- Crisps are very thinly cut

Lay’s Sensations Saveur Crème et Epices

I’m usually very principled about only purchasing chips that fall within a certain price to quantity ratio.  Fancy Kettle chips that cost $4 for 6oz?  So long, and thanks for all the fish!  However, I recently gave into temptation to buy something fancier, out of sheer curiosity and a need to have more material for the blog.

It had sat there on the aisle for the last 4 months in a fancy package of shining glossy foil, showcasing carefully mood-lit potato crisps in the foreground, with a trifecta of yellow pepper, paprika, and sour cream hovering in the background like the supporting cast in an 70’s style action movie poster.  Slowly my reservations were chiseled away, and rationalizing with the need to write more reviews, these chips ended up in the shopping cart.

Starring Genghis Khan as the space pirate,
Madonna as the star queen, and
Mister Rogers as the astro avenger.

Now part of the temptation was that I wasn’t quite sure what flavor the chips were meant to represent.  Everyone knows the universally recognized colors for Sour Cream and Onion flavoring is green and white, and the packaging sported both green, white, and a picture of sour cream.  Dead giveaway, right?  Not so fast, in place of an onion, there’s a bell pepper and a bowl of paprika.

It took me a while to figure out after biting into them, but basically these chips were seeking to evoke the flavor of sour cream dip with a sprinkling of paprika on top.  Pretty specific, but you'll find more than a few recipes which features this combination.  As flavorings go, it’s on the subtle side: a mildly sweet sour cream flavor, some garlic, and a pleasing but faint spicy aroma that builds up a little over time, but never so much as to be really threatening.  Very nice and all like a stiff but classy date, and they do capture the whole sour cream and paprika thing, if in an altogether too subtle manner.  Personally, if I had a choice between something that flirts frustratingly beyond my satisfaction and something that hits my tongue like a sledgehammer, I will happily lean towards the latter extreme.

Thought bubble:  I can only hope he's
just as stiff in bed.

Texture wise, the crisps are clearly designed with an eye towards superior quality.  In most respects this goal was achieved, as the crisps are thick, less crumbly, and very evenly sized.  However, they do suffer from lacking the kind of uneven and interestingly textured surfaces we expect from most chips, instead displaying smooth and regular surfaces that are efficient but that do not fire the imagination- thereby completing the portrait of the polished but unexciting aristocratic suitor who tries to make up for his lack of sparks and intensity with money and refinement.

Fair lady, I practically invented being
languid.  Yes, even before the British.

So all in all, while I appreciate the enhanced texture and subtle flavor of these chips, I feel that they fail to deliver a truly stunning experience to justify the (high) price. These chips will appeal to those with delicate, cultured palettes, who eschew the gross crudity of strong flavorings, and appreciate suavely blemlishless potato crisps of high quality and utter regularity.  Those barbaric individuals of cruder, more primitive tastes should probably look elsewhere.  Why settle for Humperdinck when you can have Westley?

Stars: 2/4

Spiciness Rating: Mild

Pros:

- If you wanted Sour Cream and Onion chips without the onion, than these are the chips for you…

- if you don’t mind the Paprika element as well that gives an interesting but unthreatening spicy dimension

- Above-average quality thick and crunchy crisps

Cons:

- Flavoring is too subtle

- Though the crisps are thick, they are also perfectly smooth and lack the kind of bubbles and crumples that make, say, kettle chips so interesting

-Flavoring is too sub- I guess I should learn to know when to let something go?

Lay’s Max Craquant Saveur Cheeseburger

 

          It would seem Cheeseburger chips are the new genre to match, as since I first tried out the Dorito’s variety in the summer of 2010, I was surprised to discover Lay’s own Cheeseburger chips in Paris, of all places.  Apparently the idea has appeal, even though it was in France that a militant farmer activist used his tractor to demolish a McDoanld's in protest of the American invasion of crap food in the land of haute cuisine (although on the less symoblic level, it involved a dispute over trade tarifs on Roquefort cheese and genetically modified beef, which definitely has shades of the opening of Episode I The Phantom Menace).  Just like banning Valentine’s Day in Malaysia, incidents like this are really proof of the seduction of debased foreign values- the purveyors of traditional culture go forth with pitchforks to cleanse those attracted to corrupt outsider values (or food), but low tastes can only but prevail in the end.

This McDonald's in construction was
mysteriously burned down in the town
of Voreppe after the residents compla-
ined that it would smell bad.  Lesson
to draw from this: use deodorant in
France if you love life.

            As I have mentioned before, I’ve never actually been a fan of fast-food style hamburgers since I stopped being of the age to care about the ‘free’ toys that came with the Happy Meals.  (Interestingly enough, there is a lawsuit in California seeking to ban McDonald’s from including toys in their Happy Meals!)The real thing, made at a local hamburger joint, or better yet, grilled at home, is by far superior.  And yet, just like my experience with the Cheeseburger Doritos, I found the rainbow of hamburger-associated flavors irresistibly nostalgic and delightful in its color and vibrance.

            Lay’s chips are on ruffled potato chips, which make for a significantly different eating experience than the Doritos.  Whereas Doritos nachos are basically all flavoring, with these you can still taste the potato underneath the flavors.  Fortunately, the potato crisps are pretty good quality, being thicker and crunchier than average.  I had initially feared that using potato-chips instead of nacho chips would dilute the cheeseburger flavor, but actually it had the effect of making the chips easier to eat at length by dialing down the intensity of the hamburger-seasoning.

Americans are so bad
at lighting fires that we
we grow suspcious of
barbecued meat that
doesn't taste of petroleum.

            Still, the flavoring is basically why you’d be interested in these chips, and I’m happy to report that they deliver a powerful taste of ketchup, pickles, onions and mustard supported by a subtle but comforting aroma of fire-grilled beef.  (You can practically taste the lighter fluid!)  Obviously the vinegary aspect present in mustard and ketchup are pretty much mutually reinforcing, but that in no way diminishes the uncanniness of the emulation.  Nicely enough, the ingredient lists includes actual tomato, garlic, vinegar, onions, mustard seed, and green peppers, so it looks like they didn't reduce everything to molecularly bonded aromas as one might expect.  The only notable omission when compared to the Cheeseburger Doritos, is the lack of actual cheese flavor, which is indeed rather odd for a cheeseburger-flavored product.  Clearly they were marketing on the ‘concept’ of being Cheeseburger flavored, even though these are in fact ‘Hamburger flavored.’ Now if they only get around to the kebab-flavored variety, I will be perfectly happy.

            So in summary, chalk another one up to the chemists in the employ of multi-national food factories, these chips were evocative of meat, condiments, and vegetables all at once and generally of good quality, offering an interesting and generally easier to eat alternative to Dorito’s praise-worthy rendition of the same concept.  So, if while overseas you feel a need to dip into some hamburger-nostalgia chips, don’t worry- the French do too, and have that covered for you.

Stars: 3/4

Spiciness Rating: None

Pros:

- Excellent burger emulation full of the taste of mustard, ketchup, pickles, and onions

- Nice grilled meat aroma in the back ground

- Thick, crunchy potato crisps of above average quality

Cons:

- No cheese flavor

- Some might prefer the slightly more intense flavor of the Doritos Cheeseburger Nachos

Lay’s Max-Craquante Saveur Pizza Pepperoni

Note: There is a similar sounding product titled 'Lay's Limited Edition Pepperoni Pizza', though I can't confirm if it is the same product.  The reviews I've seen for it have all been in Dutch, but this does suggest the possibility they may be available in the United States.

I had a bit of a WTF moment when I first had these, because they didn’t immediately fit in to what I expected from the etablished genre of pizza-flavored chip.  Italianish-herbs, check, but other than that they were spicy-hot and had a sort of intensive meat flavor that threw me off.  Then I looked again at the package, and I figured out what it was all about.



If you are concerned that there is
insufficient grease, we will helpfully
provide you with more.



Permit me to describe to you a certain kind of pizza which most of us have encountered in our school days- (and don’t bother saying, I haven’t been to college!- because high school cafeterias and McDonalds take-out pizzas are still in the same category).  Picture a round, crunchy thick crust, little to no tomato sauce, and baked mozzarella cheese, cooked till it’s covered with brown spot, covered in patches of red oil.  Spotting the pizza like polka dots are slices of thick, spicy pepperoni, baked in the oven till the edges are crunchy while the centers remain tender and dimpled , pooling with reddish oil that is spilling over into the cheese.  Not exactly authentic Italian pizza, but a very American variant, and quite possibly delicious if fresh out of the oven.

It’s that school-cafeteria pepperoni pizza flavor- with emphasis on the spicy peperoni, baked cheese, a hint of garlic and Italian herbs- that is so evocatively captured by these chips.  The spiciness provides some welcome prickling in the throat, but nothing strong enough to bother all but the most extreme of spice-phobes.  The chips themselves are medium-sized ruffled rounds with a light speckling of green herbs, and as advertised, they are ‘extra crunchy’- they provide a more satisfying crackle-and-pop than some of the more oil sodden ruffle chips, though they are still not quite up to being kettle cooked quality, of course.

In summary, I found myself very pleasantly inspired to relive the cheap thrills of spicy American pepperoni pizza, and that creativity in the flavor matched to a decent quality in the chips themselves. I can only hope they’re selling something similar back in the states for when I return!

Stars: 3/4

Spiciness Rating: Mild

Pros:

- Awesome cafeteria pepperoni pizza flavor

- Pleasing mild salty-spiciness is redolent of baked pepperoni

- Thick crunchy ruffle chip texture is above average

Cons:

- There’s basically nothing wrong with what they are, but some might object to what they aren’t: some less specific pizza flavor, or that they aren’t kettle chips

Chili Cheese Fritos

         Many bizarre contrivances have crawled out from the moist dens of college cafeterias, conceived in an effort to feed the masses of impressionable young students only recently weaned off mom’s home cooking with whatever combination of cheap ingredients were at hand.  One that I recall fairly vividly as both hilarious but reasonably edible was Frito casserole, a mixture of ground beef, refried beens, and cheddar cheese, a sprinkling of lettuce and tomatoes on top, and soggy Fritos.  Yes, you heard that correctly.  I can only imagine how some cafeteria quartermaster decided “Yes, let’s buy Fritos in bulk and make casserole with it!”

A Texas BBQ joint apparently had a
similar idea, offering up Frito Pie.
However, this version seems consider-
ably tastier, as it includes beef brisket
and barbecue sauce.  Still, Fritos and
bean casserole, together again!

            I actually recall it with faint nostalgia; not something I’d go out of my way to make myself, but it wasn’t bad (in a greasy American-style taco sort of way) and it was a unique product of our academic community- oh yeah, that and educated young minds brimming with promise, ready to die ashamed they had not already won a victory for humanity.  Look it where that got us.  

      Anyway, the Chili Cheese Fritos I happened upon in my mother-in-law's cupboard (how much like a creepy old fairy-tale does that sound?) very pleasantly evoked that old cafeteria special- as well as it should remind anyone else who has had chili with cheddar on top.  Overtop a nice cheesy flavor made (according to the package) with romano and cheddar, there are ‘taco’ spices, one of which I can say with certainty is cumin, not something I expect to find on any ordinary chip!  The reddish-brown flavoring is spread with a pleasing consistency and I found it to be well balanced with the natural flavor of the corn chips, unlike another Fritos product which will I shall leave unnamed.

This website featuring 'college cooking'
actually features a recipe for Frito Pie.

     So overall, I was pleasantly surprised that the Chili-Cheese Fritos delivered a unique flavor effectively, were competently executed, and brought me back over five years to the days I was flunking chemistry and getting hit on by my wife.  Admittedly, I probably won’t buy them in quantity because spicy-chili Fritos are not the sort of itch I frequently need to scratch, but it’s there if you want it, and it’s well done for what it is.

Stars: 2½/4

Spiciness Rating: Very Mild

Pros:

- If you harbor nostalgic sentiments American style tacos and ‘Mexican’ casserole from the school cafeteria, this will hit your spot.

- Taco spice flavoring, with its hints of cumin, is more sophisticated than you would expect and is well coated on the Fritos

Cons:

- How often do you think to yourself, “Mmmm, I really feel like going out for some school cafeteria food tonight.”

Lay’s Saveur Fromage (Cheese Flavor)

When an American product has ‘cheese’, they mean one thing, and that is Cheddar.  We put Cheddar in hamburgers.  Cheddar on toast.  Cheddar in Mexican food, even though they actually use ‘white cheese’ over there.  Hell, even ‘American Cheese’ is supposed to be some form of Cheddar, though its extensive processing and shiny plastic-wrapped slices have their own admittedly unique bouquet.  Are there any other options short of going overseas?  (Sorry, mozzarella is not an American invention, though we probably eat more than the Italians at this point.)  Well, you can get Monterey Jack.  You know, kind of like cheddar cheese with spicy peppers in it.

Rumor has it that Cheddar cheese is
actually only made in shredded and
thin-slice form, but our field agents in
Wisconsin report that some bricks are
still made in isolated hamlets where
Mexican restaurants and school
cafeterias can't get to them.

Anyway, one consequence of this is when you get Cheese-flavored chips in the United States, they are by default Cheddar cheese flavored, unless they go out of their way to say otherwise (a few Parmesan flavored exceptions come to mind.)  Cheese flavoring means orange-powder coating, end of story.  So when I went to France, where there are at least 300 more varieties of cheese commonly eaten than the United States, I was curious to see how they would handle the whole ‘cheese flavoring’ thing.  Certainly, the last cheese flavoring they would ever consider would be cheddar, whose existence they have only been made dimly aware of through McDonalds. 

Fortunately, the marketing experts at Lay's were savvy to this cultural distinction, at least so far as the packaging is concerned, which portrays a very sophisticated looking slice of holey emmenthaler cheese (a milder variety of Swiss cheese) on the package.  They also did their homework with the coloration of the chips, which is light yellow rather than orange, which would only have been appropriate if they were doing mimolette chips.  This left me more than a little intrigued as to whether they had suitably altered the flavor to a different non-Cheddar standard.



Which famous European cheese does this
remind me most of?  Hmmm...

The good news is that the flavoring isn't quite your average cheese flavoring in the United States.  The bad (or at least, boring) news is that it’s still a ‘Cheddar cheese’ flavoring.  Make no mistake, it is a little saltier and creamier than what you normally get, a more intense invasion of the taste buds as it were, but it does not evoke gruyer, emmenthaler, or brie so much as the thick crusty orange flavoring on a Cheese Puff.  Fortunately for me, that is plenty tasty in itself, but it doesn’t quite expand the genre, as we like to say in literary criticism. 

Texture-wise, these are pretty much your average Lay’s chips- a baseline of that which is perfectly adequate though unexceptional.  I must note, at least, that I was pleasantly surprised to have many large, well-coated chips.

In summary, comrades, I must sadly announce that the European revolution in cheese-flavoring has not yet come, the time is not yet ripe to storm the barricades until the masses have been educated and demand more cultural distinctiveness in their unhealthy imported snacks.  However, I did find something a little more flavorful than I usually got in the states, such that between me, my wife, and an opportunistic roommate, the bag was reduced in a space of less than 24 hours.  (In defense of my honor, I must note it was a relatively small bag, like everything else in France!)  So despite my disappointment¸ that must constitute a mild recommendation in and of itself.

Stars: 2/4

Spiciness Rating: none

Pros:

- Cheese flavoring is a little on the zesty side- more ‘Cheese Puffs’ than Doritos.

Cons:

- Not really different from American cheese-flavored chips

- Average in quality

Fritos Bar B Q Flavored Corn Chips

Note: This product is not to be confused with Frito Honey Barbecue Twists, which are angelic emissaries from Golden City of the Maker, whereas the following product could only be the darkspawn of the Fade.

           There is a special place in hell reserved for various chip brands that claim to have a certain flavor they are lacking in practice.  But, just as even hell has some rejects, some flavorings are too lowly to even a occupy their own corner of damnation, and are left to wander the real world a hollow shell of their potential selves.

            To clarify: perhaps the designers of the BBQ Frito corn chips thought a minimal salting of barbecue flavoring would somehow be enough, or were worried that if the flavor was too strong the taster would lose out on the underlying Fritos flavor.  But whatever the case, they utterly failed in making Fritos that have an actual barbecue flavor.

Note: They didn't mention
corn chips, did they?

            Now, I will admit that I think I may have tasted some faint whiff of a barbecue flavor hidden somewhere within the overpowering salty corn oil taste of regular Fritos.  However, the flavor is so faint that I can’t honestly be sure that it is really there and not a phantom barbecue-flavored placebo I’m swallowing with all the pretty maroon-colored flavoring dust.  But even though ectoplasmic barbecue flavor would be a pretty cunning conspiracy on the part of Frito-Lay, it does not make for a tasting experience in any substantial way different from chomping on regular Fritos.  

That’s not the worst thing ever, regular Fritos are okay if unspectacular in my opinion (perhaps a little oversalted), but the fact that I specifically bought BBQ flavored Fritos that have almost no actual barbecue flavor is a serious problem as far as I’m concerned.  Furthermore, the calorie count on those things at 300 for a small bag is ridiculous even by the standards of oily flavored chips.

 The difference is you realize
zombies aren't your friends when
they try to eat you, and you realize
the BBQ Fritos are bad when you
try to eat them.

            Now, for the record, this was my second sampling of BBQ Fritos, having decided to try them again after the last disappointing occasion on the theory that perhaps I simply received a poorly mixed batch.  But this bag was just as disappointing as the previous one, and the little purple dust on the chips was definitely visible, so I am reasonably assured that we are talking about a kind of barbecue-zombie, rather than barbecue-ghost.  That is, the physical flavoring is there, but it has no soul.

Stars: 1/4

Spiciness Rating: none

Pros:
- If you like Fritos already, these taste exactly the same and probably have the same cost.

Cons:
- What barbecue flavoring?  I can see it, why can't I taste it?  Leprosy?
- The product doesn't deliver what it advertises.  Try Honey Barbecue Flavor Twists instead.
- Ridiculous calorie count for a small bag, as if they wanted to put you in the grave.
- Zombies!

Lays Chips a L’Ancienne Saveur Jambon Fume

(Old-Fashioned Smoked-Ham Flavor)

Have you ever finished watching a movie and thought to yourself- “Wow, what an amazing twist in the plot.  Too bad the characters, setting, cinematography, and dialogue ranged from direly boring to utterly crappy.”  It’s those kinds of films that get one thing right, do it so very well, but are full of tragic fail by being deficient in every other regard.

I’m perhaps over playing the link here with the ‘Smoked Ham’ flavored chips from Lays I recently tried out, but basically my complaint is that it pulls off a pretty clever trick with the flavor, but fails to follow up anything particularly interesting thereafter.  It’s like a student that show up to class with a snazzy intro for their Power Point presentation, hoping to get away with having done almost no research outside of Wikipedia.  (We’ve probably all been that person at least once in our lives…)  



That aisle on the left is all ham.
Seriously.



This is yet another flavor I found in Europe which I have yet to see in the US- ‘smoked ham’- and so I was pretty intrigued from the get go.  Ham is THE lunch meat in France- go to the grocery store or deli.  No roast beef in sight.  Bologna need not apply- save for the occassional package of mortadella.  But aside from some sliced chick or turkey, there are at least two dozens varieties of ham on sale at the super market. What, don't you want some pate or sliced table sausage with your bread?  Perhaps you should buy a tasty ham sandwich with butter and mustard from the boulangerie?  So in a sense, ham chips are obvious here. 

The chips inside are slightly above average quality salty potato crisps, and when you first bite into them you immediately are hit by an evocative buttery-ham flavor.  However, while the flavor is very cleverly done, the problem with a very salty ham flavor is that after a bite or two, it tastes nearly identical to salty potato chip flavor.  So about three mouthfuls in, you will easily forget that you are eating ‘ham-flavored’ chips and just process them as being the regular sort.

Sometimes a lack of subtly is a virtue.
More ham, not less!

Now as regular potato chips, they are unexceptional though in no way 'bad', but I can’t help but feel that they miss the mark.  I want my ham flavored potato chips to be more hammy, a la William Shatner, something complex enough to continue stimulating the tongue, not a brief sort of amuse-guelle that is quickly washed away in a wave of generic saltiness.  So while there are no major faults with these chips, I cannot help but rate them critically for their lack of panache.  The initial flavor as it hits the tongue is intriguing, but no further delights follow it as you probe too deeply.  Like too many movies today, these chips offer a shallow experience with only a brief flash of innovation, no matter how cunning.

Stars: 1 ½

Spiciness Rating: none

Pros:

- Buttery ham flavor is at first uncanny and amusing.

- Decent texture

Cons:

- After the initial few bites, they begin to taste exactly like regular potato chips.

- Relies to heavily on saltiness rather than additional flavoring to evoke ham

Lays Tangy Carolina BBQ

            Having first tasted Utz’s South Carolina BBQ chips and greatly enjoyed them, I had fairly positive expectations going when I bought Lay’s own ‘Tangy Carolina BBQ’ offering.  It was a pleasant surprise to discover that Lay’s had not merely emulated Utz’s formula in a technically superior package (or potato chip, to be precise) but taken the flavor in a slightly different, thoroughly pleasing direction.

            Lay’s chips succeed admirably at emulating the flavor of South Carolina barbecue sauce, which is basically a thinner, more vinegary variety compared to the thicker, sweeter Midwestern barbecue sauces typified by KC Masterpiece that you usually find in stores and restaurants.  Even though I still more in the Midwestern camp, the South Carolina style offers some very welcome variety to the field.

What this means in practice is, just like the Utz’s rendition of the Caroline barbecue, you have a sort of combination of barbecue sauce and vinegar flavors.  However, Lay’s chips also incorporate the peppery flavor of the spice rub that would go straight on the meat of an actual barbecue, and is more rewardingly complex for it.  There is also a pleasing mild spiciness which builds to a gentle warmth on the tongue during prolonged munching, without actually moving onto the ‘flaming hot’ territory. 



You can practically taste the prickle
of the spice rub on your tongue and
hear the sizzle of the meat.  The next
version they produce will have
glistening drops of oily grease too.



Altogether, the chips do a terrific job of evoking the flavor of actual barbecued meat, rather than just barbecue sauce.  Who says there hasn’t been progress in the chip world?  This is only one of several chips products I have had in the last year that went from ‘merely’ attempting to simulate the flavor of the sauce to trying to evoke the flavor of the meat and the spices rubbed on it!  (I will eventually put up a review for the Doritos Tailgate Barbecue, which takes this premise to an entirely new level.)

            Furthermore, the chips are superbly sized and almost perfect in texture- satisfyingly crunchy, without being too hard or too soft, and complex in shape.  These were clearly manufactured to a higher standard than run of the mill Lay's chips.  This also happens to leave0 them a definite cut above the tasty but otherwise ordinary Utz South Carolina chips, and highly recommended overall.

Stars: 3½

Spiciness Level: Moderate

Pros:

- Tangy South Carolina barbecue sauce flavor is delightful as always for anyone who enjoys a vinegary-sweet sauce

- Nice and innovative attempt to evoke the flavor of spices rubbed onto barbecue meet

- Excellent texture, with thick and crunchy crisps

-Nice moderate spicy flavor that delights without being likely to offend

Cons:

- May not be wholly satisfactory for those looking for a more traditional Midwestern sweet-and-thick barbecue sauce