| brand | name | flavour | tasting-notes | pairs-with | Rating | By | Date |
|---|
| Walkers | Max Strong | Jalapeno and cheese | Strong, good with a beer | Beer | 9 | WH | 2021-02-12 |
| Mackies of Scotland | Mackies | Salted | Shit texture, but flavour is okay | randyoutube at chris's flat | 6 | WH | 2021-02-12 |
| Walkers | Sensations | Thai Sweet Chilli | Great flavour, but makes you very thirsty | An evening of fine banter | 8 | WH | 2021-02-12 |
| Walkers | Double Crunch | KFC Zinger | Pleasantly spicey, with a nice KFC-y flavour | KFC, Beer | 8 | CS | 2021-02-12 |
| Doritos | Doritos | Tangy Cheese | Artificial cheese so high quality, you almost believe it's real | Intervention, Sleight of Hand Pro, Skrillex | 6 | CW | 2021-02-12 |
| Walkers | Max Strong Double Crunch | Bold BBQ Ribs | Smoky bacon flavour but a bit more complex. Ridges were too deep and detracted from the mouth-feel of the crisp | A sore mouth from the deep ridges stabbing you | 7 | WH | 2021-02-12 |
| Bernard Matthews | Turkey Sandwich | Turkey | Very juicy + tender though not a crisp. | Red Pepper Jelly | 7.5 | AB | 2021-02-12 |
| Jacob's | Mini Cheddars | Lime and Chilli | Juxtaposed cheese and lime that leaves you wanting more of either and less of both | a light beer | 6 | SM | 2021-02-12 |
| Jacob's | Mini Cheddars | Nacho Cheese and Jalapeno | Pungent fake "queso" flavour is elevated by the addition of the jalaps, striking a nice balance between spice and cheese | no beverage, enjoyed as is | 7 | SM | 2021-02-12 |
| Jacob's | Mini Cheddars | Chipotle Chicken Wings | flavour offers nothing other than mediocre heat. There are far nicer crisps that have a stronger spice | anything to get the taste out | 4 | SM | 2021-02-12 |
| McCoy's | Ridge Cut | Sizzling King Prawn | Quite literally the best crisps I have eaten. Prawn cocktail is a hard flavour to get right, as you must hit a number of difficult notes. Firstly they must have a high Tang-factor, that here comes from a high citric acid content so high it must be moderated with a strong acidity regulator. Quite literally too much flavour for the average consumer to bear without the Tang-factor approaching dangerous levels (!). Second, the crisps need a strong savoury backbone. Without this foundation you run the risk of having too light or unsubstantial a flavour as can be seen in the Walkers Pickled Onion Crips (high Tang-factor, low umami quotient). The key here is a moderate amount of salt, and the use of smoke flavouring, something i have not observed in any other Prawn Cocktail flavoured crisps that really grounds the incredible taste. The third factor is one that is often taken for granted: a delicate fishy balance. What do I mean by this? It is commonly observed in lesser crisps such as skips that feature a pronounced fishy aftertaste. While some is required for an authentic prawn cocktail experience it is the delicate interplay of fishy undertones that lurk mysteriously below the solid, earthy, umami flavour of the crisps that provide an adequate, nay, exceptional stage for the delightful, electrifying, dance of tanginess that plays upon the tastebuds of the crisp enjoyer. Without a single one of these elements this snack would be incalculably worse. In addition to a transcendental flavour, these crisps boast thick, chunky ridges that give a hefty mouthfeel and satisying crunch. They also have the secondary effect of increasing the surface area. This enables the crisp-vessel to more adeptly deliver enough Sizzly flavour to leave your tongue almost completely saturated in the incredible prawn flavour. In conclusion, I really believe these crisps to be the apex of potato snack invention, for I cannot think of a single way to improve them, bar selling them in packets big enough to quell the crisp-lust brought on by these aptly named King of Crisps. | Adaptable. Can be paired with any beverage, but best when savoured in isolation | 10 | SM | 2021-02-12 |
| Walkers | Max | Kentucky Fried Chicken | Strong Umami flavour with building pepper notes on the tongue. Paired with Beer, the pepperyness is complimented nicely by the cooling action of the beer. Moreish | A nice hoppy beer | 8.5 | WH | 2021-02-12 |
| Sainsbury's | Prawn Cocktail flavour Tapioca Snacks | Prawn Cocktail | Pretty ok, standard prawn cocktail flavour in a nice and crunchy shape | Probably anything | 5 | CS | 2021-02-12 |
| Walkers | Walkers | Cheese & Onion | While the crisps are by no means bad, they are uncharacteristically disappointing by Walkers' standards. Obtained originally from a "Meat" multipack (despite neither cheese nor onion being a meat), all six packets were left in the bag to be eaten last. When I had worked my way round to eating them, I discovered that they were bland, with the flavours entirely lacking in any excitement. | coffee, surprisingly | 3 | CW | 2021-02-18 |
| Sensations | Lime and Coriander Poppadoms | Lime and COriander | \\\\\\very citrusy good if u like that sort of thing | prodecco | 10 | BS | 2021-02-12 |
| Space Raiders | Space Raiders | Space Raiders | Great. 30p. | Anime, Beer | 7 | CW | 2021-02-20 |
| Walkers | Max Strong | Hot Chicken Wings | meaty notes, similar to walkers roast chicken flavour crisps, but with a notable heat build up of spice, it tends to overshadow the flavour however | Tennents | 7 | WH | 2021-02-22 |
| Snaktastic | Pringles Knock-off | Original | Intense salt taste. Very cheap compared to the real deal. Interestingly, the crisps have much less of a defined shape than pringles. The crisp is otherwise identical in flavour to real pringles | Destiny Fails Us: A New Life by Strawberry Dagger Studio | 9 | WH | 2021-02-27 |
| Pringles | Sizzl'n | Cheese and Chilli | Whilst a great crisp it is inferior in every way to the Max Strong Jalapeno and Cheese crisp. So while this does score highly you're much better off taking this only when you have no access to the aformentioned Max Strong crisps. | lust for Max Strong | 8 | ML | 2021-03-01 |
| Mackies of Scotland | Ridge Cut | Paprika | Fairly sweet, certainly taste like Mackies with paprika on them | Strange European Tastes | 7 | CS | 2021-03-01 |
| Co Op | Irresistable | Sea Salt and Chardonnay wine vinegar | Intense vinegar taste. So intense it will actually hurt your mouth and leave it a bit sore and numb if you get a big bag of these puppies, a small bag is enough. The texture is crisp and crunchy, moreso than other "real" crisps such as kettle. Very very nice in small doses | Anything | 10 | WH | 2021-03-08 |
| McCoy's | Ridge Cut | Salted | The delicate salt flavouring is nicely balanced against the potato and oil flavours of the crisps. As with other ridge cut crisps, the ridges provide a large surface area for the salt to be delivered. | Not doing work that you should be doing. | 7 | CW | 2021-03-12 |
| Walkers | Wotsits Giants | Flaming hot | Nice flavour, but really let down by the texture. It gets stuck in your teeth too easily. Nice subtle heat build up, with a pleasant tanginess. Texture still bad | Randanime | 5 | WH | 2021-03-13 |
| McCoy's | Ridge Cut | Cheddar and Onion | Perhaps the only cheese and onion crisps to be named "Cheddar", but they are named so for a good reason. The cheese flavouring has the unmistakable richness of cheddar, while the onion flavouring is subtle and understated. These may be the best cheese and onion crisps on the market - a must try! | Honestly, just try them on their own. | 7.1 | CW | 2021-03-13 |
| Penn State | Baked Pretzels | Original Sea Salted | They certainly are pretzels. Nice and salty, but not overwhelmingly so, and there isnt a huge pile of salt when you've finished the bag, unlike other, lesser pretzels. | Anything that goes well with Salt | 5 | CS | 2021-03-14 |
| Walkers | Salt and Vinegar | Salt and Vinegar | The base line for salt and vinegar crisps in the UK. Nothing special. More vinegar than salt. | Drinking | 4 | CS | 2021-03-17 |
| Walkers | Quavers | Cheese | The crisps leave a pleasant cheesy aftertaste for quite some time after eating, and each "Quaver" has a very satisfying crunch. This is a very light snack, so avoid if you are looking for something filling. | Sitting in the Meadows with your good buddies - awwwwwwww | 5 | CW | 2021-03-18 |
| Walkers | EL | Cheese and Onion | Absolute trash, why would this be included in a meat selection pack? It's not even a meat and all the meat flavours are vegetarian anyway. Absolute waste of space in a multipack and a waste of shop shelving. | Disappointment. | 0 | EL | 2021-03-22 |
| Walkers | Mix-Ups | Spicy | A perfect crisp for when you want a lot of variety. Has a crisp for every mood in this wonderful grab-bag. Not too spicy. | Depends on which crisp | 9 | CS | 2021-03-26 |
| Mackies of Scotland | Mackies | Sea Salt | Ignore the other review, done by someone who wouldn't know a good crisp if it fuckin slapped him on the head, this is the single best Salted Crisp experience you can have. A brilliant texture with a lovely salty taste, this is everything the true genius would expect from a packet of crisps. | Everything. Truely the finest. | 10 | CS | 2021-04-03 |
| Manomasa | Tortillas with spirit | Serrano Chilli & Yucatan Honey | The packaging for this crisp is certainly posh. You really get the sense with the graphic and feel of the packaging that you are getting a premium crisp. Every element of the crisp's being is described in flowery words on the back, from the flavour to the mouth-feel. Opening the back you're greeted with a rich nose of spiciness and sweetness. The tortillas are Hexagonal, they say its because that is a better shape for stacking things on top, but I don't know if I'm sold. The crisp tastes quite dry, although the flavour is very moreish. The spice builds up nicely, but is never overpowering. I don't think i could place the "Yucatan honey" in the flavour mix, but the flavour is certainly complex and is not just overwhelming spice. | A nice dip, I think its almost required due to the dry texture | 8 | WH | 2021-04-03 |
| McCoy's | Fire Pit | Flame Scorched BBQ Rib | Perhaps a case of expecting too much, this crisp is somewhat let down by its unwillingness to commit to either the Fire Pit spicey or the BBQ Rib sweet/meatyness. Overall, an alright crisp, but when compared to the other fantastic meat crisps by The Real McCoys, it's somewhat of a letdown. | Your usual lager beer | 6 | CS | 2021-04-09 |
| Walkers | Max | Fiercly Flaming Hot | Spicy, but not a lot of else. Not actually that spicy but doesnt taste of much else. I feel like theyre going for the pure spiciness aspect with the flavour and branding, but it doesnt even hold up. | Anything pure spice pairs with | 7 | WH | 2021-04-09 |
| Co-op | Irresistible | Aberdeen Angus Steak & Peppercorn Sauce Crinkle Cut Crisps | Fantastic meaty flavour, complemented by a strong, but not overpowering, note of pepper | Prosecco or a tasty beer | 9 | EL | 2021-04-11 |
| Jacob's | Mini Cheddars | Original | While I can't say I was particularly overwhelmed by the flavour, I can say that I can see why these "Cheese snack biscuits" have been around so long. There's just something about the strong (albeit processed) cheesey flavour that will always have me coming back. One thing is inevitable - I will be buying these again, maybe in a week, maybe in a year. On a side note the new mini cheddars advert is one to watch, it lays out a pretty dire life for the natives of cheddar town who are constantly being hunted and killed... really makes you think | Any drink to help wash out the biscuit remnants from your teeth. (Water works well; other drinks untested) | 8 | ML | 2021-04-12 |
| Golden Wonder | Transform-A-Snack | Saucy BBQ | Transform-A-Snack. The illustration on the packet shows how these crisps can be assembled together to make a car. When I tried this, however, the wheels would not stay on. The flavour isn't anything to write home about either | not really anything tbh | 2 | CW | 2021-04-13 |
| Mackies of Scotland | Lentil Wave | Barbeque | Another very nice crisp from Mackies of Scotland. As nice and crunchy as the Sea salt potato crisps, but with a nice lentil twist. BBQ is flavour isnt overpowering, and enough salt to give them a nice twist. Well done, Mackies! | Anything Lentils would go with. Or BBQ. | 9 | CS | 2021-04-13 |
| McCoy's | Fire Pit | Flame smoked chorizo | Basically just takes like smoky bacon but with spice. Not bad but any means but the packaging and branding indicated a new flavour experience. It loses points for lack of originality | Marvel products latest episode | 7 | WH | 2021-04-17 |
| McCoy's | Fire Pit | Flame Roasted Peri Peri | Unlike the other entry into the McCoy's Fire Pit range which I have tried, the Flame Roasted Peri Peri was a pleasant surprise. A nice persistent heat, as to be expected, but the spice had a nice fruity flavour to it. | Coding | 9 | WH | 2021-04-18 |
| Sainsburys | Rings | Onion | I flew too close to the sun and let my curiousity get the best of me. They taste like the base-line for onion rings. Very crunchy, very strong flavour but that flavour is not necessarily great. Another poor show from Sainsburys | Hubris and Grim Facination | 4 | CS | 2021-04-18 |
| Walkers | 100% Great British Potatoes | Tomato Ketchup | Did Walkers not have a partnership with Heinz at some point? These crisps are not branded with Heinz, and taste more like the watery stuff you get from fish and chip shops. Very similar to the taste of Prawn Cocktail, but with a slight tomato twist. | think i just need a glass of water | 6.2 | CW | 2021-04-19 |
| McCoy's | Fire Pit | Flame Roasted Peri Peri | a delicate, zesty mix of spices, these crisps are a breath of fresh air for tanginess fans. While the flavour is lovely there is not nearly enough on even the most laden crisps to justify giving this a higher score. A tasty crisp let down by a diluted flavour | fresh, crisp lager | 6 | SM | 2021-04-22 |
| Golden Wonder | Spicy Bikers | Spicy flavour | Surprisingly sweet. A bit of an odd taste, but not unpleasant. I don't know why they're wheels.
Alright for a £1 corner shop crisp | Something nicer | 5 | CS | 2021-04-22 |
| McCoy's | Fire Pit | Flame Scorched BBQ Rib | One of the only meat flavoured crisps to really wow me. Most are just variations of salt, smoke, and umami, these crisps have a good depth of flavour while still having enough interesting tastes to keep it enjoyable. Expected much less, pleasantly surprised | something sweet to offset the salt | 7 | SM | 2021-04-23 |
| McCoy's | Fire Pit | Flame Smoked Chorizo | Disappointing. lacking in any kind of flavour past paprika these crisps aren't even exceptionally bad, just boring. They taste like a somehow worse quality BBQ saucer with half the flavour removed. A reminder of the mediocrity of the failed fire pit crisp line | just don't | 4 | SM | 2021-04-23 |
| Walkers | Wotsits | Sizzling Steak | A measley attempt at meat flavour crisps. Barely any flavour combined with the barely any texture composition of wotsits leads to a miserable affair, akin to chewing through a big bag of packing foam. Avoid | Don't | 0 | WH | 2021-04-24 |
| Hula Hoops | Flava Rings | Tangy Cheese | "Flava Rings", in contrast to the regular Hula Hoops that we all know and love, are large and puffy. The cheese flavouring pairs very nicely with the airiness of the crisps, resulting in a very pleasant -though not particularly original- eating experience. These crisps are uncannily similar to Wotsits in both taste and texture, and are well worth a look into. | 2 BLTs | 6.5 | CW | 2021-04-28 |
| Sainsburys | Crispies | Bacon | They're ok. They aren't that bacony, but they are crispy in that familiar corn way. | A nice pizza to offset the mediocrity | 4 | CS | 2021-04-28 |
| Pom-Bear | Potato Snacks | Original | Don't rate these at all. flavour is very bland. Individual crisps are too crunchy to be enjoyable. Any positives? They're shaped like bears, I guess... | being 26 years old | 2 | CW | 2021-04-30 |
| Lorenz Snack-World | Crunchips X-CUT | Salted | The first thing you notice with these crisps is that they are very clearly foreign. Dark Blue packet means Salted? Pah, not on our continent!
The second thing you notice is that they claim "Where there is Crunchips, there is PARTY". Unfortunately, there is no party. There is only some alright ready salted crisps in a decent crunchy and ridged pattern. Overall, just fine. Foreign can be normal | Anything good old british crisps with pair with | 5 | CS | 2021-05-08 |
| Golden Wonder | Spicy Bikers | Spicy flavour | As Barry has already mentioned in his review, the crisps are sweet in flavour, not spicy. The flavouring of these crisps is too chemical for me to enjoy, but the wheels in the bag are a fun shape to eat. Do not be fooled, however, the wheels are NOT FUNCTIONAL. They are too wide in the middle to be gyroscopically stable, and they will topple before they have even reached a few centimetres. The crisps are described on the packaging as "wheely great". Although I do appreciate a good pun, I cannot agree with this statement. | Golden Wonder Barbecue Saucers | 4 | CW | 2021-05-09 |
| Golden Wonder | Saucers | Barbeque | A very high quality product. The crisps have a deliciously rich barbeque flavour, especially enjoyable when combined with the airy, crunchy shapes that make up the bag. I believe that Golden Wonder is finally living up to its name. | Golden Wonder Spicy flavour Spicy Bikers - for contrast | 7.9 | CW | 2021-05-09 |
| Eat Real | Hummus Chips | Sour Cream & Chives | So many conflicting flavours that seem to come one after another. The initial taste is somewhat like Quavers (not bad for hummus squeezed into shell shapes), but this flavour vanishes almost instantly to make way for a series of truly unpleasant aftertastes. Avoid. | don't | 2 | CW | 2021-05-10 |
| Walkers | Walkers | Flamin' Hot | I was surprised with these - they're not too bad. They taste nice and smoky. They have a little kick to them, but aren't too hot. Probably won't be getting them again, but I enjoyed them more than I thought I would. | a mild lunch | 3.8 | CW | 2021-05-12 |
| Smiths | Chipsticks | Salt 'n' Vinegar | The salt and vinegar taste is slightly on the bland side, but the lack of intense flavour makes them very moreish. The crisps are nice enough for 39p, but you're not eating crisps on a budget, are you? Probably best to shell out for something better. | tuna wraps | 6 | CW | 2021-05-14 |
| Walkers | French Fries | Salt & vinegar | A tasty crisp, different to the standard potato crisp in both its shape and texture. It has a solid snap to it initially, with a good crunch after. It's easier to eat a single "fry" than with usual crisps, thus making each "fry" feel more significant. I would say that this is the most important asset of the French Fry, but my opinion has been affected by other factors which I will outline below.
flavouring is evenly distributed along the "fry" itself and also across the packet of "fries" as a whole, with little flavouring lost by way of sticking to the bag. There is also minimal loss through the "fries" breaking up into bits, unlike standard crisps, which is also a positive. The flavouring itself is quite basic but enjoyable.
Portion-wise, one bag was perfect, although that would be affected by external factors like hunger.
Overall, although it is a solid crisp, and I did enjoy them, I would not want to eat "French Fries" as my only type of crisp as I feel that the novelty would wane over time. | Anything really, it's not strong enough to clash much. | 6 | EL | 2021-05-16 |
| The Curators | Pork Puffs | Original Salted | With the name "pork puffs", I expected something grander than a regular packet of pork scratchings. These taste exactly like any other pork scratchings you have ever had. If you have never had pork scratchings before, they taste of fluffy salt. | the gym, the pub, everything in between, handmade in the uk | 3 | CW | 2021-05-19 |
| Mackies of Scotland | Potato Crisps | Pickled Onion | Wonderful, full bodied flavour. Most pickled onion crisps go hard on the vinegar and light on the onion, but not these. A good mix of tangy and savoury that is only let down by Mackies uniformly awful "mashed potato" texture | water to wash the flavourless funk from your mouth afterwards | 6 | SM | 2021-05-20 |
| Jacob | Wee Cheddars | Strathdon B|lue Cheese | cheesier than your average mini cheddar, these "wee" crisps have a stronger flavour than one would've thought. The flavour seems to 50% mini-CHEDDAR, and 50% a not entirely disgusting blue cheese seasoning. The more i eat the more i like the flavour. Wins points for novelty | really nothing i can think of that would work with these | 7 | SM | 2021-05-20 |
| Golden Wonder | Saucers | Sour Cream & Onion | The crisps have a pleasant tangy flavour -almost zesty- that builds up as the bag is eaten. The onion that is supposedly in the crisps does not really come through, but the sour cream is there in enough quantity for the crisps to be enjoyable. Once again, the shape of the saucers is perfect for making the crisps feel substantial without being too filling. Unfortunately, this variety of Saucers cannot compare to the vastly superior Barbecue flavour, but it is still a fairly good snack in its own right. | lunch at 2:48 | 5 | CW | 2021-05-25 |
| Co-op | Irresistible | Hand Cooked Korean Style Fried Chicken | I can't say how much these taste like Korean Style Fried Chicken, as i've never had any before, but these crisps are a nice twist on the typical formula. Some good spices and nice and crispy. | Anything Korean Style Fried Chicken would pair with | 7 | CS | 2021-06-02 |
| Snyder's | Pretzel Pieces | Jalapeño | The pieces in the bag are smashed into a variety of different sizes, giving a unique shape and weight to each one that you eat. Unfortunately, however, the crisps are let down by their taste. As far as I can tell, the pieces have no flavour outside of salt and spice. There may be a tiny undertone of jalap somewhere, but if I have to look for it, it isn't enough. | BRING BACK THE BUFALLO ONES PLEASE, SNYDERS | 3.5 | CW | 2021-06-02 |
| Snyder's | Pretzel Pieces | Jalapeño | Ignore the other reviewer, these are sublime in texture and taste, a pleasant warmth and salty flavour, with an exceptional crunch. The flavour isn't pure spice, there is a strong and fresh Jalapeno flavour. In addition, the naturally jagged nature of the pretzel lends itself to capture little nuggets of seasoning | Anything | 9 | WH | 2021-06-05 |
| Yushoi | Oven Baked Pea Snaps | Sweet Chilli with lemon | A very interesting crisp-like. Nicely balanced flavour, not too spicey, not too sweet. Lemon isn't overpowering.
The fact they're made from peas ia a bit weird, but there isnt an intense pea flavour, so its quite a nice change. | Divinity Original Sin 2 | 7 | CS | 2021-06-07 |
| Walkers | Limited Edition Footy Favourites | Hot Shot! Hot Dog | May have to give out my first 1/10 for this one. Emma ate one and had to spit it out. I didn't finish the bag. | Football | 1 | CW | 2021-06-08 |
| Walkers | Limited Edition Footy Favourites | Hot Shot! Hot Dog | I've quite happily eaten snails, frogs' legs, and offal, but was actually retching after tasting a crumb of this. 0/10 literally could not consume. | Poor taste (so football) | 0 | EL | 2021-06-08 |
| Cheetos | Cheetos | Football (Cheese) | They were nice enough. Very similar to regular cheetos (for obvious reason) but overall better, as they didnt get powder everywhere and were less of a pain to eat. | Gaming, Films, Everything Cheetos would, Not Sports | 5 | CS | 2021-06-14 |
| Bobby's | Sticky BBQ Ribs | BBQ | They're like slightly more solid wotsits but with a lovely BBQ taste. Quite sweet, but not overpowering. Would recommend for anyone looking for something a bit different | A disappointing lunch | 7 | CS | 2021-06-15 |
| Hula Hoops | Big Hoops | Salted | Remember when you were a kid and you used to put Hula Hoops on your fingers? Remember as you got older, and your hands got bigger, that they would no longer fit? Remember how sad it made you thinking that you would never put a Hula Hoop on your finger again? That you had put the last one on your finger, and you never knew it? Hula Hoops' Big Hoops allow you to revisit that part of your childhood, but this time with your grown-up hands. They fit on my fingers anyway. | Adult Sized Hands | 8 | CW | 2021-06-15 |
| Awfully Posh | Pork Crackling | Sea Salt | A good solid pork scratching product. A nice salt flavour, but not too much to be overpowering, however in texture they are delightfully consistent. A lesser quality pork scratching product would have a wide variety of thick and thin bits, with some beats very crispy and dry and some with a revolting wet gooey interior. These however all hit a pleasant middle ground. | Rum and Coke, any pub environment, darts, footie | 8 | WH | 2021-06-15 |
| Bobby's | Snack Mix | BBQ Sauce | With a nice, strong barbecue flavour, and rigid, crispy pieces, this snack mix is a delight to eat. The four different shapes in the bag provide enough variety to keep the snack interesting well into the bag. | the relentless scottish sun | 7.1 | CW | 2021-06-24 |
| Bobby | Snax | Beefy | The "snax" in the bag seem to be the exact same shape as the "Saucers" line by Golden Wonder, except that half of the shapes were smashed in the packet. In this reviewer's opinion, this is one of the most satisfying shapes to eat in the current crisp market. The flavouring of these crisps is deliciously salty and meaty. I would definitely recommend giving them a go if you happen to come across a packet. | something light - maybe a soup? | 7.8 | CW | 2021-07-05 |
| Walkers | Bugles | Cheese | The first few bugles seem ok, but after about a handful, the unpleasantness of the cheese powder starts to become unbearable. | a bin | 2.4 | CW | 2021-07-16 |
| Golden Wonder | Ringos | Salt & Vinegar | Low on salt, and low on vinegar, the flavour of the Ringos is far from overpowering. Rather than making the crisps bland, however, the muted flavours actually make the crisps really moreish. The Ringos in the bag are flatter than you would expect, and do not come in uniform shapes. This makes the packet fun and enjoyable. | a familiar film perhaps | 5.9 | CW | 2021-07-20 |
| Walkers | Football Favourites | Sour Cream & Sweet Chilli Kicker! | very unusual but very moreish. The only thing that brings to mind a "sweet" chilli is the first bite of these crisps. The sweet opener is ephemeral, disappearing as quickly as england's hopes at a world cup. The underlying flavour, however, is simply excellent, a savoury, spicy taste that is notably different from other similar crisps. Dry heat and savoury flavour make these crisps uniquely delicious. | being hungover | 7 | SM | 2021-07-25 |
| Walkers | Football Favourites | Hot Shot! Hot Dog | a surprising taste that is strangely dissimilar to an actual hot dog. To me it tastes like a fine ketchup crisp with added notes of smoky bacon, reminiscent of hotel breakfasts as a child. A delightful blend of sweet and savoury, I was genuinely surprised by how nice they were. Would buy again | coffee (surprisingly?) | 7.5 | SM | 2021-07-25 |
| KP | Peanuts | Dry Roasted | Feeling rather delicate today, I surveyed my living room for a convenient and easily consumed snack. Imagine my delight upon spotting a sealed pack of KP Dry Roasted Peanuts, Reseal for Freshness, The Nut Nut's Nut. Although they have not healed me completely, the subtle flavours, crunchy texture, and above all, salt, have improved my situation somewhat. I thank whatever kind deities that must be smiling upon me, for how else would these tasty snacks have appeared in my time of need? | ASDA Fair trade Colombian Ground Coffee, phsyical/mental anguish after drinking 2 bottles of wine | 9 | EL | 2021-07-25 |
| Walkers | Football Favourites | Chicken Tackle! Masala | In all my years of crisp tasting i have never tasted anything like this. Walkers, despite everyone and everything telling them not to, have invented a crisp with the flavour of cucumber. Fresh, crisp, and watery, the first thing you take while biting into a Tackle! masala crisp is legitimately the flavour of cucumber. the initial flavour passes rapidly, in what is turning out to be a hallmark of the Football Favourites line. The masala flavour afterwards is slightly spicy, but wholly mediocre. All in all only try these crisps if you want to be astounded at the state of modern science | hendrix and tonic | 4 | SM | 2021-07-29 |
| Walkers | Football Favourites | Steak Pie-nalty | A dissapointing end to the shockingly diverse football favourites line. These crisps taste like any other steak crisp on the market, and offer nothing of the novelty value of the other flavours. Just quite dissapointing. | just dont | 2 | SM | 2021-07-29 |
| Tyrells | Posh Prawn Cocktail | Prawn Cocktail | Not bad. I wouldn't say these were especially posh, but I'm not sure how you make crisps posh.
flavours a bit weak, and the crisps themself have a nice crunch. | a nice lager | 6 | CS | 2021-08-07 |
| Jacob | Mini Cheddars Sticks | Grilled Cheese & Sizzling Steak | flavour is a bit bland. They're just Mini Cheddars but longer. | | 3 | CS | 2021-08-16 |
| Discos | Discos | Salt & Vinegar | Not the worst crisps I have ever eaten (Hot Shot! Hot Dog!), but also not the best. There is an uneven distribution of flavouring among the discos in the bag. Some taste so strongly of vinegar that they are difficult to eat. | day smoking | 4 | CW | 2021-08-18 |
| Seabrook | Loaded Fries | Chilli Heat | Texture is very similiar to Yushoi's Oven Baked Pea Snaps, so i'm a fan. flavour is nice and spicy, could be compared to Flamin' Hot Cheetos. Very nice overall. | a nice refreshing lager beer | 8 | CS | 2021-09-03 |
| Walkers | Monster Munch GIANTS | Roast Beef | They certainly are giant. I dropped one on my desk and there was a lot of debris. They're alright, but with all crisps like these, eating too many in a short period gets a little unpleasant. | Nostalgia | 6 | CS | 2021-09-07 |
| Walkers | Monster Munch GIANTS | Pickled Onion | Not much to say about these. The pickled onion flavour isnt too overpowering, so they're pleasant enough. | Pepsi | 5 | CS | 2021-09-19 |
| Golden Wonder | Fully flavoured | Cheese & Onion | "Fully flavoured" is a bit of an odd thing to list on your packaging, but to their credit none of the crisps in the bag are lacking in flavour. The cheese & onion is nicely meaty in that weird way that cheese & onion often is. My only complaint is that the bags are quite lightly filled - you don't feel completely satisfied after eating the entire packet. | another one of the same | 6 | CW | 2021-09-23 |
| Mackies of Scotland | Potato Crisps | Flamegrilled Aberdeen Angus | So why is it always Aberdeen Angus beef? Is Aberdeen Angus particularly impressive? None-the-less, these are some very nice crisps. Up to the usual Mackies high standard | Maybe a real cow | 8 | CS | 2021-09-24 |
| Mackies of Scotland | Potato Crisps | Tangy Tomato | I'm not overly attached to Tomato crisps, but these are pretty alright. Tangy is a good descriptor. | Other tangy things | 6 | CS | 2021-09-28 |
| Walkers | Walkers | Thai Green Curry | An interesting crisp indeed. While it does manage to offer a surprisingly realistic green thai curry taste, it's simply not got something with a deeper flavour to anchor it. The fragrant lime and floral thai basil come across well, as do the coconut milk and curry spices. The pitfall here has been the exclusion of any "meaty" flavour. Look at other similar crisps, McCoy's Sweet Thai Sweet CHICKEN, Walker's Kickin' CHICKEN Tikka. Other curry based crisps have something more to offer, this one is sorely lacking. While the curry flavour is shockingly good, it really feels like a crisp incomplete. | fruity beer | 7 | SM | 2021-09-29 |
| Seabrook | Seabrook | Lea & Perrins Worcestershire Sauce | I bought these crisps because they are officially sponsored by Lea & Perrins, making them the OFFICIAL worcestershire sauce crisp, at least in this reviewers eyes. The flavour is nice but lacking. I am a big fan of tangy crisps but light, tangy tasting notes are all they offer. They also seem to have quite a bit of sugar added judging by how sweet the flavour is. "Bags of flavour" yeah right. "Made with Pride" only if the crispmakers were gay because there is nothing to be proud of here. Walker's version is better. | strong drinks to wash the taste out | 4 | SM | 2021-09-30 |
| Asda | Potato Sticks | Beefy | The crisps are much longer and thinner than I expected them to be - more or less the size and shape of safety matches. This is not in line at all with what is shown on the packaging, but the unique shape really works in the crisps' favour. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for the flavour. The "beefy" flavouring is entirely generic, with a slight soapy note that taints every bite. I would recommend giving these crisps a go, but only to experience the odd shape. | to be experienced on their own | 5 | CW | 2021-10-01 |
| Walkers | Max | Sizzling Flame Grilled Steak | Pretty good, nothing too special. Walkers seem to be onto something with these ridged crisps, but there isn't a huge amount of flavour to make these that recommendable. | | 5 | CS | 2021-10-13 |
| Tyrells | Hand-cooked English Crisps | Mature Chedder and Chives | I wonder if theres some sort of joke with the name and the image on the bag, which is of some old women holding a big block of cheese. Crisps are very nice though. Not lacking in the cheese and chive flavour, and have a nice texture. | A nice Pasta dish | 7 | CS | 2021-10-13 |
| Waitrose | Christmas Tree Shaped Tortilla Chips | Turkey & Stuffing | Quite nice, Turkey isnt a crisp flavour i've had before. The shape is a fun novelty, but it's a bit early to be eating christmas trees. Not really worth £2 or the trip to Waitrose | Christmas | 7 | CS | 2021-10-17 |
| KP Snacks/Tayto | NiK NAKS | NICE 'N' SPICY | The first thing you notice about these crisps are their strange lack of uniformity - The crazy shapes truely boggle the mind. They certainly have a spicy flavour, but its hard to tell exactly what the spice is. The back of the packet doesnt really shed any light, listing only paprika extract and spice extract. Even immediatly after opening, they taste a bit like a packet thats been left open for a while. Alright overall | A nice crisp beverage | 6 | CS | 2021-10-20 |
| Well & Truly | Crunchies | Really Cheesy | These taste exactly like macaroni and cheese, but are fairly nice once you've gotten over the shock. The undertones are quite pleasing, but the only overtone is floury cheese. | bed | 3 | CW | 2021-10-28 |
| ÜFIT | CRÜNCHERS POPPED PROTEIN CHIPS | Smokehouse BBQ | Very nice BBQ flavour makes these a pretty good contender to brands like Popchips. These claim to be high in fibre and protein, but i'm not sure how. Have a bit of a weird after taste, but not enough to ruin the experience | Excerise, apparently, but im not gonna find out | 6 | CS | 2021-11-02 |
| Walkers | Quavers | Salt & Vinegar | Incredibly misguided - Quavers excel at being Quavers, a simple cheesy gimmick crisp. Slapping another incredibly basic flavour onto a Quaver just feels lazy. The bag boasts they "They're Back!" but honestly, they should just stay wherever they went to. Disappointing. | Nothing | 2 | CS | 2021-11-07 |
| KP | Peanuts | Salt & Vinegar | It's the classic Salt and Vinegar taste we all know and love but simply on peanuts instead of crisps. The peanuts are all of reasonable size, no dud ones, and the flavour is good. The highlight of the bag comes at the end when you can empty all the powder onto a spoon and cause your mouth sheer pain with the vinegar powder. 10/10 | Anything | 10 | WH | 2021-11-10 |
| Asda | Onion Rings | N/A | These onion rings look, feel, and taste exactly as you would expect - like onion rings. The flavour is maybe a bit milder than the standard, but other than that, there's not much to comment on. Sorry. | The Orkney Brewery "Corncrake" Golden Ale - Fruity, Irresistible, Crisp | 3 | CW | 2021-11-12 |
| Seabrook | Loaded Bites | BBQ Beef | Imagine biting into a packaging peanut. Imagine that packaging peanut tasted very convincingly of BBQ Beef. But at the end of the day, you swallowed a packaging peanut. These crisps are just like that. | Moving fragile, yet beefy, household goods | 6 | CS | 2021-11-13 |
| Cheetos | Cheetos | Cheese | Very nice. The cheese flavouring is delicious, and stays with you for a long time after eating. The crisps in the bag are pleasantly soft, without being too squishy. Overall, the bag is filling, but still leaves you wanting more. High quality crisp. | big tidy | 7 | CW | 2021-11-16 |
| Popchips | Popped not fried | Thai Sweet Chilli | Pretty nice. They have a texture and aftertaste similar to Quavers. Could do with more Thai Sweet chilli flavouring. Reminds me of all the popchip flavours that we have lost. | Crisp related Melancholy | 5 | CS | 2021-11-20 |
| Popchips | Popped not fried | Barbeque | Better than the Thai Sweet chilli flavour, they didn't skimp on the flavouring for the Barbeque version. | More crisp related Melancholy | 6 | CS | 2021-11-21 |
| Pringles | Sizzl'n EXTRA HOT | Cheese & Chilli | Shockingly, Pringles have delivered a crisp-like that is actually spicy. They taste mostly like spice with a hint of cheese, but honestly, they're perfect with a nice refreshing lager beer. The tubes are still stupid though, how can anyone actually fit their hand in these. | A cold lager beer | 8 | CS | 2021-11-25 |
| Sainsbury | Taste the Difference | Roast Turkey & Herb Stuffing | Excellent. Tastes like 30% of a good christmas dinner in one handy bag. | The other 70% of a traditional christmas dinner | 8 | CS | 2021-11-27 |
| Co Op | Dirty Fries | N/A | When I bought the bag, I thought that these were chip shaped wedges of potato, fried into crisps. I should have looked closer at the bag, though, as they are in fact square-shaped hollow tubes. The crisps have an intensely fake cheese flavour that makes them unpleasant to eat. Not worth getting. | N/A | 2 | CW | 2021-12-01 |
| Space Raiders | Space Raiders | Beef flavour Cosmic Corn Snakcs | These taste totally galactic. Fun shape, with a taste that starts off relatively unpleasant artificial, but grows on you as you get through the bag. Taste the cosmos | Water that is sourced from the milky way | 4 | CS | 2021-12-04 |
| Mackies of Scotland | Mackies | boxing day curry (festive flavour) | These crisps taste like chinese curry sauce. not sure if a boxing day curry is traditional. Quite an aromatic flavour builds up after a few of these, which is not unpleasant, and actually quite moreish | Coming inside from the cold | 7 | WH | 2021-12-05 |
| Tyrells | Hand-cooked English Crisps | Sweet Chilli & Red Pepper | Incredible. Strong flavour, Nice spice with a great sweetness. Great texture. This is everything a crisp should want to be. | Anything that goes well with Spice | 9 | CS | 2021-12-14 |
| Taki's | Fuego | Chilli and Lime Artificial | They certainly do taste like Lime. Just an intense burst of bitter lime and spice, then thats followed by a horrible oily taste with every bite. They're made by Bimbo Donuts in Spain and imported by Colour Bramd, and honestly, i wish they'd just let Bimbo Donuts keep them. Only redeeming factor is the spice, but you can get better tasting things. | No | 2 | CS | 2021-12-15 |
| Seabrook | The Original Crinkle Cut | Beefy | The brown Shimapan pattern on these crisps serve as a warning sign to warn you that these crisps taste shit and pants. | Fortnite Crowned Victory Royales | 2 | CS | 2021-12-23 |
| Tesco | Finest | Lightly sea salted | Nice | Beer | 9 | WH | 2021-12-25 |
| Walkers | Taste Icons | Madras Curry | These crisps boast to support local restaurants through using flavours inspired by local restuarants. "Ha," I thought "I bet these arent from anywhere near here", Forgetting i live in the capital. Turns out they're inspired by a restaurant in Loanhead.
Interesting origin aside, these are alright. It's interesting to have a curry crisp with so much going on. A solid new flavour, I can see myself getting these again. | A nice cold Lager | 7 | CS | 2022-01-04 |
| Waitrose | Waitrose | Sea Salt | Good texture with good crunch. However it is almost indistinguishable to a kettle crisp | Waiting for the exodia deck to finish | 7 | WH | 2022-01-06 |
| Doritos | Corn Chips | Chilli Heatwave | Despite being a staple of gaming and the sesh for many years, Doritos are shockingly underreviewed. Chilli Heatwave manages to stand the test of time and remains a perfectly viable crisp. Sweet and Spicy in a nice easy to handle shape. Perhaps a little dusty? | The Sesh and The Gaming | 7 | CS | 2022-01-08 |
| Walkers | Giant Wotsits | Really Cheesy | I'm not sure i understand this new thing that Walkers is doing - Why not just have a bag full of more normal sized crisps? Why do they have to be so big? Gimmick aside, they're just Wotsits. Do you like Wotsits? Then you'll probably like these. If you don't, then don't bother. I like Wotsits, but these just don't really have a reason to exist. i'd rather have a big bag of regular sized crisps. | Regular Sized Wotsits | 5 | CS | 2022-01-10 |
| Mackies of Scotland | Potato Crisps | Lorne Sausage & Brown Sauce | These are an interesting flavour, but they're mostly just Brown sauce with a tiny hint of sausage. Lorne sausages don't really taste any different to regular sausages. I'd only really recommend these if you really like Brown sauce. | A meaty meal | 5 | CS | 2022-01-12 |
| Hula Hoops | Hula Hoops | BBQ Beef | I've just eaten 6 packets of Hula Hoops in a row, so they must be good, right? Even the weakest flavour in the multipack - beef - was superb. Everything from the meaty taste to the loud crunch in your ears is enjoyable, but I'm pretty sure this is news to no one. | King Weed - Conquerors of the Light, Collection Part IV | 7 | CW | 2022-01-13 |
| Walkers | Max | Kentucky Fried Chicken | They're quite nice. Have a taste similar to KFC Poppers. Not as good as the Double Crunch Zingers. Pretty good in their own right. | Soggy chips and a hangover | 6 | CS | 2022-01-14 |
| Sainsbury's | Tortilla Chips | Lightly Salted | Lighty Salted is a lie. These things are saltier than (Insert joke here)! Good when used for Nachos, as i imagine they were intended, not so great on their own. Overall, very very standard, but for 90p, I didn't expect much else. | Bolognese, Chilli, Cheese, Salsa, Your usual Nacho ensemble | 3 | CS | 2022-01-14 |
| Sainsbury's | Crunchy Sticks | Salt & Vinegar | I need to stop trying these cheap Sainsburys crisps. There's no salt in these horrid little sticks, just vinegar and corn. Not inedible, but christ, just spend an extra 20p and get something much much nicer | Anything to wash away the vinegar | 2 | CS | 2022-01-15 |
| Mackies of Scotland | Mackies | Tangy Tomato | Disappointing. The usual texture problems Mackies suffer from aside (which I am aware is controversial) the tomato taste on these is very mild, and in fact they taste mostly of worcestershire sauce and salt. The flavour never seems to build up though.
Emptying the dense flavour crumbs at the end of the bag into my mouth invoked a flavour hit which I was hoping the rest of the bag would invoke | A BLT | 4 | WH | 2022-01-19 |
| Happy Shopper | Burger Bites | Beef | Do you remember those flash games where you were tasked with following customer orders to build burgers and you could stack stuff as high as you wanted? This tastes like one burger patty and 10+ dollops of mayonnaise. I don't like mayonnaise. Disgusting. | Mayonnaise, informally mayo, is a French loanword for a thick, creamy sauce or dressing commonly used on sandwiches, hamburgers, composed salads, and French fries. It also forms the base for various other sauces, such as tartar sauce, fry sauce, remoulade, salsa golf, and rouill | 1 | CS | 2022-01-19 |
| Walkers | Legendary | Ready Salted | "Legendary" ready salted? What's that? Is that some kind of new line by Walkers? No. It's just regular ready salted. I don't know why they put "legendary" on the packet. I would consider these to be the baseline for all other crisps to be measured. They are very enjoyable, but there's not a whole lot going on. | to be used as a snack while you're making lunch | 5 | CW | 2022-01-20 |
| Doritos | Corn Chips | Tangy Cheese | American's legitimately believe that cheese tastes like this. This is the sort of thing you'd squirt out of a can. It's like cheese if it was HYPER CHARGED. Cheese rants aside, these are nice. Not the best dorito flavour, and get a bit sickly after a while, but still a valid purchase. Your fingers will get extremely dusty. | Some nice soap to wash away the dust | 6 | CS | 2022-01-20 |
| Walkers | Sensations | Thai Sweet Chilli | Lovely. Very sharp sweet chilli flavour. Like biting a big crispy chilli. | Anything probably | 8 | CS | 2022-01-23 |
| The Reak McCoys | Ridge Cut | Thai Sweet Chicken | An extreme misstep from the usually great McCoys. Horribly sweet with a very odd not quite right spice flavour. Would not recommend in any capacity. | Anything to distract from the flavour | 2 | CS | 2022-01-26 |
| Manomasa | Tortillas with spirit | Chipotle & Lime | Pretty nice. Bit too limey. Tortillas themselves are good. | Water | 5 | CS | 2022-01-30 |
| Przysnacki - Dobre Bo Nasze | Pranzynki | O Smaku Bekon | Just to clarify, I have absolutely no idea if the details I have provided for brand, name or flavour are correct, mostly due to the fact I can't read Polish.
Regarding the actual crisp, these are lovely. Unlike similar kinda of Bacon Crisps, these are big, crunchy and very Bacon-y. You get a lot in the bag for the relatively low asking price, even despite the fact that this is an imported product. I would highly recommend giving these a shot if you can find them | Zubar, Tyskie, Karpackie, Perla Pils | 8 | CS | 2022-02-02 |
| Hula Hoops | Big Hoops | Iconic Barbecue Beef | I'm not exactly sure what they mean by "Iconic", as they taste very very similar if not identical to the Ridged McCoys flame grilled steak flavour so those are the obvious comparison.
Compared to the McCoys greasiness, the hula hoops are dry, and have the classic hula hoops reconstituted potato mouthfeel. This actually adds to the dry-rub steak taste, and are preferrable to the McCoys.
Interestingly this bag contained a misfabrication hoop, which was misshapen and came with around 3x the amount of flavour coating on it. This was a very nice crisp, and actually much nicer than the proper-shaped ones.
I wouldnt want to consume a full bag of the 3x flavoured type, but it does imply that the rest of the hoops could have used at least a little bit more flavour-dust.
Good and solid, not exceptional, but enjoyable nonetheless | Adult sized hands who like some flavour | 7 | WH | 2022-02-04 |
| Well & Truly | Crunchies | Sour Cream & Onion | These claim to be a naughty new flavour, and i can see why. They're so soury creamy and oniony. They are also well and truly crunchy. Might be a bit much for one sitting, but a nice change to the standard crisp. | being by yourself so nobody else is subjected to these crisps smell | 6 | CS | 2022-02-09 |
| Well & Truly | Crunchies | Really Cheesy | The knobbly, nik-nak looking shapes would probably be really nice if they weren't coated in horrible cheese. They have the same problem as all corn-based crisps, that your teeth get coated in starch, but this is not too big of an issue. What is too big of an issue, however, is the terrible fake cheese flavour. It is fake enough to make the whole experience unpleasant, but not so bad that the bag is inedible. I could not in good conscience recommend these crisps to anybody, but I did manage to eat the whole bag myself. Ultimately, it is my own fault for picking the cheese bag. | nah | 3 | CW | 2022-02-10 |
| Cheetos | Twisted | Flamin' Hot | Very standard corn puffs twisted into impossible and mad shapes. Very nice spicy flavouring. Lots of verys. Overall, great. Maybe a bit expenive at £1 a bag, but worth the cost. | Final Fantasy 7 - Disc 2 | 8 | CS | 2022-02-14 |
| Walkers | Max | Fiercly Flaming Hot | These are not flaming hot. There are Tomato and Paprika with maybe a bit of chilli? Not particularly bad, but I just wish crisps would stop advertising themselves as hot when they're slightly spicey. Disappointing. | Spicier Crisps | 5 | CS | 2022-02-18 |
| Pipers | Made by Farmers | Cider Vinegar & Sea Salt | Like with most Salt and Vinegar crisps, theres more vinegar here than anything else. However, this works well in this crisps favour, as this cider vinegar is lovely. If you want something a little different to your standard walkers crisp, these come highly recommended. Give them a go. | Pizza | 7 | CS | 2022-02-21 |
| Pipers | Made by Farmers | Anglesey Sea Salt | These are contenders for the best Salted crisps. I really feel like I need to go back and have a bag of Mackies to see which is better. Maybe a blind taste test. Incredible Salted Crisps. | Mackies of Scotland Sea Salt | 9 | CS | 2022-02-24 |
| Cheetos | Spirals | cheese with ketchup | Perhaps the strangest crisp I have ever eaten. The name "Crisps" suggests that a "Crisp" must be crisp. You should feel a bite. Cheetos Spirals defy that. These feel like biting into a cotton bud, almost become more like a powder with every bite. I sincerely feel that these have to be tasted to be believed.
The combination of cheese and ketchup isn't as strange as it might sound, creating an oddly sweet cheesy flavour. | Curiousity | 7 | CS | 2022-03-06 |
| JüBI - Your Yummy Buddy | Corn Puffs | Pizza | These are like bigger, softer Wotsits. Not quite as soft as Cheetos Spirals, but they don't really have a crunch like other corn puff style crisps. These taste very much like a very cheap, salty and maybe over-seasoned pizza, like the sort of mini pizza you might have in Happy (or maybe it was Harry) Hippos in Mintlaw 20 years ago. Not enough flavour to fully cover the puffs, which makes it feel like eating slightly pizza'd packaging peanuts. | Those weird little smily face potato things that probably dont exist anymore | 5 | CS | 2022-03-16 |
| Proper Chips | LENTiL CHiPS | Barbequeue | Very tasty barbequeue flavouring, but very few crisps in the bag. The small number and airiness of the crisps combines to make the snack quite unfilling. In the entire bag there are only 97 kilocalories, which is not enough for my 12 o'clock snack. | bread, bacon, tomato, lettuce, mayonaise, bread - in that order | 6 | CW | 2022-03-18 |
| N/A (I can't read chinese) | 3mm something (Can't read chinese) | Intensely sweet but still incredibly spicy | I have absolutely no idea what these crisps are. They might contain something illegal in the EU. Theyre a little soft. All of these negatives mean absolutely nothing. My life is now dedicated to tracking these crisps down. | Lager and odd chinese medication | 10 | CS | 2022-03-21 |
| CoFresh | flavoured Potato Snack | Jalapeno Grills | These are very interesting. They taste like denser Quavers. Not much in the way of complex flavouring, as these taste of Jalapeno and Jalapeno only. For 50p, these were incredibly worthwhile. | A curry | 7 | CS | 2022-03-23 |
| Koikeya | Original Premium Japanese Potato Crisps | Teriyaki | The back of the bag tells me that the Japanese call crisps "Potechi". These taste like Teriyaki. Nice and crispy. Nothing hugely special, but I like Teriyaki, so I like these. | Education and Fun Facts | 8 | CS | 2022-03-25 |
| Walkers | Wotsits Max Crunch | Flamin | These are just nik naks but way nicer | aneem | 10 | WH | 2022-03-26 |
| McCoy | Ridge Cut | Flame Grilled Steak | Nice. Very standard steak flavoured crisp. As always, the ridge cut McCoys are excellent. | Funny Pranks and Tricks | 7 | CS | 2022-04-01 |
| M&S -FOOD- | Hand Cooked Crisps | Lightly Sea Salted | There's an episode of Red Dwarf with a machine that duplicates objects- one using the best aspects, and one using all the worst. These are like if you shoved walkers into the duplicator, but the output are slightly above and slightly below average. They're nice. But they're just salted crisps | Star Trek | 5.5 | CS | 2022-04-03 |
| Wotsits | Crunchy | Really Cheesy | They're like Nik-naks, but not like Wotsits at all. I don't think the cheese flavour fits things that aren't Wotsits. Generally ok, but the spicy ones are much much better | Lunch | 6 | CS | 2022-04-04 |
| Salty Dog | The hand-cooked crisps that bite back | Sea Salt | Pretty good. Given the name, I expected something much crunchier. Very clearly made with Sunflower Oil. Can't really taste the dog though. | Being locked out | 6 | CS | 2022-04-11 |
| Salty Dog | The hand-cooked crisps that bite back | Ham and Wholegrain Mustard | Imagine salt and vinegar crisps, but replace salt with ham, and vinegar with mustard. Overpowering, in my opinion. Not the best, but a real departure from your standard bag of walkers. | Anything that can wash away the Mustard | 5 | CS | 2022-04-12 |
| Ikea | Festligt | Potato Chips With Salt | Much like everything in Ikea, this is good value for a somewhat generic product. I'd say a bit too (salty) for my liking, but they do have a nice (crunch). About halfway through the (bag), the (oily taste) gets a bit much for me. Overall though, I got what I paid for. This review can be applied to basically every Ikea product by switching the words in brackets | Spending 10 minutes trying to screw in a screw that hasnt been aligned correctly and then getting really mad | 5 | CS | 2022-04-17 |
| Walkers | Max | Crispy Chicken | Much like all the other Max lines of Walkers, the crisps themselves are very nice. I wouldn't describe the flavour as crispy, but they have certainly got the chicken part right (although it is that weird chicken flavour that doesn't really taste like chicken). These are alright, but I found them a little lacking. I think they would have been a bit better with even just a touch of spice. | Spice | 6 | CS | 2022-04-21 |
| Tesco Finest | Crinkle Cut | Lightly Sea Salted | Another incredibly strong contender for the crown of best Salted crisps. These crisps are so incredibly crunchy, easily rivaling Walkers Double Crunch. £1 for a pretty big bag, and no crisp goes unsalted. Supermarket crisps are usually disappointing, but Tesco have come out with a surprising dark horse. | Dark Hay | 9 | CS | 2022-04-23 |
| Co Op | Irresistible | Margherita Pizza | Surprisingly basil-forward. These actually taste more like pesto than pizza, with some cheese notes coming through. cant taste much of the supposed tomato | Revising SQL | 7 | WH | 2022-05-01 |
| Ikea | Festligt | Pickled Mushroom | I bought these at Ikea because I was certain that I would never see this flavour again. Very much avoided eating these, because i was also certain they'd be fuckin weird. Surprisingly, they're actually very nice. Not really sure how to describe the flavour, but i'd say to give these a shot next time you're buying a GRUPPSPEL, a VITPYROLA or if you're just browsing to find your new favourite LIKSIDIG and ANLEDNING set. Recommended for the crisp fan who has tried everything | VÅFFLOR and AHLGRENS BILAR | 7 | CS | 2022-05-02 |
| Kettle | Hand Cooked Potato Chips | Sweet Chilli & Sour Cream | These taste like sour cream and sweet chilli. Kettle crisps are nice. Good combo. I wish big shops sold more weird flavours. | Crisps | 6 | CS | 2022-05-08 |
| Golden Cross | Johnny's Onion Rings | Onion | I haven't eaten these yet. This is a pre-review section, solely to point out that instead of a little blurb about the crisps, Golden Cross instead opt to have information on how to complain and return their product on the back of the bag, which doesn't give me much confidence that these will be any good. We now move onto the real review. These crisps are quite soft and incredibly salty, which seems odd for onion rings. I can't comment on how oniony they are, as its hard to taste anything other than salt, and there is nobody nearby to smell them. Overall, Golden Cross have disappointed, from the moment I looked at the bag to finishing the bag. These are cheap, and they act it. If you like onion rings, pay a little more and get something better. | Cash, English, Depp and flipping it inside out and using it again | 4 | CS | 2022-05-19 |
| Seabrook | The Original Crinkle Cut | Ham | Pretty nice, but I'm not entirely convinced they taste of ham - which is maybe for the best? Flavour is pretty weak, but these crisps claim to be "The Original Crinkle Cut". It's not exactly clear if they are making the claim that they invented the crinkle cut, but if they did, crispmakers around the world owe them a tremendous debt. | Early morning ambition | 4 | CW | 2022-05-19 |
| Pringles | Sizzl'n SPICY | Spicy Chorizo | These are indeed Spicy and Chorizo. The tube is very accurate. But the tube is also very thin. Please take this into consideration when you are purchasing your Savoury Snack. | Banishing two to summon Shenshen | 8 | CS | 2022-05-21 |
| Walkers | Wotsits Giants | Prawn Cocktail | These are nice. The prawn cocktail flavour slowly builds up and is very pleasant with the light texture. They still get stuck in your teeth though, -3 | Ten nents la g erbe er | 6 | Wh | 2022-05-21 |
| Tesco Finest | Hand Cooked Crisps | Mature Chedder & Red Onion | Very nice. Neither the chedder or onion flavours are overpowering. Very crunchy too, which is a plus. | Lager | 8 | CS | 2022-05-27 |
| Walkers | Sizzling | Smoky Bacon | I don't think people are fair on the flavour of smoky bacon. It's one of the classics, yet nobody ever seems to get it. For what it's worth, this packet is exactly what I needed right now. Nice smoky and salty taste with a meaty edge that makes them quite filling. I would like to thank Emma for hotspotting me so that I could write this review. Kirkwall Airport won't let me on the WiFi unless I respond to a verification email - an email I am unable to access without WiFi. Fucking joke. EDITOR'S NOTE: The hotspot did not allow me to upload this review, so there is actually nobody that I would like to thank. | Hangover (I would not recommend this pairing) | 7 | CW | 2022-05-30 |
| Walkers | Sensations | Baked Cheese and Honey | A new entry to the Walkers Sensations range, limited time only apparently.
As for the flavour of these, cheese is the main thing you taste. They are very cheesy and it tastes like the type of cheese that would really smell if it was real cheese and in fact I struggle to notice any sort of honey in them. There might be a slightly sweet after taste buried in that strong cheese flavour, but it certainly doesnt taste like honey | Morning gaming after a bit of a hangover | 4 | WH | 2022-05-30 |
| Walkers | Sensations | Baked Cheese and Honey | I will disagree with the above review on only one note - I would say you can taste the honey, but it certainly doesn't improve things. I'm not a big fan of whatever cheese flavour they're trying to emulate. Not the worst thing I've ever eaten, and I do appreciate the effort to try something new with flavours, but crisps being this sweet is a dark and dangerous path. | Not being hungover, Cheers for the invite Lads | 4 | CS | 2022-05-30 |
| Walkers | Monster Munch | Flamin' Hot | Monster Munch are much better at this size. The giant ones are a little much. Perhaps unsurprisingly, there aren't very "flamin' hot" - They taste like a splash of very mild hot sauce with a lot of sweetness to dilute the already mild flavour. This is to be expected from crisps aimed at children, i suppose, but at least don't pretend that they're hot with a name like that. These are much better in the fantastic spicy Mix Ups, but on their own, they're fine. Nothing special. | The other crisps in a bag of Mix Ups | 5 | CS | 2022-06-01 |
| Walkers | Sensations | Roast Pork and Apple | The partner to the "Baked Honey and Cheese" new sensations flavours. These are quite possibly the worst crisps I've ever eaten. Pork flavour is barely not there, and they mostly taste like apple. As you can imagine, apple tasting crisps are an abomination. First bag of crisps in a long time which I actually cannot finish. | walking home after dueling then trying some more the next day which was a grave mistake | 0 | WH | 2022-06-04 |
| Lorenz | Pom Sticks | Paprika | Now I've never eaten a match stick before, but these are exactly what I imagine their texture would be if they were edible. Replacing the taste of wood is potato and paprika, and it really works in this instance. Like match sticks, they're a little bit of a bastard to pick up. If they were a bit longer then they might be a bit more user friendly. I would not want these to be thicker though. | Starting a fire | 6 | CS | 2022-06-04 |
| Jacob | Mini Cheddars | Bangin' Cheese Burger | very interesting, the "banging cheese" they seem to be referring to tastes remarkably like parmesan, which as far as i know isn't a traditional burger cheese. the classic burger flavour trademark of pickle is here but subdued. in general these chippies are smoky, savoury, and with a slight tang from the parmesan and pickle.
give it a go I guess, but there are far better burger crisps out there | Fuckin' French Fries mini cheddars | 5 | SM | 2022-06-05 |
| Walkers | Quavers | Prawn Cocktail | Taste is really disappointing in this one. There almost isn't any. While a muted flavour might be the best choice for a cheese flavoured crisp, it really doesn't work well with prawn cocktail. I bought these expecting them to be horrible, but to my surprise they were ok. Wouldn't recommend these to a friend, but if it's your only option they aren't that bad. | something with more taste | 3 | CW | 2022-06-09 |
| Walkers | Max | Punchy Paprika | These taste like Paprika. Suits the Walkers Max crunch and flavour. I think I would have liked them more if they had a little bit of other spice to deliver the promised punch. Nothing hugely special, probably worth a try if you like the Max range. | Listening to Sans Undertale noises for 6 hours | 6 | CS | 2022-06-11 |
| Golden Wonder | Transform-A-Snack | Spicy | Incredibly disappointing - Unlike my fellow reviewer, I didn't even manage to assemble the crisps into a car shape, as not a single "body" crisp in the bag was whole. Every attempt ended with a car missing a wheel. Not only that, but every piece has been baked, meaning that everything is a different size, as they have puffed up differently. This is very very unprofessional - How am i supposed to use my 39p crisps to make a toy car if these idiots cant even bake them right? How else am i supposed to pass my long work hours? These aren't really spicy, they're what i'd call "British Spicy", where they have a hit of spice related flavour that is completely overwhelmed with sweetness. Golden Wonder? More like Golden These Are Shit | Steamed Carrots, as these are a bit spicy for me | 2 | CS | 2022-06-13 |
| Darling Spuds | Hand Cooked Potato Chips | Sea Salt & Moderna Balsamic Vinegar | These crisps are very tasty. They have a texture half way between a Mackies and a Kettle chip, but they are neither as floury as mackies or greasy as a kettle. The flavour was a bit less subtle than other "hand cooked style" salt and vinegars which can tend to hit you in the face with sharp vinegar flavour (looking at you Co-op). This means you can safely enjoy plenty of these without mouth burn. Very nice, and imo the new benchmark for "hand cooked" crisps. | I cant believe tearalaments beat splights 3/3 duels | 9 | WH | 2022-06-15 |
| Jacob | Mini Cheddars | Classic Cheese Pizza | lovely! enjoyers of pizza flavoured snacks rejoice there is a new delectable on the market. Slightly cheesy, slightly tomatoey, and with a vauge smokey taste that reminds me of pepperoni, these crisps imitate some of the better pizza flavoured snacks of the past. Unfortunately, imitate is all they do. While aping the flavours of texturally and flavourally superior pizza snacks like Shapes and Combos, these crisps neglect to do anything new. Hampered by the (now quickly growing oversaturated) medium of mini cheddars it feels that there is a natural limit on what can be achieved with the next generation of Cheddars flavours. While they have tried to circumvent this with the new Nibblets and Sticks, they have written themselves into a corner trying to manage both inventiveness and consistent branding. the mini cheddars varieties are still made from the same wheat flour base baked in exactly the same way, the only difference is the shape of the protocrisps prior to cooking.
When I say reaching the natural limits of the medium Im talking about the difficulty of creating a new taste experience on what is essentially 30 different flavours of the same crisp. While they are lovely, and I will continue to look forward to new releases, I feel the cheddars formula needs some experimentation to really drive home the initiative the boys at jacobs are displaying.
Quite simply, the flavour creators at Jacobs are visionary. While not every flavour is incredible, some are outright awful (looking at you cheese ploughmans mini cheddars), they are CONSISTENTLY bringing out new flavours, the vast majority of which are lovely and interesting. Take the new cheese pizza flavour for example, It is nice, tasty, but nothing new. For this reason its one of the worst mini cheddars flavours after original, but still lovely from the strength of the flavour profile imagineered by the Jacobs team.
My point is that with a very strong team working on flavour I would expect some diversion of resources to texture. Something has to change because at the minute the delicious flavour of the new flavours of mini cheddars (since the 2nd wave "Strathdon Blue Cheese" era) is THOROUGHLY let down by the failed or incomplete innovations in the way of crisp technology. Perhaps embrace the "mini" and simply make a bag of tiny cheddars that you can drink like the flavourful melange at the end of a package of potato crisps. I don't know, but there are clearly many avenues to be explored vis a vis size, shape, texture, cooking style, that clearly aren't and it is, in my opinion a waste of talent. | overthinking | 7.5 | SM | 2022-06-15 |
| Darling Spuds | Hand Cooked Potato Chips | Mediterranean Sea Salt | An incredibly nice Salted Crisp from Darling Spuds. The crisps themselves are very light and not excessively oiling, making them very pleasant for casual snacking, but there's enough salt to satisfy even competitive snacking. I've often been surprised by the general high quality of the common or garden salted crisps, and Darling Spuds have also managed to make a fantastic crisp. However, these do have a rather hefty £2 price tag - Not a huge investment, but it could mean the difference between one bag or two bags of crisps. Forces difficult decisions regarding your feelings on quality vs quantity. | Crunching the Numbers | 9 | CS | 2022-06-15 |
| McCoy's | Ridge Cut | Sizzling King Prawn | Many people say these are the best crisps around. Are they? Yes. | lounging about | 10 | CW | 2022-06-16 |
| Savoursmiths | Luxurious hand cooked british snacks with style | Bubbly and Serrano Chilli | Yeah that Bubbly refers to Champagne flavour crisps. These crisps join the exclusive prestigious rank of crisps I actually can't finish. The "Bubbly" component consists entirely of a sharp carbonation taste, and nothing of the taste of actual champagne. Christ maybe "Bubbly" does just mean carbonation? I've only just realised this while writing this, I should probably start again, anyway I digress, these crisps are a war crime, avoid | Nothing | 0 | WH | 2022-06-18 |
| Frit Ravich | Chips Mediterraneo | Mediterranean | Well balanced taste, tomato-y but not too tomato-y initially then the herbs kick in. Flavour could maybe be 5-10% stronger but I like how light they are. Doesn't feel like they're trying too hard. | Being on holiday somewhere hot | 8.5 | CM | 2022-06-19 |
| Darling Spuds | Hand Cooked Potato Chips | Thai Sweet Chilli | I wrote an entire review of these, but then I clicked close instead of submit. Oops. To summarise the points, Nice crisp, Nice flavour. Tastes like Thai Sweet Chilli Sensations, but less spice build up. I miss the spice, but I'd recommend these to people who like the flavour but aren't so fond of spice. | The Wrong Button | 7 | CS | 2022-06-19 |
| Jacob | Mini Cheddars | Ploughman's Cheshire Cheese (revisited) | being slightly drunk, and at a corner shop that sold discontinued crisps, a familiar face caught my eye. Apparently they were still selling the flavour of mini cheddars that constitutes my benchmark for some of the worst crisps ever. My understanding of the mini cheddars mythos can be essentialised to the pre- and post-ploughmans world, so ingrained was it with my understanding of Jacob's artistic direction. "Wouldn't it be a good time, considering the new Cheddars
product line, to revisit a crisp you consider fundamental to the crisp rating scale?" I asked myself in the midnight queue of the scotsman. maybe it was the inebriation, maybe the inspiration given from on high, but I went with my impulse, and sit here now with a large bag of ploughmans mini cheddars. The experience has left me questioning my tastes, and lamenting the deleterious effect of the impermanence of human memory.
To be blunt, these crisps are perfectly serviceable, enjoyable even. Like a fine five-alarm chili here are stages to the flavour development. The first (and least enjoyable) is the taste of nothing. Much like noise cancellation, the initial "hit" is akin to the absence of flavour; where a flavourless mini cheddar would still impart the taste of its starchy biscuit, this flavour seems engineered to cancel out the intrinsic taste of the crisp, leaving the tester with only the tang of water. A marvelous technological development by itself. The second hit is the eponymous cheshire cheese. Soft, delicate, yet fruity and full, the flavour does a remarkable job of emulating the real. Unwarranted, undeserved, and unwanted however is the flavour of bread. I mentioned this in my original review, but the distilled flavour of bread is hardly something I think should be applied to crisps. The curious mix of flavours is only complexified by the final undertone: branston pickle (yes i mean the brand, it is uncanny). Branston as a whole can be defined by the presence of the individual flavours. Other sandwich pickles can be lovely, but ultimately taste of a combination of their parts. Branston pickle is unique due to the pronounced flavour of its constituents (carrots, pickle, turnips etc). it is remarkable to see this here, and slightly bewildering to the 'buds. While each of these flavours could individually pique the interest, the result of their mixing is a cacophony upon the tongue. Quite why these crisps were made is a mystery, and their flavour balance is at best questionable and at worst deranged. But still, they aren't BAD. and here i want to talk about the impermanence and fluidity of human memory. The impression these gave me the first time was enough for me to define my judgement system for years. I had championed these crisps as failures, an antiparagon of the "never miss" style of jacobs innovation. How could I have believed this so vehemently in light of the abject mediocrity of these crisps? Have we not all remembered so clearly an event that others have seen in such a different light so as to be two competing realities? the mechanism of memory is one fraught with doubt, and supported by the twin pillars of ego and adherence. memory is but a present belief whose significance and veracity is verified by our own repeated insistence of the fact. Indeed, our memory is malleable in so much as it supports or rejects our internal biases, as our past fades the mythologizing of our history fails to capture the verisimilitude of the stimuli we encounter. These crisps, to me, represent a truman show-esque shattering of my perceived reality wherein previously upheld constructs are shown to be as illusory as the nature of my consciousness itself. The bready flavour that is apparent here lodged itself in my mind; I read "ploughmans" and my connotations of the sandwich filled in the gaps in my perception. My expectations and preconceptions acted as a filter, influencing my impression of the chaotic taste sensation. As the sands of time bore down my memory like the waves upon the white cliffs of dover, what was left was a pure, crystallised version of the flavour that suited my internal biases and expectations. What then is our memory? a collective lie we tell ourselves? a loose association of events, feelings, and desires? Science does not yet know. Until this point, it is important to be aware of the fallability of our memory. Our view of the world is built upon the patterns and relations we establish as normal through our life's development, things we see, understand, and assimilate to aid us in understanding both our immediate world and the unknown events that besiege us as our lives move on. One view of the nature of humanity is of us as advanced automatons, our memories but electrical signals writ large on the sprawling network of individualised cells that we consist of. Like the data stored on a computer, our memory can be corrupted or altered, albeit with less immediate consequences due to our extended evolutionary development. As they say, to err is human. In todays world where the line between man and machine is becoming blurred, the only thing you can be sure of is that both myself and the creators of the ploughman's mini cheddars are, undoubtedly, human. | very high percentage gin i got from work | 4 | SM | 2022-06-21 |
| Walkers | Squares | Salt & Vinegar | Very crunchy, tastes a bit like the last few crunchy chips at the end of a Chippy takeaway. I would be interested in trying a similar crisp with a different flavour, or a more interesting shape, but apparently these only exist in Salt and Vinegar - Arguably the worst flavour of the walkers standard trio. If you like Salt and Vinegar, these are good enough. Fine with a meal deal, but probably wouldn't go for these in other contexts. | Salt, to try and mask the Vinegar | 5 | CS | 2022-06-22 |
| Golden Wonder | Tangy Toms | Tangy Toms | These are surprisingly good, like the texture of a quaver, but the outer surface was a bit crispier so it leads to the crisps having more bite than a quaver. The taste is pretty unique, and I've not had crisps that taste like them before, it's an acid forward punch with a sweet tomatoey finish. They still get stuck in your teeth pretty badly though which is a negative | Friday | 7 | WH | 2022-06-24 |
| Golden Wonder | N/A | Beef & Onion | A fairly nice crisp. Good meaty / salty flavour throughout, with that distinctive crunch of Golden Wonder. Unfortunately the bag is let down by the very small portion size. Although this packet contains 15% of your recommended daily intake of fat, very few crisps come in the bag. So few in fact that I actually considered counting out the number of crisps before eating them. I didn't in the end because I was hungry. | 85% of your recommended daily intake of fat | 6 | CW | 2022-06-24 |
| Wicked Kitchen | Pretzel Thins | Sea Salt & Pepper | I love Pretzels. In Pollock, I survived on Dr Pepper and those Sour Cream Pretzels. I have attempted to cook my own Pretzels. Like many others, I mourn the loss of Synders Pretzel Pieces. These are Preztels as I have never had them before. These thin, almost Banana chip-like slices of Pretzel are a very intresting take on the formula. Unfortunately, I think I chose the least interesting flavour. While salt on Pretzels is a classic combination and is by no means a bad thing, I would have loved to try these with a less traditional flavour. However, it's unfair to judge these on that basis. The salt and pepper is nicely balanced, but they do end up drying out your mouth as you go through them. That can be remedied with a drink of course, but still worth noting. Overall, give these a shot if you are a fellow Pretzel fan. | An ice cold lager | 7 | CS | 2022-06-24 |
| Wicked Kitchen | Salt and Vinegar Squares | Salt and Vinegar | These odd little squares are a combination of Lentil and Potato, and are like if Walkers crossbred Squares with Quavers. Can be oddly sweet at times, but mostly just Vinegar. These are fine. They're different in some ways, and a bit too familiar in others. Not quite wicked enough to be interesting. | A general lack of interest | 5 | CS | 2022-06-26 |
| Seabrook | The Original Crinkle Cut | Prawn Cocktail | Nice texture, which comes with the territory for crinkle cut crisps, softer than some crinkle cuts (walkers double ridged) but still retains a good bite. The flavour is a bit strange though, unlike regular prawn cocktail these actually taste remarkably fishy, with a fishy aftertaste. This takes away from the overall taste, which other than the fishy tang, is textbook prawn cocktail. Something a little bit different, but still familiar. Like a marvel film. | Lunch and watching captain america the first avenger | 6 | WH | 2022-06-27 |
| Asda | Extra Special | Korean Style BBQ | These Crisps are like someone mixed the BBQ flavours and the Smoky Bacon flavours together and then added a hint of spice, and that's it. Not terrible, but doesn't live up to the promise of it's stated flavour which sounds more exotic. | Yugioh | 7 | WH | 2022-06-27 |
| Real | Hand Cooked Crisps | Sea Salt | These crisps are very crunchy. Might be the crunchiest of the "hand/kettle" style crisps I've had. The salt is very coarse for crisps too, meaning big bursts of salty flavour instead of a homogenous salt level. The crispiness is nice, though they've achieved this with excess oil so prepare for greasy fingers. This may divide audiences but me personally, I love these crisps. I think this is one the best of this style of crisp I've tried in a while, and I'll be looking out for them again. It's no wonder they won a great taste award 2021. They came free unexpectedly with a snax cafe delivery so I dont know where to buy them. | Python | 9 | WH | 2022-07-01 |
| Tesco Finest | Hand Cooked Crisps | Prawn Marie Rose | I'm not sure who Marie Rose is, but her crisps are quite nice. They're like prawn cocktail except a bit more fancy. While I was writing this a thought popped into my mind - they taste like Prawn Ketchup crisps. I am unable to seperate this thought from the memory of the flavour. Maybe this is a good thing. Maybe it isn't. Like most hand cooked crisps, these have a nice texture. Unfortunately the thought of Prawn Ketchup consumes all. Give these a shot if you like Prawn Ketchup. I looked up Ketchup and google said that it's a "Yourmomdiment (synonym of condiment)" - This entire review has been a disaster. | Shrimp table condiment with a sweet and tangy flavor | 7 | CS | 2022-07-04 |
| Co Op | Irresistible | Sea Salt and Chardonnay wine vinegar | Some may think these too strong, however, in this age of drab, dull crisps, should this not be a good thing? This crisp is unapologetic in its flavouring, which is of note in a couple of ways.
Firstly, although the flavour components themselves (Sea salt and Chardonnay wine vinegar) are "very co op," as a shop mainly for the elderly and infirm, akin to M&S, I would expect their crisps to be very bland, so as not to harm or offend.
Secondly, in a more physical sense, it is a wonder that they can get so much flavouring to stick to these crisps. Flavoursome crisps tend to have a vehicle for the flavour, either macro (like ridged crisps, such as McCoy's Sizzly King Prawn) or micro (like pretzel crisps with porous surfaces, such as Snyders Buffalo Pretzel Bites.) These crisps, however, are very flat. Just how do they do it?
Mysteries aside, the result is an incredibly moreish snack that I would highly recommend to any fans of Chardonnay wine vinegar and/or strong flavours. If you don't like Chardonnay wine vinegar (or indeed, strong flavours of Chardonnay wine vinegar) then this is not the crisp for you. | Zelda speed runs, Henry Weston Medium Dry Vintage Cider | 8 | EL | 2022-07-05 |
| Tayto | Rough Cuts | Sweet 'N' Sticky BBQ | Ah, the Irish. So proud of their Taytos. For a long time, I've heard tales of how Tayto crisps are better than the crisps you get in the UK. And do you know what. I would agree, if you had only ever eaten Walkers. These are really nothing special. These feel more like a random crisp you'd get in a corner shop than a stape of Irish Cuisine, a mere cross between Bobbys and Golden Wonder. The flavour is very nice, i will give them that, but it's definitely on the lower end of ridged crisps, a little too soft and thin to offer any crunch befitting of ridges. I have once again been mislead by our treacherous neighbours. They're good, but little more. | Things that people hype up but then turn out to be just ok | 5 | CS | 2022-07-05 |
| Asda | Cheeky Monkeys | Original Flavour | Quite an enjoyable crisp, but would I buy them if they weren't named for and shaped like cheeky monkeys? Probably not. | Yet more seltzer | 5 | EL | 2022-07-14 |
| Doritos | Corn Chips | Flamin' Hot Tangy Cheese | These are Doritos. A lot spicier than I expected, to the point of it almost completely overpowering the alleged Tangy Cheese. I'd recommend to the elite gamer who needs an extra kick in their daily Dorite. | Gaming | 6 | CS | 2022-07-14 |
| Asda | Cheeky Monkeys | Original | These are a clear ripoff of Pom Bears, even right down to the colour of the packaging. Like Pom Bears, these crisps are shaped like lovely little animals, but this time the animal is the Cheeky Monkey. Unlike Pom Bears, however, the shapes are missing their bodies, leaving you eating 20 or so detached heads - frightening. Also like Pom Bears, these are made from that sort of bubbly hard substance, listed on the back (I think) as "Tapioca Starch". This material works quite well at giving the crisps texture, but it could have been a little bit softer. The flavour is salt, but you may not know it given how plain the crisps taste. | CW | 3 | CW | 2022-07-15 |
| Walkers | Giant Wotsits | Prawn Cocktail | Wotsits not being cheesy feels like it should be wrong, but Prawn Cocktail lends itself to Wotsits quite well. Around half-way through the bag the flavour build up starts to get a bit much. Or maybe it was the guilt of betraying the trust of the friend who left their favourite bag of crisps here. Were these crisps nice enough to mask the sense of betrayal and loss of trust? Yes. | Irn Bru | 6 | CS | 2022-07-24 |
| Wotsits | Wotsits Giants | Flamin' Hot | An alright level of spice that just gets too hard to get through. Not sure Wotsits being bigger is a good thing overall. They feel like a worse version of spicy cheetos. Walkers, try making giant French Frys next, that could be interesting | Leftover Pizza | 6 | CS | 2022-07-31 |
| KP Snacks/Tayto | NiK NAKS | NICE 'N' SPICY | What happened to the Nik Naks of my childhood? Once upon a time, these crisps would make you the envy of the playground. They used to be one of the best crisps around, well loved for their unique shape and powerful flavour. Now it seems Nik Naks have slipped down the tier list to far below average. While the crisps still have their original shape, they are about the blandest a crisp can be without actively being unpleasant. Under normal circumstances, the shape would be enough to carry it up a few points. However, the sheer mediocrity of the modern Nik Nak taste prevents me from giving these crisps a score higher than three. | a single packet of crisps for lunch - c’est la vie | 3 | CW | 2022-08-03 |
| McCoy | Ridge Cut | Salt & Malt Vinegar | To date, there hasnt been a review of these mccoys, the final of the standard three flavours. They're okay, I dont know why they specify Malt Vinegar on the packaging. Theyre salt and vinegar ridged crisps. Not particularly good but not particularly bad. There's certainly a worse choice out of the three (rhymes with wee's and cumyum) | Lunchtime | 5 | WH | 2022-08-03 |
| Asda | Giant Wiggles | Cheesy | Yet another rip off from Asda's virtual bargain bin, and this time the subject being copied is Wotsits. Wiggles absolutely nails the shape, but falls so far flat emulating the flavour. The taste is your bog-standard false cheese that you, the reader, has probably had a hundred times before. There is nothing unique about this crisp, and there is nothing enjoyable about this crisp. I will probably not be finishing these, so if anyone wants the other 9/10ths of the bag let me know. As a quick aside, the first one I tasted had a flavour that I associated with a very specific memory. I was, however, unable to put my finger on what it was, and was not able to recapture this sensation. This led to me eating far more that I otherwise would have. | NiK NAKS a few hours ago | 1.5 | CW | 2022-08-03 |
| Walkers | Max Strong | Fiery Prawn Cocktail | Spicy and prawn cocktail are my two favourite crisp genres so I thought I would go hogwild for these. Unfortunately they leave a lot to be desired in the flavour department. The prawn cocktail is just a really shitty, fishy skips flavour that I would not recommend. The spice just seems like an odd, it doesnt really gel with the other flavours and I can't even tell where the spice comes from. In the other ones its jalapenos, or peri peri spice, this is just, generic spice added to already shit crisps.
Not a buy, quite disappointed. Walkers already has great prawn cocktail crisps, and I can see why rereleasing them but spicy could be a bad idea, they woud be a whole lot better than these. | Do not consume | 3 | SM | 2022-08-07 |
| Popworks | Popped Crisps | Sweet & Salty | What defines a crisp? Must a crisp be savoury? Is it a crisp purely due to its components? Popworks has made me consider many questions with these bizarre parallel world crisps - And while some may consider these not crisps, Popworks boldy refute this by putting "crisps" all over the packet. They're like Doritos if they made a few different decisions in childhood and turned popped and sweet instead of baked and spicy. They're like if pop-corn didn't have the boom boom boom and chose a life of being triangle instead. While these may be crisps legally, are they spiritually crisps? Do i like crisps, or do i simply like the flavours? Would i be this torn if you handed me spicy popcorn? Crisis aside, these are a very unique crisp - a good balance between the salt and sweet with a nice texture, as mentioned above, similar to flat pop-corn. Give them a shot - Allow your boundries to be tested once in a while. | Anything to relieve the stress these crisps present you | 6 | CS | 2022-08-07 |
| KP | Hula Hoops | BBQ Beef | Everyone knows these are good - I'm only reviewing these now because I never realised how small regular hula hoops are - Even the widest hoop was too small to fit on my hand. Stunning. I suppose what's really shocking is that i've been having Big Hoops all this time and never noticed. | Confusion and Crisp Related Stress | 7 | CS | 2022-08-08 |
| Popworks | Popped Crisps | Sweet Chipotle Chilli | These are ok. Not quite as of an enigma as the sweet and salty flavour. Quite nice, with a good level of spice, but have a pretty unpleasant sweetness build up which makes them a bit hard to get through. Not dissimilar to Pop Chips. I'd like to try a flavour of these crisps with less of a focus on sweet flavours. Keep it up, Popworks. | Meetings | 6 | CS | 2022-08-09 |
| KP | Discos | Salt & Vinegar | These odd little crisps have the taste and texture of unpopped Poppadoms. Quite to Very Vinegary, which doesn't really compliment the texture very well. Like a School Disco of the past, you just kinda have to accept that you're stuck with them until you get picked up, so you may as well try and enjoy it as best you can. At least you can get some Kwenchy Kup or Moray Cup. Christ, I'll even take some MacB. | Vague memorys of having a bad time | 4 | CS | 2022-08-11 |
| Walkers | Max Strong | Fiery Prawn Cocktail | Not a bad crisp, and I respect that the Max Strong team is trying out new things, but the flavour of this one doesn't quite land with me. These crisps are an attempt at a spicy twist on an old classic, but the prawn cocktail doesn't really come through. The primary flavour I get from these crisps is tomato - so much so that if they were called "Fiery Salsa" I probably would not have noticed. As is common with the Max Strong brand, the crisps have a slow heat that builds up as they are eaten. I would not recommend these crisps to a friend, but I do not regret picking up a bag to try. | your largest pouch of tobacco, please | 4 | CW | 2022-08-17 |
| Golden Wonder | Fully flavoured | Smoky Bacon | Despite being called Golden Wonder, I'd say these aren't quite the gold standard for Bacon crisps. The flavour is very nice, if a little light compared to similar offerings from other brands. A good build up of flavour as you get through the bag, but just not quite enough. All things said, these are a good mid budget crisp for your lunch time meal deal and they still deliver a good crisp eating experience. | Sausage Roll | 7 | CS | 2022-08-19 |
| Smiths | Chipsticks | Salt 'n' Vinegar | Surprisingly alright for 39p - Not really anything special. A little crumbly, which makes them a bit of a pain to eat. As always, Salt and Vinegar may as well just be Vinegar, and that's just a bit boring. | Going home at 10pm | 4 | CS | 2022-08-21 |
| San Nicasio | Potato chips with extra virgin olive oil and himalayan pink salt | Smoked Paprika | First and foremost, these crisps are £3. For 3 british pound coins, you get a 150g bag. These crisps are incredibly, incredibly thin. Usually one might exaggerate for comic effect, but I honestly question if there are potato in these crisps. Held up to some light, they would be near transparent, if not for the fact they're coated in red substance that the bag claims is Smoked Paprika, but in reality tastes of Smoked. The alleged Himalayan Pink Salt is applied incredibly sparingly, leading to the crisps themselves tasting of little more than crunchy smoked oil. These crisps, possibly imported from Spain, are dreadful. Incredibly little taste on an unpleasantly thin crisp AND an asking price of 3 of my hard earned Pounds. Truely insult to injury. Avoid, don't even bloody bother. | The Bin, but sadly they're on strike right now | 0 | CS | 2022-08-25 |
| Wiejskie Ziemniaczki | Naturalnie z Polskiej Wsi | Cebulka | Fairly nice cebulka crisps hailing from Poland / Scotmid. The crisps are large, quite thin, and slightly more cooked than your average crisp. This gives them a rigid and brittle feel. The cebulka flavour is quite pleasant, but cebulka without ser is a little bit strange. Maybe that's just how they do it in Poland? | Ser | 4.5 | CW | 2022-08-26 |
| Capo | Chips | Sabor Chili | I think it's rare to see a crisp that promises a just chilli flavour, mostly having been relegated to the likes of Thai sweet, chilli and lime, or jalapeño and cheese, but it really works. They is only a hint of spice, and they just taste like actual chillies, very genuine flavour. Very morish. Texture is nothing remarkable but nothing bad either, a thinner crisp than your kettle varieties, but crunchier than your walkers standard range. Very enjoyable | Day by the pool | 8 | WH | 2022-08-31 |
| Long Chips | Long Chips | Sea salt and vinegar | Have you ever really wanted a pringle but it's roughly the size and shape of a bookmark? If so you'll love these. If not, it's exactly the same as a pringle but in a different wacky shape. If nothing else you're picking up a crisp roughly 4x less frequently then you'd have to pick up a regular pringle due to the large size. That's the kind of laid back Spanish way I suppose. I can't say I've ever desired a crisp this shape, so it's basically the same as a salt and vinegar pringle but losing a few points due to mild disappointment | Sitting | 5 | WH | 2022-09-01 |
| Takis | Takis | Queso TNT | Nice spicy cheese flavour, as if doritoes tangy cheese were spicy. Not as spicy as the max strong jalapeño and cheese ones though. They're in a rolled up shape but with the texture of a dorito which makes a dense crunchy mouth feel | San Miguel | 7 | WH | 2022-09-03 |
| Walkers | Max Strong | Hot Sauce Blaze | Like all Max Strong crisps, these are genuinely spicy. The hot sauce in question is quite tomato-y, and i'm not able to point at one brand or flavour and say "it's like this one". This is a bit of a shame, as I can see these being some special if they had just a little bit of extra oomph somehow. Max Strong claim they are "perfect with beer", and to test this, I have a Heverlee Pilsner Lager. And they are certainly good with beer - A cold lager beer compliments the spice nicely. However, I do think that the spice mutes the flavour of the lager a little, which makes it quite easy to drink. I'm unsure if this is a positive or a negative. Overall, a good crisp for a sesh, a little lacking in some regards, but you certainly get what you pay for. Another strong entry in the Max Strong range | Heverlee Premium Pilsner Lager Beer | 8 | CS | 2022-09-03 |
| Walkers | Max Strong | Hot Sauce Blaze | A very unique flavour, initially I thought it was a sriracha flavour, then some sort of spicy ketchup, but I think it's genuinely a new flavour. Light and tangy, these crisps have a garlic and chili tang that reminds me of sriracha, yet with a sweetness and smokiness that differentiates it. Actually quite spicy, these puppies aren't lacking heat. They are a very unique flavour, I'm at the end of a big bag now, and I still can't tell if i really like them or what the flavour is. I think I like them because i would certainly buy them again. | kopparberg strawbberries and lime | 7 | SM | 2022-09-05 |
| Bobby's | Spirals | Salt and Vinegar | Fairly tasty, but the spiral shape prevents you from getting the full flavour of the salt and vinegar. Despite this, the flavour is still nice, and the crisp-material is firm and crunchy. | Have to not be last out of the office otherwise I have to set the alarm | 4 | CW | 2022-09-05 |
| Walkers | Max Strong | Fiery Prawn Cocktail | These are prawn cocktail crisps except this time they are spicy. They're fine. Yea. They're Prawn Cocktail but spicy alright. If you like the sound of Prawn Cocktail but this time with spicy, then they will do you just fine. Yeah. Probably up your alley. | Depends if you take your Prawn Cocktailed Spiced or your Spice Prawn-Cocktailed | 5 | CS | 2022-09-05 |
| Cheetos | Pandilla | Sabor/Goût/Flavour/Gusto | *Review copy of crisps received for free - Thank you to the anonymous donator.* These crisps feature a very large Chester Cheetah cosplaying as a Christopher Lee classic, Vampire. I don't know what flavour these are, but from the lore presented, as well as the fact the crisps are all ghost or bat shaped, you can infer that these are Blood or Ectoplasm flavour. However, my finely attuned taste has allowed me to determine that these are cheesey. They might even be a little tomato-y. These are quite nice. I'd say that I probably wouldn't go all the way to Spain to get though. I'd probably have to get at least one more bag for it to be worthwhile. If they appeared on British shelves, then i'd say give these a try. | Being invited in | 7 | CS | 2022-09-08 |
| Well & Truly | Crunchies | Smokey Paprika | Part one of a series of crisp reviews (sponsored by TK Maxx) and we're off to a good start. Crunchy, paprika-y and moreish, this crisp is a good snack, not too filling but enjoyable with a bev and the newest television series of your choice. | Game of Thrones 2: House of the Dragon | 8 | EL | 2022-09-08 |
| Well & Truly | Crunchies | Smokey Paprika | So much better than the cheese variety, unsurprisingly. The nik nak shaped, knobbly pieces really are great fun to eat. The paprika is a little dry, but very moreish. I would recommend picking up a bag to try for yourself, and I will be seeking out more from this brand in the future. | House of the dragon s01e02, pressing close instead of submit - sort this interface out | 6 | CW | 2022-09-08 |
| Doritos | Corn Chips | Loaded Pepperoni Pizza | These crisps boast "NEW MORE CORN PERFECT CRUNCH" on the bag. Did Doritos need more corn? Who can say. These are legitimately quite pizza-y, a feat i wasnt sure how they would accomplish. These now-even-more-corny little triangles hit you with a complex wave of tomato, cheese and pepperoni. A very interesting combination of flavours that really remind me of those £1-2 frozen supermarket own brand Pepparoni pizzas. Maybe a little too similar to Tangy Cheese Doritos at times, and personally, I feel like the flavour is missing just a little something, but these certainly deserve a try. Please note that these are not a substitute for regular pepperoni pizza, and that these little daggers of corn should come with a health and safety warning, because they've cut my mouth. | Dark and twisted thoughts of making Nachos with them | 7 | CS | 2022-09-17 |
| Doritos | Corn Chips | Triple Cheese Pizza | These are Tangy Cheese but if they tasted more like real cheese. Pretty good. No meat on this review this time. They're cheesy doritos. | Trying to think of a better review | 5 | CS | 2022-09-20 |
| Walkers | Squares | Cheese & Onion | Despite my firm belief that Squares only come in one flavour (Salt & Vinegar), I was surprised to see these on the shelf of my local shop. However, my firm belief that Squares are perhaps the most lackluster of all the Walkers brands holds true. These crisps have very little flavour, and taste a bit like a plain, flavourless and bland poppadom. And to add insult to injury, most of crisps in the bag aren't even squares. I'm not going to pretend that these are the worst crisps on the market, they aren't that bad, I just can't even fathom why you'd bother when you can get a better version of the same flavour for the same price. | Anything with flavour to make up for the deficit | 3 | CS | 2022-09-22 |
| Sainsburys | Taste the Difference | Coronation Chicken | (Review copy recieved from a BoysBoysBoysBoys admin) I've never really had Coronation Chicken. I've only ever really seen it in sandwiches and something about how bright yellow it is kinda put me off. I've got vague memories of trying it before, and I think it was ok. According to Sainsburys, Coronation Chicken is regular roast chicken absolutely drenched in the cheapest curry powder you can find (and a quick google search basically confirmed that's what it is anyway. Very Post-War). Infact, these kinda taste like someone tried to make their own OC (original Crisp) by taking a bag of Roast Chicken Crisps and dumping a tub of Curry Powder into it. Not good, but not inedible. They're a bit too much for me. Too much of something that makes them not appeal to me. Maybe it's the patriotism associated with the dish. | Summer, apparently | 4 | CS | 2022-09-29 |
| No Brand | Made For Consumer | Purple Sweet Potato Chips | Everything on this Pringles-like tube is correct - These are Purple, Sweet, Potato and Chips. These deep purple crisps may seem like they would have an unfamiliar and bizarre taste, but instead they only have a familiar and bizarre taste - These taste a lot like those Hovis Biscuits you get in big Cracker boxes. Incredibly nice, although there is quite a build up of Sweet Potato flavour. Maybe you'd like it, maybe you wouldn't, but none the less these are a very unique crisp. | Maybe some cheese? | 8 | CS | 2022-10-04 |
| Tesco Finest | Crinkle Cut | Pigs in Blankets | Tesco Finest crisps have a pretty good track record for me, but these aren't anything special. They're nice and crunchy, but a bit sharp, and have a pretty weak flavour that basically amounts to your standard bag of bacon crisps. Not very impressive, unfortunately. | Water | 4 | CS | 2022-10-09 |
| Tesco | Rings | Onion | These started simple enough. 300g for just over One British Pound. They tasted ok, fulfilled the role of a cheap bag of Onion Rings, would have been happy to give them a 5 there and call it a night. But then something happened. 300g is a lot of crisps, so I didn't finish them in one sitting. So the next night, i sit down to watch some Michael Dorn Show, and decide to get the rest of the onion rings. When i went to pour some in a bowl, something was wrong. They looked too shiny. They looked almost wet. So i looked into the bag. And pooled at the bottom, sliding down the side, was Oil. Oil all over the bag, the crisps, the bowl. Absolutely Disgusting. Completely ruined the experience, even retroactively. | A better review had I done it before the Oil | 1 | CS | 2022-10-17 |
| Tesco Finest | Crinkle Cut | Glazed Ham Flavour | I certainly ate these with a cold so they didn't taste of much | Couldn't tell you | 5 | WH | 2022-11-04 |
| Walkers | Sensations Naan Chips | Lime Pickle | Really quite nice. The Naan chips taste great, theres a nice spice build up, very lime pickle-y. I'd love to see this range have some more flavours, there's probably real mileage with this idea. Good stuff, Walkers, maybe you aren't so boring after all. | Something to counter (or enhance) the spice | 8 | CS | 2022-11-04 |
| Proper Chips | LENTiL CHiPS | Sweet Sriracha Chilli | These crisps have an initially strange combination of flavours, but really grew on me after trying a few. Similar in texture to a Sensations Poppadom, maybe slightly crunchier. Give these a go, pretty nice change. | A similarly spiced meal | 8 | CS | 2022-11-18 |
| Hula Hoops | Flava Rings | Big 'N' Beefy | Now why would you take Hula Hoops, a perfectly good crisp with its own little gimmick, and turn it into a Golden Wonder style of puffed up rubbish? These are crisps we've all had a million times before, and don't really bring anything new to the proverbial table. Might be better in a different flavour, but these just didn't do it for me. | Going out of your way to go to the big Tescos | 5 | CS | 2022-11-22 |
| Sainsbury | Taste the Difference | Pigs in Blankets | THey're like smokey bacon, except with more seasoning to trick you into thinking they're christmas-y. Not too bad, but not much else to say. I ate these while playing Grim Dawn so i only kind of remember eating them. | Grim Dawn | 5 | CS | 2022-12-04 |
| McAllister's | Potato Crisps | aberdeen angus steak | These are a Mackies knock-off from Lidl, but if i had tried these without knowing that, i might have said they were Mackies. Maybe a little too much flavouring, maybe the crisps aren't quite the same, but i think these are close enough to fool someone who hadn't bought them. Nice, and substantially cheaper. A blind taste test between the salted flavour of these and Mackies would be a very very interesting experiment to conduct. | Kevin - (born 8 November 1962) is a Scottish former footballer | 7 | CS | 2022-12-07 |
| Snyder's of Hanover | Pretzel Pieces | Hot Buffalo Wing | Wow! a top shelf entry from snyder's pretzel chunk line. These pieces are absolutely covered in zingy buffalo flavour, it's rare to find one without full coverage. Not to mention the flavour itself packs a powerful punch that I have yet to see replicated ever since they stopped being sold in the UK. They probably have some delicious American chemical in them that's banned here.
I had to order these in a 20 pack with other flavours as it was the only one sold anywhere I could find. This is a testament to their moreish flavour, and unmatched texture. Good, hearty pieces of pretzel make every bite meaningful and packs a powerful crunch.
Overall one of the GOAT crisps on the market and a taste that'll keep you coming back. Truly a masterpiece from a pretzel manufacturer boasting of over 100 years of baking. | A spoon to keep your fingies clean | 10 | SM | 2022-12-11 |
| Snyder | Pretzel Pieces | Cheddar Cheese | I have to admit that i'm partial to the taste of fake cheese so for me these crisps are a smash hit. Something about them reminds me of the cheese on a big mac, which is a flavour that shouldn't work as well as it does. The pretzels are lovely as always but with that cheeto flavour we all know and love | tennents | 8 | SM | 2022-12-12 |
| Huligan | Pretzel Crush | Cheese Sauce | these usurper crisps are inevitably compared to their predecessors: snyders pretzel bites. The texture is undoubtedly worse, being both dryer and harder than snyders brand crisps. Even the smaller "crushes" are so dried out that they make an audible noise when munched. Snyders has the market cornered on good preztel texture, but they could have at least done better than home baking. The cheese sauce is certainly a nice surprise, tasting even more like fake cheese than it's transatlantic counterpart. If you dont like fake cheese then hoo boy you'll hate these. The texure is subpar and the flavour is certainly a wild card. overall not very impressive given the current pretzel landscape, but i enjoyed them nonetheless. | spoon | 6 | SM | 2022-12-17 |
| Savoursmiths | Flavour Potato Crisps | Somerset Cheddar and Shallot | I was going to say these are the first Cheese and Onion crisps I've ever had that have that weird fake-cheese "queso" taste. But then I looked at the packet, and realised that these are actually the first Cheese and Shallot crisps I've ever had that have that weird fake-cheese "queso" taste. The crisps are firm and oily, having texture similar to Kettle's products, but the flavour of these ones is not that nice in all honesty. The back of the bag claims "Bid farewell to 'ready' & 'salted', and introduce your taste buds to luxury potato crisps as we explore new taste horizons!". I'm not convinced. | The shallot is a botanical variety (a cultivar) of the onion. | 4 | CW | 2023-01-10 |
| Pretzel Pete | Seasoned Pretzel Pieces | Honey Mustard & Onion | Not quite as hard as the obvious comparison, but this made eating these random chunks of pretzel easier, in this reviewers opinion. The seasoning was odd, as it felt like it was cycling through all the flavours, with all being overpowering at different times. This flavour was a little much for me, but i'd like to see more varieties. | A Lager Beer | 5 | CS | 2023-01-16 |
| Little Freddie | Multigrain Smiles | Cheddar Cheese | These are crisps for babies, not in any sort of metaphorical way, literally for babies. And like most things for babies, they are perfect if you want the child to grow up hating it. I can't imagine any child excited for a little crisp-y snack if this is the rubbish they get. Very disappointing. The monkey on the packet (presumably the titular Little Freddy) is cute. | Being a new born idiot | 1 | CS | 2023-02-20 |
| Little Freddie | Multigrain Smiles | Cheddar Cheese | The answer to a question I never wanted answered, little freddie cheddar cheese multigrain smiles are actually worse than the Hot Shot! Hot Dog by Walkers. I repeat, it is, in fact, possible to make a crisp worse than the Hot Shot! Hot Dog. Opon reflection, a relative scale of things I would rather eat if I HAD to would be thus:
-egg
-Hot Shot! Hot Dog by Walkers (a crisp of)
-This liver noodle soup I accidentally ordered in Taiwan once
-An agèd pigs trotter Chris accidentally bought once and an old man got really excited
-little freddie cheddar cheese multi grain smiles
-Dead spiders from the floor
For actual tasting notes, it tastes like sick with an aftertaste of sick, and is so thick that it coats the inside of your mouth. | Dead spiders from the floor | 0 | EL | 2023-02-21 |
| Bon Chance | Bread Chips | Cheese & Garlic | Bread chips are a weird idea, but they seemed nice enough. The garlic was quite a bit too much for me, and the cheese flavour wasn't patricularly great, and there was a bizarre taste of Mustard, but the pack informs me that there is only a trace amount, if any. Go for these if you're a big fan of garlic and not much else | Any other flavour to dim the garlic | 4 | CS | 2023-03-02 |
| Doritos | Corn Chips | Burger King Flame Grilled Whopper | I never in my life thought i would ever taste a lettuce flavour crisp. I thought eating more would maybe build up a flavour, but they just taste like warm burger lettuce. Perhaps this is karmic retribution for being a dirty crisp peddler. Gains a point for sometimes not tasting only like lettuce and tricking me into trying one more. | Absolutely fucking nothing | 2 | CS | 2023-03-08 |
| Tesco Finest | Finest | Sea salt and chardonnay vinegar | If you thought the co op version of these were too acidic think again. These make those ones look flavour less. My mouth burned so hard that the next few days I was picking loose skin off my lips like after sunburn. 10/10 | Anything | 10 | WH | 2023-03-18 |
| Doritos | Corn Chips | Flame-Grilled Whopper | quite disappointing. There's a lot you can do with the various flavours in a burger, and this crisp hits almost none of them. It's a very basic "smoky meat" flavour found anywhere else with a verrrryy slight tanginess to them. Sad, after the success of the Domino's-Doritos collab I expected the burger king addition to really POP. Lackluster flavour, really don't bother. | glass o water | 4 | SM | 2023-03-22 |
| Snaktastic | Tortilla Chips | Chilli Heatwave | If you wanted a crisp that tastes like Salt and Vinegar crisps had a little spice on them, then these are the crisps for you. If you're normal, they won't be the crisps for you. | Hangovers | 4 | CS | 2023-03-31 |
| McCoy | Ridge Cut | Salted | I am guilty of overlooking the standard flavours of McCoy when it comes to my crisp selection - Perhaps it's because they're so common or garden, or simply because psychological conditioning has made smaller bags less attractive to me, but these are a solid crisp in their own right. Very satisfying, appropriately salted crunch crisps. It's just a real shame they only seem to exist in really small 25g bags. | A decent lunch break | 7 | CS | 2023-04-03 |
| Abakus | Seaweed Crisps | Cheese | These taste like Quavers until they sadly do not taste like Quavers anymore. The seaweed build up ramps up slowly, but then suddenly hits with a tidal wave of ocean mank taste. The ocean does not taste good even slightly. The only positive thing i can think of saying about these crisps is that they have completely crushed my desire to eat crisps... For now | Despair | 1 | CS | 2023-04-05 |
| Asda | Extra Special | Peking Style Spare Rib Flavour Tortilla Rolls | Weak crisp. Weak flavour. Just kinda OK. | "The Real McCoy's Full on Flavour - Epic Eats Nacho Cheese Flavour Ridge Cut Potato Crisps (£1.25, 65g)" sitting on my desk | 3 | CW | 2023-04-19 |
| Asda | Extra Special | Peking Style Spare Rib Flavour Tortilla Rolls | Despite the poor reviews on here and on asda groceries, initially, I thought these weren't too bad. A sweet, smoky, Chinese flavouring on some crunchy tubes. After a couple I thought they could do with some hummus. After a few more, I realised they weren't that great at all, but continued eating them because they were there. Eventually I gave up, bu Chris finished them so at least no crisps were wasted. Still a shame though, as they could have been good. | A vague sense of disappointment | 5 | EL | 2023-04-19 |
| McCoy's | Full On Flavour, Epic Eats | Nacho Cheese Flavour Ridge Cut Potato Crisps | As a general rule, crisps that are designed with cheese flavouring in mind (Quavers, Wotsits, Mini Cheddars, etc.) tend to be quite enjoyable. On the other hand, cheese flavours introduced by established brands for novelty value tend not to be as good. McCoy's, being a brand with a very strong and diverse lineup, falls squarely into this second category. When you buy a packet of McCoy's Nacho Cheese Flavour, you don't expect them to be all that great. As it turned out, this assumption was correct. These crisps, while by no means inedible, are pretty bad. They have the same fake-cheese, chemical taste that you would expect them to have, with their only stand out feature being a quantum trace of spiciness. They have the classic McCoy's mouthfeel, one of the best going, but this is not enough to carry the crisp. All in all, I would say, get these crisps if and only if you're really fond of test-tube cheeses. Side note: in one of Smam's early reviews, she used the word "queso" to describe this flavour. I find this to be an incredibly descriptive word. For some reason, it paints a perfect picture of the taste. | working from home, with crisps | 4 | CW | 2023-04-20 |
| Walkers | Sensations Coronation Celebration | Regal Lamb and Mint | I'll get it out the way first - Yes, they chose Lamb because it connects to the thought of "young animal" and then to the thought that the Royal Family have Epstein connections, and yes, it is because they are all pedos. Someone at Walkers is getting put in the Tower of London for that blunder! But I'm not here to get political. This crisp is as it says on the tin (bag) - They are quite delectable, but i'm not really sure i'd go quite so far as to say Divinely Delectable. I'm not sure i can comment on how much these taste like Lamb, because i've not had it for over a decade, but it certainly is a meaty flavour with just a touch of mint. Very nice, it's a shame that they're limited edition and here only to distract you from the fact that the Royal Family is an outdated concept that exists only so the media can distract the crisp eating public with headlines about Royal goings on when they don't want them to look at whats really happening. | Making a tin foil hat out of the bag | 8 | CS | 2023-04-20 |
| Koikeya | Original Premium Japanese Potato Chips | Sweet & Sour Pickled Plum | If not you, then who? If not now, then when? - Sun Tzu.
Now that's a difficult flavour to describe. The initial hit is very underwhelming, but comes with a horrible popping sensation, like - genuinely - that popping candy stuff you get in chocolate. It tastes like licking sugary vinegar off of a plum, but really faintly. Now, I don't get on with sweet and sour at the best of times, so I may not be giving the most objective review, but in my opinion, sweet and sour isn't a good fit for a crisp, and neither is pickled plum.
(Review copy provided by Barry, about 100 years ago.) | One Can Coke Zero, One Can Tennent's Lager, One Pint Water | 3 | CW | 2023-04-28 |
| Snaktastic | Crisps | Smoky Bacon | I don't think i've ever had a smoky bacon crisp so underwhelming before. Normally, you can taste a smoky bacon crisp for hours after, but these flavours have faded after almost a few minutes. IS this a positive? Is this a negative? Depends how much you like bacon echoes. Very cheap though - Thanks Lidl | Procrastination | 4 | CS | 2023-04-28 |
| McKennedy American Way | Potato Chips | Mac Cheese Style | No, there isn't an &, And or even an 'N' between the Mac and Cheese. So i can only presume this is some form of minimalist and overly expensive cheese. These taste like fake cheese, as every other crisp does, but i will admit that it builds up a more creamy profile than your standard chedder crisp. No hint of the alleged "Mac", regardless of if it means Macaroni or Macintosh. I can only assume that this is an attempt by Lidl to sell a standard flavour by giving it a gimmicky name and packet. Well, this clown was suckered into this particular circus. Good, but probably didn't need to be a separate "brand" | Cheese | 7 | CS | 2023-05-01 |
| Taylors | Ridge Cut | Lightly Sea Salted | These are basically Mackies ridge cut crisps. But an imitation is still good enough | Mackies | 8 | CS | 2023-05-01 |
| McCoy | Epic Eats | Nacho Cheese | very disappointing. I'm always here for new McCoy's flavours, and i anticipated good things from a new nacho cheese product. Unfortunately the new flavour leaves so much to be desired. There is nothing new or interesting here, it is just cheese flavoured. We already have cheese and onion mccoys so i guess this one goes out to all the onion opps out there, but there is nothing you can find here that you can't find anywhere else. i was expecting some sort of spicy queso flavour and I am thoroughly let down by this bland taste. Nacho best work, McCoy's. | anything to wash it down | 3 | SM | 2023-05-02 |
| Bobby | Crunchy & Punchy Snacks | Spicy BBQ RIBS | Kinda ok. Its like if you had a nice BBQ'd (food) then absolutely drenched it in Vinegar. Come on, Bobby is, I know you can do better than this | Pizza | 4 | CS | 2023-05-06 |
| Popworks | Popped Crisps | Salted Toffee | Is this ok? Is this right? I've attempted to research British Food Standards to find out the exact definition of crisps, because these don't feel like they should be called crisps. Clever Clogs will remember that I had this same moral dilemma when i last reviewed a Popworks product, but Salted Toffee Crisps feels like a step too far. Somewhat weak flavour, but honestly, i think in this case this is a positive. Not the worst thing i've had, but i just can't shake the feeling that these just aren't "crisps". Smells very nice, so if you want a source of salted toffee smell, but don't want to spend money on a candle or something, these would do nicely. | Confusion | 5 | CS | 2023-05-08 |
| Walkers | Sensations Coronation Celebration | King Prawn Cocktail | It's prawn cocktail as you know it, but perfectly refined. It's an almost regal form of the classic prawn cocktail. I can see King Charles III enjoying a packet of these, perhaps after a long coronation ceremony.
Of course, the elephant in the room here is the other heavyweight champion of the prawn cocktail space, the McCoy's sizzling king. Unfortunately, Mr. Walker's offering here does not match up, and sadly it is simply because of the flat form factor of the crisp they've gone for. It can't match the extra ridged surface area of the McCoy's, and as such cannot be rated higher. | Rum and 7ups | 8 | WH | 2023-05-11 |
| Sainsburys | Taste the Difference | Mexican Style Pulled Pork | These are up to Sainsburys usual standard in terms of the crisp itself. The flavour, however, is a bit strange - They're nice in short bursts, good amount of spice and they do taste quite like pulled pork. But the issue comes in the build-up, as they end up tasting a bit dry and paprika-y, and tip the balance into a not so great area.
I'd recommend them, but wouldn't recommend going for the whole bag in one session. | Water | 6 | CS | 2023-05-16 |
| Chipoys | Flavored Tortilla Chips | Fire Red Hot | DO NOT BUY THESE CRISPS DO NOT BUY THESE CRISPS DO NOT BUY THESE CRISPS DO NOT BUY THESE CRISPS DO NOT BUY THESE CRISPS DO NOT BUY THESE CRISPS DO NOT BUY THESE CRISPS. i got these because they were new at my local corner shop, and from the front they have lovely pictures of chili and limes, and i would suggest you stare at them and imagine the flavour, since this won't possibly let you down this hard. These are clearly knock off crisps as can be seen from the shoddy packaging and remarkable physical similarity to Taki's, a far superior crisp. I bet you're wondering, sam, how could these be that bad? what is it about them? well dear interrogator it is quite literally everything. The flavour is downright offensive, taki's were at times overly lime flavoured but these take it to a whole other level. Its like theres at MINIMUM 1 lime per chip, a move clearly done in violation of OSHA's maximum tang factor per unit surface area. On top of that, the flavour of chilis (the other """"flavour"""" in these crisps) is nothing. slightly spicy? but there are so many flavours of and in various chilis that they simply avoided and went for "spicy" here. but don't forget about the texture!! they are thicker crisps, more akin to actual fucking breadsticks, than tortillas. These come from america so i imagine they have the legally required minimum amount of corn in them so as to count as tortillas. Imagine a taki sized flat breadstick that has been rolled (for some reason) back into a breadstick. They are soft like they are already out of date, hard where they really shouldn't be. They give me the impression of old breadsticks dipped in a factory reject spice flavour. The only reason these don't get a zero is because i will probably eat a few more after writing this, since i am very hungry. If they caught me with a full stomach i would be MUCH harsher | DO NOT BUY THESE CRISPSDO NOT BUY THESE CRISPSDO NOT BUY THESE CRISPSDO NOT BUY THESE CRISPS | 1 | SM | 2023-05-26 |
| Taylors | Potato Crisps | Sea Salt and Vingear | Quite a light and fluffy crisp - not in a stale sense though. Incredibly vinegary, but never quite gets to the "i can feel every surface in my entire mouth" stage that some vinegar crisps get to. Good for fans of vinegar, but good lord you need to be quite the fan of vinegar. Kinda just wish i'd gotten something else. | Anything you put in your mouth will be vinegar flavour for ages so it doesnt matter | 4 | CS | 2023-05-31 |
| Chipoys | Flavored Tortilla Chip | Chilli & Lime | Instantly intense and unpleasant. Eat just one of these, and the chilli and lime "flavour" will completely saturate your tongue. I have eaten two crisps, and a horrible, acidic, burning sensation does not seem to be leaving my mouth. I had to drink up all the water in my carafe, and was still thirsty. The flavour is extremely, extremely sharp, and not even slightly yummy. The front of the bag shows 3 "chips" and 2 whole limes, which I suspect is an accurate representation of the ratios used for the bag. It's pointless to review the shapes of the crisps because the flavour is so awful. Ditto for any other aspect of the crisp. I would not recommend buying these, even for a joke. | A bin and different crisps. | 1 | CW | 2023-06-08 |
| Kettle | Potato Chips | Sea Salt & Crushed Black Peppercorns | I think if you cooked these in Zelda, they would probably give you yellow hearts. | Zelda | 8 | CS | 2023-06-08 |
| Takis | Xtra Hot (experto) | Xtra Hot | Wow gamers, these are spicy hot hot HOT! They were not kidding when they said these were for experto's. The flavour profile itself is pure red chilli. Through the spice some of the warmth and fruitiness of the chilli does come through, so it's not pure pain and suffering. The spicyness plateaus at a nice level and isn't too much, but my spice expectations were happily met. Would love to have these again. | Dorada Pilsen | 9 | WH | 2023-06-22 |
| Walkers | Limited Edition | Wotsits Really Cheesy | Perhaps it's the nature of mankind to attempt to combine things. Without combination, we would never have discovered fire, built machines, went to space or even discovered basic cooking. Maybe we would have never have survived without our desire to put a thing with another thing. I was in Tescos today, and walked past a stand offering Wotsits and Doritos, which was odd - Normally it would be one or the other. After doubling back, i saw these were actually Walkers crisps with Wotsits or Dorito flavouring on them. What a bizarre combination, i thought, and i have been thinking about mankinds love of combining things since. I wrote all this before i tried the crisps, to stall. Now that I have finished them, I've come away with terrible truths. Wotsits flavoring is awful on crisps that aren't Wotsits, or maybe it's the Walkers crisp base actually isn't very nice. We may be seeing a new trend in crisp flavours - why try your own when you can do a marketting gimmick with someones elses work? | Unfusing these and just using something else | 4 | CS | 2023-06-24 |
| Doritos | Bits | Original | now i was taken with these badboys as soon as i saw them in the petrol station isle. The bag is half the width, but twice the height of a regular (meal deal size) bag of doritos, which leads me to call it a "sleeve" of doritos. Not only this! but the bag prominently features these tiny twisty little things (the titular "bits") that i have never seen before.
On opening them, i found that the packaging magnified the size of the "bits" by about 5x. They are, in fact, fucking tiny; the average bit is around the size (on longest side) of my pinky nail. A bit odd, to say the least! the texture is quite nice, pretty much just doritos, but in a lil crunchy shape that really adds to the crunch of the "bit". The flavour is similar to what we call "cool original" in the UK, but a little sweeter and stronger. A bit unpleasant i may say, which makes me think they took the "cool" away on purpose after trying them. Overall quite interesting, although i probably wouldn't get them again. I'd say when they made Doritos original "bits" they went a "bit" wild trying to be too original. | a bottle of water from that very same petrol station | 6.5 | SM | 2023-06-25 |
| Taki | --- | Queso Volcano | As i'm in spain, i have elected to sample all the fine crisps this country has to offer. So far I have been let down every fucking time i try something new, and these crisps are a great example of why. It is not the texture of the crisps that is the issue, it is the bizarre flavours that make me at best not hungry and at worst physically uncomfortable. A part of me is worried that maybe this is due to my british-ised tastebuds being unable to process anything with more flavour than a Toast Sandwich. Have I really fallen this far? Have i really been acclimatised like this? my 'buds have sampled food from around the globe, surely this shitey island cannot have irreparably damaged my mouth so? So, uh, the crisps. We all love taki's, there's nothing new about the texture here, it's great as always. The flavour is something that has been created in a lab specifically to induce mental damage in anyone that has ingested it, in what is a flagrant violation of the geneva conventions ban on biological weapons. For shame, spaniards. I have only once before run into a flavour that gaslights you to the degree these do (mini cheddars ploughmans flavour). There is a slight undertone of the traditional taki's "fuego" spice, but like the indulgent wank that is Tenet the mix is so awful that I just cannot pick anything good out of it. I am normally a big big fan of fake cheese flavour, but the cheese in these must have been milked from a rat and aged in some sort of nuclear waste repository. Que sorpresa dear reader, they are vile. its a blast of horrible flavour with the faint taste of chili that screams for it's life as it disappears beneath the seas of cheese, drowning in the kiddie pool lactose lagoon that is the only flavour profile of these crisps. Shockingly however, each taste is different. Some are only mildly horrible, some make me wish i was dead. It's truly wild. Because of this, I will assume, for the time being, that it is not I who is out of touch with international flavours, but the country of Spain that needs to be sent to the Hague. | anything to get the flavour out, please god anything, help me | 2 | SM | 2023-06-26 |
| Cheetos | Pandilla | Cheese | Since it's nearly halloween i thought i would give these spooky looking crisps a little try. The front image of Chester in a dracula outfit (of course still wearing his classic sunglasses, even though if he was in a position to need them he would already be dust) along with ghost and bat shaped crisps really got me in the mood for spooky season, which again is very very soon. I am thoroughly disappointed however, since I assumed "Pandilla" was the flavour and meant some weird spanish food. Apparently it just means "gang" which is confusing on many levels. Is chester a part of a gang? are cheetos themselves part of a shadowy kabal of crisp influencers hell bent on maintaining sub-par flavours? it is surely one of these, and the brazen "gang" advertising speaks to how complacent they have become in their deception. Why else would they keep making cheese flavoured crisps with slightly different designs and selling them as if it was something new? these are like if monster munch were thin, thinner than quavers, with an ok flavour of cheese. Maybe it's because im on a lot of painkillers, or because i'm on a lot of painkillers, but i think something nefarious is afoot here. are they priming us for something? when they bring out soylent green (cheese flavoured) do they expect us to lap it up like the good little peasants they believe us to be? not today illuminati, for soon we will rise up, you shall find out that it really ain't easy bein' cheesy. | becoming WOKE | 5 | SM | 2023-06-28 |
| Cheetos | Pelotazos Futebolas | Cheese | Cheetos seem to be a thing over here, with no shortage of different shapes and sizes all for some reason in cheese flavour. Seriously, i have like 2 more cheese cheetos in different shapes to review. As you may have guessed by the name these crisps are shaped like footballs, albeit a bit pathetic, much like britains chances at ever winning the world cup. Their darkened lines separate bulbous sections of the futbol that make it look more like the seashell of some malformed snail. Realistically these are very similar to the sort of cheese poofs you might find at sainsburies, but with slightly more detailing done around the outside, which does add to the "fun" factor. I will say that the texture is slightly different, being firmer and thicker than your weedy malnourished british poof (i can say it). this makes the snack feel more filling and energising, like my stomach is ready to lose to Morocco in Ro16. The cheese flavour is well developed too, rich and full, which really does set it apart from your average cheesy poof, but that is the Cheetos pedigree for you. Overall I really like these crisps, and am very surprised by how much i am enjoying them. I have resorted to using a spoon since cheetos always have the tendency to get your hands a bit messi. | choccy milk | 8 | SM | 2023-06-28 |
| Doritos | Corn Chips | Tex-Mex | AGAIN, CHEESE. What on earth is the point. To me, tex-mex conjures up the lovely combinations of middle and north america: salsa, burritos, quesadillas etc. with cheese obviously featuring as a large part in the cuisine. But it's not the only part? Feeling a bit let down here, I don't have much to say about these, we've all had doritos cheese flavour before, they're pretty nice. Good job doritos! | fanta naranja | 7 | SM | 2023-06-29 |
| Cheetos | Sticks Palitos | Cheese and Ketchup | finally something a little different! These crisps are a departure from many of the classical paradigms of modern crispmaking, particularly those of spanish origin. In a crispscape where every packet is cheese flavoured, these iconoclastic chips stand atop mount mouthfeel and shout "I also have ketchup!". it doesn't matter that you can barely taste it, it matters that they gave it a good fucking go. Not to rest on their laurels for long, these avant-garde snacks break another classic tradition: not being smooth. They have decided to make these cheetos somehow rectangular, in a move i can only describe as happening. Having already crossed the vast asian landmass and seen the sight of the glistening pacific, the crisp designers must have wept, for there were no more lands to conquer. They had finally succeeded in breaking even the convention held so sacred by crisp designers since time immemorial: that crisps must be good. Bravely shirking the shackles their ancestors strove to forge, the renegade retailers at Cheetos (ltd) went further than any designer before them, breaking every taboo like my mouth breaks their crisps apart into nutritionless sludge. And like the aforementioned sludge, the influence of these visionaries will remain forever, trapped between the teeth of our collective consciousness in the mouth of modern crispfaring society. Look on these crisps, ye mighty, and despair! | flossin that shit outta here | 3 | SM | 2023-06-30 |
| Los Autenticos | Risketos | Original | like a soft sea breeze that catches us when we least expect it, or the smell of a dish our mother used to make in the window of a restaurant, our memories of childhood often surface in unexpected ways. Smell, and often taste, is the greatest evocateur of memory, and here I feel as if i have remembered part of my childhood, once vestigial and forgotten, now brimming with vitality as if I was once again. I am transported back to the hot, dusty drylands of my youth. I am 5 years old; I am trading a fruit roll up for a packet of crisps with a classmate. I am 12 years old; I am asking my mother for the newest flavour after it catches my eyes at woolworths. I am 17 years old; I am driving to the petrol station for an evening snack. I am 29 years old eating crisps in my bed in a cheap spanish hotel, and once again i feel that same sweet joy: Twisties. I had forgotten these australian staples, far removed i am from my antipodean homeland. But these risketos are not only almost identical to twisties, they far exceed even my rose tinted memory of them. For my hemispherically challenged readers, twisties are elongated crispy corn snacks, whose form is completely irregular, ranging from short stubby polyp to long helical protrusion. What sets them apart from other similar snacks like Cheetos is their high crunch factor. The surface and inside of the crisps is incredibly crunchy, giving the snack a satisying mouthfeel and a lovely heft. Even though they are flavoured like cheese, it is only of the highest calibre of fake cheddar, and so incredibly moreish it took me 80% of a family sized bag to put them down long enough to write this review. I would give these crisps a 9 if not for the fact (That I have laboriously made) that nostalgia clouds my judgement in this case. These are crisps i will absolutely get again, and would recommend any fans of cheese snacks get imported to the UK. | the bit of jojos part 4 where it actually gets good (22 episodes in) | 8 | SM | 2023-06-30 |
| Cheetos | Gustosines | ---- | Writing an overly verbose review for these would be far too much. They are cheetos, without flavour. They are literally the packing peanuts you get in boxes. This is an absolute travesty, and what makes it worse "gustosines" means tastes in spanish. This makes me think its some sort of cruel prank that this tasteless corn foam has been pushed out into the world. Useful only as landfill. | the second pack of crisps i bought | 1 | SM | 2023-07-01 |
| Takis | Xtra Hot | Experto | (Review copy provided by boys admin) Before a hard night of gaming, i was gifted a packet of crisps as a souvenir. I was overjoyed, as it's been a while since i've had some foreign crisps. However, upon seeing the distinct purple bag of Takis, my excitement faded - my last encounter with Takis as pretty negative. However, today i have approached them with an open mind. And to my surprise, these are really really nice. The texture and shape really work, and the level of spice is just fantastic. A bit too limey at times, but i can really appreciate why these are popular now. Good stuff, give these a try if you can find them | Something sweet to conflict with the spice and lime | 8 | CS | 2023-07-01 |
| Kettle | Potato Chips | Sea Salt & Balsamic Vinegar of Modena | These are really quite nice. No idea what Modena is. Really handy for checking your dental health because if you eat exactly one of these they highlight everything in your mouth with pain | Lewis Hamilton Monster Energy Juice | 7 | CS | 2023-07-02 |
| Lays (Walkers) | Descubre el Sabor | Campesinas | Rustic, Hearty, salt of the earth: all things you could say about spanish peasant women, which is apparently what "Campesinas" means. While this is initially shocking, especially with the cannibalistic undertones, it immediately makes sense when one takes a bite of these crisps. Like peasant women, they are rich in flavour, if cash poor. it is a mysterious flavour, unlike any I've had before. There is certainly a strong taste of tomato, ala bolognese sauce, but with a depth and complexity rarely found outside el réal déal. This doesn't quite fit either however, as there are layers of onions, garlic, and some sweet taste that is almost like a barbeque sauce but much less standoffish. By this i mean that the tomato flavour base is very high in the mix, it is not (like other crisps, the most similar i can think of being pringles texas BBQ) a showcase of the crazy flavours that abound in bbq sauce. It is a celebration of each of it's ingredients in a wonderful fiesta, such as a turn of the century hombre might come home to, simmering on the stove. "What's for dinner honey?" he would say, in spanish; "It's my classic earthy meal my love" she would respond with, also in spanish. You might think this a flight of fancy, but the flavour of these crisps really does take you back to when this interaction definitely happened. I have to say they really are incredible, not just because they taste great, but because i really am still at a loss for words as to what their flavour is. And this is after demolishing a family size bag of them. I think the name is apt, since an actual description of their flavour is insufficient, and instead we should rely on the connotations brought about by the sabormaestros at Lays (walkers). Genuinely some of the best crisps I've had in a good long time, and gets a solid "Maravillosa!" from me, except this time in english. | no accoutrement necessary | 9 | SM | 2023-07-03 |
| Lays (Walkers) | Descubre el Sabor | Campesinas | Rustic, Hearty, salt of the earth: all things you could say about spanish peasant women, which is apparently what "Campesinas" means. While this is initially shocking, especially with the cannibalistic undertones, it immediately makes sense when one takes a bite of these crisps. Like peasant women, they are rich in flavour, if cash poor. it is a mysterious flavour, unlike any I've had before. There is certainly a strong taste of tomato, ala bolognese sauce, but with a depth and complexity rarely found outside el réal déal. This doesn't quite fit either however, as there are layers of onions, garlic, and some sweet taste that is almost like a barbeque sauce but much less standoffish. By this i mean that the tomato flavour base is very high in the mix, it is not (like other crisps, the most similar i can think of being pringles texas BBQ) a showcase of the crazy flavours that abound in bbq sauce. It is a celebration of each of it's ingredients in a wonderful fiesta, such as a turn of the century hombre might come home to, simmering on the stove. "What's for dinner honey?" he would say, in spanish; "It's my classic earthy meal my love" she would respond with, also in spanish. You might think this a flight of fancy, but the flavour of these crisps really does take you back to when this interaction definitely happened. I have to say they really are incredible, not just because they taste great, but because i really am still at a loss for words as to what their flavour is. And this is after demolishing a family size bag of them. I think the name is apt, since an actual description of their flavour is insufficient, and instead we should rely on the connotations brought about by the sabormaestros at Lays (walkers). Genuinely some of the best crisps I've had in a good long time, and gets a solid "Maravillosa!" from me, except this time in english. | no accoutrement necessary | 9 | SM | 2023-07-03 |
| Grefusa | Gublins | Barbeque | I bought these hilarious crisps on name alone, because who wouldn't buy a bag of crisps called Gublins? I will be featuring a new race called Gublins in my dnd campaign. These are weird ones! the shape of the crisps is essentially a circle that has become convex (concave? depends on your POV) and curved to become sort of a cup. Imagine a well cooked pepperoni on a pizza. Because of this your GpB (Gublins per Bag) is very high, as they all slot together easily. A lot of points that they gain for their name they lose for their flavour, which isn't bad, but is very sparse. The profile is mostly salt with undertones of bacon, which is unlike any barbeque I have experieced before. It is still really nice though, and I guess they want to showcase the inherent flavour of the crisp more? They're made from, as far as I can gather, a mix of corn and potato, giving them an interesting texture, with a well defined corn chip flavour. Very interesting! Overall quite nice, especially for a novelty brand. I'm impressed! | Something a bit sweet to counteract the salt | 6.5 | SM | 2023-07-05 |
| Taki | WAPAS | Fuego | Due to the nature of the rabbit hole I have been pulled into, this will be a very serious review, and will hopefully serve as a public service announcement to enjoyers of Takis Fuego. That being said, continue at your own risk if you are a fan of Takis Fuego, or common human decency. I bought these in a Spanish corner shop 2 days ago, when I saw that the crispmakers at Taki's had made a classic potato crisp featuring their fuego flavour. They are wide, large ridged potato crisps, a far cry from the corn tubes of non WAPAS takis. It is not stated on the packet what WAPAS stands for, nor is it a known word in Spanish. The idea is carried out well, their crunch is satisfying, and they are solid enough as to be comparable to the Walkers Max range. What really intrigued me was the flavour however. They are completely different from the takis I know and love despite sporting the Fuego namebrand. I thought it might just be the WAPAS variant but NO, I went the next day and purchased some regular Takis Fuego in Barcelona and they have the exact same "fuego" fake flavour. Something was afoot here. I expect, as do many others, consistency in branded, sealed crisps across locations. The difference is primarily in their tang factor: whereas British Takis have a lime-iness that is like a punch in the face, their Spanish counterparts barely register a 2 on the Richtang scale. Instead they have a mildly unpleasant taste of what I can only call "spicy MSG", specifically because I bought some spicy MSG from the big sainsburys that tastes exactly like it. The end result is a very salty, zestless taki that I think is kind of a disappointment. I had heard that stopping smoking changes your sense of taste and smell, and considering I've been off the durries for a few weeks I assumed this is what it was. So I kept these crisps until I came back to the UK, and on the way from the airport bought some Uk takis. I made myself stop at the corner shop next to my house after a very long day of travel because I simply had to know: what was going on?
Lo and behold the British takis have that classic lime flavour we all know and love. The same exact crisps in an immediately adjacent country have a completely different flavour. What? How can this be? Are there as many flavour variations of Takis fuego as there are countries in the world? Will all these flavours be lost to time lest I travel there to taste them myself? And why on earth would they do this when surely it's cheaper to use the same flavour?? Perhaps the Spaniards palette is oriented towards a more umami based profile? After careful examination of the back of both packets, the only difference (apart from yeast extract in the UK version) is the presence of Carmine. What is Carmine you might ask? It is a pigment and an acid extracted from the grinding of Cochineal beetles. Yes you read that right. The main reason the UK Takis taste drastically different is the addition of beetle acid, which would explain their high tang factor. As a vegetarian I am shaken, NOWHERE on these does it say this, I had to read through all the ingredients, looking them up individually to ascertain it. After a bit of research, I found out that in 2019 the EU limited the maximum amount of Carmine or Carminic acid to 3% (whether this is concentration or weight percentage, my sources did not disclose). This explains why the Spanish version is much less tangy, and why the UK versions have that 1 whole “lime” per Taki reputation for their flavour.. Surely they know that the reputation of their cursèd crisps would become so sullied if this was common knowledge. But it is one thing to utilise unlabeled animal parts in food, it is another to only do it in specific countries. This is especially intriguing as both the English and Spanish versions were manufactured in Spain!!! They must have 2 actual different production plants, one simply filled to the gills with beetles, and one normal. But is it just the UK that gets sent crisps laden with insectoid ingredients?
I went on American amazon, using a VPN and fake postcode (that I had cleverly remembered as that for Beverley hills, from Beverley Hills Cop) and went undercover as an American crisp fan to peruse the back of the Takis fuego packets available there. I saw some horrific things. Real images on the Takis page, the real takis page, of grotesque steaming nachos made with takis that looked like something an enormous beetle would’ve shat out after being milked for its acid. Unsurprisingly, American companies do not publish their ingredients, because they are probably all class 1 carcinogens. After further research on some American vegan blogs, I found out that they do in fact contain Carmine. I have no idea how they found this out without the nutrition information, I only pray that the whistleblower in Takis that revealed this was assassinated swiftly and without pain. But why only America and the UK? Then it hit me: Brexit. Now that we have officially severed ties with the continent, and I have to get in the fucking non-eu passport line at the airport, we are “free” from the “influence” of “Brussels”. This means that we have no safety net to stop us from being fed caustic, carcinogenic, creepy, AND crawly additives like we are lowly American dogs, suckling at the high fructose teet of the corn syrup cow. Bark bark wire mother, more insect milk to make my bones grow porous and pliable please! At this point I’m beginning to lose my grip on reality. I stop. I play some games. I let the information I have uncovered wash over me like water from a Takis employee's hose over a vat of freshly hatched beetles.
I could understand that we were unknowingly being fed this filth, but I just couldn’t figure out why. Why would someone do this? Were they getting their sick kicks out of it, like a sadistic Takis employee beating a low yield beetle within an inch of its life? I don’t want to believe this, not one bit. I want to know why a multimillion dollar business is needed for this when you can simply grind beetles into brownies you make for your friends. There must be a logical reason a company would devote an entirely separate factory for the production of these satanic snacks. So I started to dig deeper. I was reading a publication on InChem documenting the various adverse health reactions of people in the UK to Carmine. Like the crisps I still shamefully ate while reading it, it was very dry. But once I got over that, what I noticed shocked me. Of all the cases of “Catalan Carmine” related injuries in Britain, over 92% of the injuries were documented in women. This would already be statistically anomalous by itself, but its importance became much clearer when I realised two things: 1. The paper made no note of the tremendous gender balance in cases of affliction, obvious evidence of a coverup, and 2. From a previous paper, ONLY the females of the cochineal beetles are baked and ground to make Carmine. This surely couldn’t be a coincidence, and who is to say the “man” who was hospitalized was not simply in the closet, blound by ignorance like the British public is blind to Takis deception. Then I read something that made it all come together, like the final blend of Takis UK seasoning being mixed by the freaks at, I shit you not, Bimbo Donuts Iberia. In every documented case, this virulent substance affected the hosts by binding to proteins to activate its harmful properties and circulate through their digestive tracts.
Reader, cast your mind back to the days of Mad Cow Disease. Dangerous prions permeated this country's supply of beef, a staple meatstuff farmed, primarily, from FEMALE cows. It all makes sense. Time is a flat circle. The days of Mad Cow (Mad Crisps?) were but the first attempt at instigating a Britain-level extinction event, a prototype of something sinister snuck into our food supply. I believe that this was a biological weapon, engineered by the nation of Spain in order to bring about the destruction of the UK. It was stopped in time to prevent catastrophe, but it was only one battle. The war, unbeknownst to us, has continued to rage on. Having failed once, Spain went into exile, and developed an improved pathogen that could be snuck into our food in an act of war decades in the making. Consider too, the isolation of Britain from Europe, and the loss of regulations that could prevent this disaster. A misinformation campaign planned by Spain (Catalonia Analytica has a nice ring to it doesn’t it?) tilled fertile soil for the seeds of treachery, the pieces of which are heretofore laid bare:
The puppet group Bimbo Donuts, on behalf of the Spanish government, add large quantities of ground cochineal beetles to delicious crisps they export to the UK. When ingested, the nefarious beetle powder binds to the proteins of British women, causing health problems that could prove fatal to 50% of the country's citizens.. Total destruction on a scale over 5 times that of the bubonic plague, in its first phase alone. With half the population gone, communities, businesses, and eventually the entire nation would collapse. A sinister plot indeed, and all carried out through the Trojan Horse of our times: Taki’s Fuego. A crisp that was perfectly crafted to be simply irresistible, bearing a secret as dark as the beetle pits of Madrid. Indeed, in their arrogance they hid their intentions in plain sight: WAPAS? It stands for We Are Poisoning All Snacks, downright telling us that after the destruction of Britain, the rest of the world is next. If you’ve managed to make it through this without losing your appetite you’ve a stronger stomach than I. Let this serve as my 39 articles, nailed to the door of the desecrated cathedral of Crispendom, their sins laid bare for all to see. I publish these findings in full knowledge of the mortal danger brought upon myself by exposing these Crispmaking Conquistadors. Heed the warnings written here; By the time you read them, I will already be dead. | The Truth | 5.5 | SM | 2023-07-07 |
| Lister's | Crisps born & bagged in Yorkshire | Lightly Sea Salted | I think its safe to say that the entire population of the entire world likes Salted Crisps. Only some Bizarre skin-walker descended from a primordial or common or garden slug would say "oh no, Salted is not for me, it makes me dissolve." These, like a lot of things from Waitrose, were pricey, at £2.30 for a bag. The good ol' days of £1 for a big bag of Mackies are long behind us. These bags boast loud and proud that they're from Yorkshire, but seeing as i can neither confirm nor deny if Yorkshire is a hole or not, its hard to gauge the impact this has on the crisps. Additionally, they are apprently "Third Generation Farming" which is about as impressive as a shop that boasts "Established in 2015". You may have noticed that I haven't actually mentioned the crisps yet. That is because I know that you know almost exactly what these crisps are like. They're nice - Pleasantly crunchy and well salted - We've all had these 100 times before. Why do Supermarkets insist on stocking different brands of the same thing? However, this is no reason to be mad at Lister's over here, they did nothing wrong. | White Monster | 7 | CS | 2023-07-16 |
| Lister's | Crisps born & bagged in Yorkshire | Sea Salt and Vingear | Note: review copy provided for free by a generous user.
This crisp is thicker and less greasy than a Kettle Chip, but not so thick to be akin to the powdery,mushy, almost reconstitued texture of Taylors (formely Mackies). A plesant halfway house, with a bit of bite but not too much grease.
Flavourwise, these are only okay. Pleasantly salty, but lacking in vinegar punch. The cider aspect of the vinegar is strong though, with an almost fruity undertone | bad screen | 6 | WH | 2023-07-17 |
| Chipoys | Flavored Tortilla Chips | Fire Red Hot | I saw these in the Co-op today, and was stunned at their appearance - These bags look like a really low quality bag of crisps you'd see flat on a floor texture in a source game. It was only after I finished this bag that i saw that these have been reviewed before - and with a pretty big warning not to buy them. But honestly, I don't see what's so wrong with them. They're pretty ok, very limey and spicy, but nothing that offensive. At least they aren't made of beetle. | MacB Strawberry and Kiwi flavoured water | 5 | CS | 2023-07-19 |
| Co Op Irresistible | Hand Cooked Crisps | Margherita Pizza | These were quite pizza-y, in fairness - more pizza express than dominos. I had these last night and I don't 100% remember them because they were Star Trek crisps, but the fact that I don't have vivid memories implies that they can't be bad. I've even tried sniffing the bag, but it's not jogging any memories. Give these a shot, they're definitely better than JüBI's attempt. | Funny Neelix | 6 | CS | 2023-07-21 |
| The Real McCoys | Full On Flavour, Epic Eats | Nacho Cheese | An exceptionally uninteresting crisp | A Beverage | 4 | CS | 2023-07-26 |
| Takis | Xtra Hot | Experto | These crisps hit you with a bold taste that makes you think "wait are these regular takis?", so used are you, plebian, to the spicy crunch of regular takis. But as you let the flavour soak you realise there is a depth here not seen in these crisps cochineal cousins. The citrus taste is more subdued, yet still bold, less limey and more lemon/general citrus. The heat is also much drier, like a sprinkle of chilli flakes added to a carbonara, rather than a few squirts of hot sauce. It hits the back of the throat and stays there long enough to be legally allowed to live there. The heat is also suprisingly potent, it just doesnt hit right away. It slowly builds up until it reaches intolerable levels, aided by how fast you're smashing these badboys into your mouth. Its a clever move to have this slow burn heat coupled with a flavour so moreish it'd be run out of venice. I was originally wondering what was so "Experto" about these crisps, was it the spice level? a new shape? I think it means that you need an Experto pallette to enjoy these crisps, as they are a far cry from the punchy in your face flavour of regular takis. Their subtle heat and complex flavour means these will be appreciated by any crisp enjoyer looking for more in their snacks. | lime pepsi max | 7 | SM | 2023-07-26 |
| Walkers | Doritos | Chilli Heatwave | something was definitely lost in translating the doritos flavour over to regular potato chips. I believed that the chili heatwave flavour was more than strong enough to be put pretty much anywhere and thrive. This had remained true for the chilli heatwave wotsits that are very solid, but it does not hold for regular potato crisps. They have attempted to make the crisps thicker and crunchier (i believe) to add some similarlity to doritos, and while this is a MUCH appreciated textural adaptation, the flavour simply falls flat. Most of the crisps contain a whisper of flavour, and even the ones that scream their seasoning barely even taste like chilli heatwave! In short, don't buy. I hope that walkers takes the new thicker crisp and uses it more, that's really the only thing we can learn from this experiment. | bruh not much | 4 | SM | 2023-07-26 |
| Lorenz | Crunchips WOW | Incredible Paprika & Sour Cream Pleasure | These are some pretty good crisps, actually. The paprika and sour cream is nice and mellow, not as in-your-face as some paprika flavoured crisps can be. The flavour is very subtle and very moreish. The crisps are kind of thin, but not insubstantial. I find that this actually adds to the enjoyability, as they convey the lovely flavour without being too filling. The word that springs to mind eating these is "delicate", like silk or some other delicate thing. Recommend. | Surprise - way better than expected. | 8 | CW | 2023-07-28 |
| Morrisons The Best | Hand Cooked | Sea Salt & Suffolk Cider Vinegar | Morrisons are a weird supermarket- they seem to have nowhere near the coverage that the likes of tesco or sainsburys have. Yet here in the middle of nowhere, in a tiny shop in Strichen, there was a Morrisons. And so I went, looking for crisps. Unfortunately I found nothing too exciting, the usual fare, but here we are. The Best appear to be Morrisons version of Tesco Finest, and are likely indistinguishable in texture and flavour. These crisps are so strongly flavoured of the titular Cider Vinegar that you could fool me into thinking they were just bitter apple flavour. Not exactly unpleasant, but not really my sort of thing. | Something sweet | 4 | CS | 2023-08-01 |
| Tayto | Wheat Crunchies | Spicy Tomato | Pretty nice crunchy tubes. Pretty Tomatoe'y. The Red Letter Media Animated video features the Half Life 2 fast zombie sound effect. Very Strange | Confusion | 4 | CS | 2023-08-03 |
| Lorenz | Crunchips WOW | Terrifying Jalapeño & Cream Cheese Inferno | Another hit from this lesser-known crisper, "Terrifying Jalapeño & Cream Cheese Inferno" is well worth a try. This time the flavour is standard jalap, with a nice build up of spice as you reach the end of the bag. I'm not sure about "terrifying" or "inferno", and my mouth is very sensitive to spice. I'm sure that these would be very mild to someone who participated in genuine hot sauce reviews. Nevertheless, the name is the worst thing about these crisps - everything else is superb. The boys and girls at Lorenz seem to know what they are doing. | Bringing back fractional ratings | 6.5 | CW | 2023-08-04 |
| Taffel | The Original Snacks | Nacho Cheese Balls | mmm, tasty. The lack aroma hits you much like a punch to the face doesn't. It's an ephemeral, transient kind of taste that delicately pirouettes across your tongue for just a second, coquettishly disappearing as soon as you start to taste it. Needless to say this is not the kind of behaviour I expect from Nacho Cheese flavour, which if it was to dance would do like, the worm or something. This strange behaviour is only exacerbated by their texture, which has the delicateness of an amuse boosh. They lack of any kind of structural coherence means that these crisps would be easily edible by a chihuahua, with a measly bite force of 100-180 PSI (the lowest of all the dogs). It feels like eating 5 of these would be the equivalent of eating 1 of any other brand. Overall an interesting experience, but I would not recommend these for consumption, lest they had been gifted to me by a felly crispasseur. | Monster Enegery Rosa | 4 | SM | 2023-08-18 |
| Herr's | Flavoured Cheese Curls | Jalapeño | This bag of crisps starts off strong, with the front depicting the titular cheese curls surrounded by Jalapeño peppers and a block of cheese, and directly beside that, has a solid brick of text saying "Serving Suggestions" in 10 langauges, which is a little comical. The crisps themselves taste nice - they weren't lying about the Jalapeño, or the cheese, but may be lying when they say "made with real cheese". Although the bag also implies that they're American, which might explain things, as they have no concept of "real" over there. I'm not so fond of the actual crisp though - The corn puff structure is a little odd, and they feel a little too packaging peanut-y. Not the worst thing i've tried for a review though. | Jalapeño's and cheese, apparently | 6 | CS | 2023-08-22 |
| Walker's | Max | Pepperoni Feast | I'm a sucker for the Max Strong range, and when i saw these were sponsored by the Hut themselves I knew I had to try them. Immediately what hit me was the texture, making me realise that I like the Max Strong line, because of their satisfying crunch and sublime mouthfeel, and the Max range just falls flat next to these. Immediately but just after the first bit, i was transported back to my childhood, to a snack called Arnott's Pizza Shapes, an australian classic. The flavour here is almost identical, unlike any other crisps I have eaten. Its a not wholly unpleasant pizza flavour that is watery and thin, even on the most laden chips. The pepperoni tastes more like ham, since the spicy and salty medley of pepperini is absent. The other flavours play a bigger part, such as the saucey oregano and sultry tomato. Unfortunately it must be some sort of american cheap dish pizza because the sweet sugary taste of the sauce is very offputting. Thats what they get for trying to co-pizza the hut. Overall the flavour is a very very week imitation of a pepperoni pizza, that gives you just enough flavour to make them moreish, but too little that every chip is insubstantial. The resulting emotional state after eating can therefore be compared to some sort of torture method, or drug related "chasing the dragon" effect. If you can stomach these hazardous crisps, or would like to try Arnott's pizza shapes, give them a try, they're a bit sad. | your favourite australian comedy podcast | 4.5 | SM | 2023-08-30 |
| Taylors | Ridge Cut Potato Crisps | Hot Buffalo Wings | Not the world's best packet of crisps, I'm afraid. These crisps don't exactly have a lot of flavour, with the only major sensation coming from the spice that builds up as you eat. For some reason, I keep getting an aftertaste of parsnip, but I cannot see any ingredient listed on the back that could be responsible. To exacerbate this, the crisps feel quite limp in the mouth. There is not a lot of consistency to them, which is horribly reminiscent of some baby-friendly crisps that Barry once gave me. The tagline on the bag reads "a thick-cut crunch like no other", which is simply not true. From previous reviews, I was aware that Taylors was a rebrand of a previously popular crispmaker, but I was not sure who. To my shock, I discovered that it happens to be Mackies! Mackies used to be among the crème de la crème (cream of the cream) of crispers, but based on these, I would not give Taylors the time of day (about half 2). | corporate rebranding | 3 | CW | 2023-08-31 |
| Taki's | Wild | Spicy buffalo artificially flavoured | Wow gamers these are spicy hot hot hot. There is an undertone of something cheesey despite the flavour not suggesting that, but it actively detracts from the experience. Mostly it tastes like cheese and spice. It's a shame because takis have done better in the past. | Super bashing brothers ultimate | 6 | WH | 2023-09-01 |
| Walkers | MAX - Pizza Hut edition | Texan BBQ | As a standard note, the MAX crisps themselves are very nice - lots of variety in shapes and sizes, and have a decent texture. The actual flavour, however, is a little odd. I can't say i'm an expert on Pizza Hut, being the on the lower end of the takeaway pizza tierlist, but of all the flavours to attribute to them, why Texan BBQ? A look at their menu suggests they're no more well known for BBQ than any other generic takeaway. The BBQ flavour is quite sweet compared to your standard fare. They do, however, include a promotion to get 2 for 1 pizza from Pizza Hut (which went directly into my spam folder - good work lads), but that hardly seems like the reason to buy crisps. (In a horrible twist, Pizza Hut won't even deliver to my address, so this promotion is USELESS.) Overall, I wouldn't recommend these - The tie-in feels like nothing more than a label to slap on a painfully average bag of crisps to get a little more attention. | My 2 for 1 code - MKTAET5H5 | 4 | CS | 2023-09-02 |
| Tesco | Poppadoms | Plain | A wiseman once said "Poppadoms are just Indian crisps" - They are therefore eligible for reviewing. Unsuprisingly, these poppadoms aren't exactly very interesting. They're very lentil-y, but other than that, they are plain. They excel when paired with a curry or relish. I do not recommend buying these to eat on their own, because really, that's just a bit sad. | Spice Tailor Fiery Goan Curry | 3 | CS | 2023-09-05 |
| OLLY'S | Pretzel Thins | OH SO CHEESY | In spite of the not cheap price of £2.10, these weird pretzels taste like the saltiest of cheap cheese impressions going. Sort of like a big pretzel-y mini cheddar. Not totally unpleasant, but for the price, you can do a hell of a lot better. | Not looking at the price tag before check out | 4 | CS | 2023-09-15 |
| ASDA | Just Essentials by ASDA | Onion Rings | The first thing that has to be said about these is how little you get in the pack. There are a total of 11 onion rings in my bag, but don't worry, this is enough to form a full opinion. These are the typical onion rings that you can get just about anywhere. Have you had a packet of onion ring crisps before? If so, then you know exactly what these are like. I reached this point in my review when the bag ran out. There really is nothing more that I can say about these. "ASDA Essentials"? More like "ASDA You Can Go Without Buying These"! 3/10. | Unlocking all pyromancies in Dark Souls for an achievement | 3 | CW | 2023-09-16 |
| Taylors | Potato Crisps | Pickled Onion | I was super excited for a new pickled onion crisp, it being a flavour with a naturally high tang-factor. These are severely underwhelming though. They have that anemic, fluffy texture of mackies that tastes like the crisps they would eat in the future once potatos have died out and they only have reconstituted carbohydrate powder to reconstruct crisps. Really takes you out of it, especially since the flavour is nice, but very lacking. You can barely taste it! perhaps this is what the future holds for scottish crisp fans. I shudder to think. | an enormous can of red bull | 3 | SM | 2023-09-16 |
| ASDA | Just Essentials by ASDA | Salt & Vinegar Sticks | Another Just Essentials crisp, but a big improvement over the onion rings. These are basically just Chipsticks in both form and flavour. The bag was full this time around, and the salt and vinegar was perfectly adequate. Nothing to write home about, but consider that these can be purchased for literally pennies. | gonna make some toast or something | 4 | CW | 2023-09-17 |
| ASDA | Just Essentials by ASDA | Cheese Puffs | Don't know why I expected these to be spherical, but they aren't. They resemble Wotsits in shape, but have a far inferior flavour. They taste of the colour of the bag ("CSS Yellow", the full #FFFF00), and its pretty unpleasant. If it wasn't for Wotsits, Mini Cheddars, and the like, I would completely write off cheese as a flavour for crisps. Which is a shame, because it's one of my favourite flavours in just about every other context. | Eating cheese in every meal | 3.5 | CW | 2023-09-18 |
| Doritos | Corn Chips | Triple Cheese Pizza | This was one that slipped under the radar. When Doritos put out their recent line of pizza flavoured chips (the other being Loaded Pepperoni Pizza) I initially avoided these since I’m not thrilled by the regular Cheese Doritos. A prejudice born of my own ignorance, for I had judged the cheese branch of the dorito tree erroneously. With their newest flavour they have achieved something noteworthy. Their earlier work consisted of very simply flavoured corn chips, with the notable outlier of Chili heatwave (A rare shake up to the Crispscape at the time, especially when it debuted almost 2 decades after the last entry from Doritos (It was Cool Ranch (/Original) in 1986)). Even then, their flavour is bold, wild, and feisty, more at home at the roller rink than at the chess club. I thought Loaded Pepperoni had pushed the envelope in the corn chip scene by really emphasising that layered cheese:tomato:pepperoni taste in a way that let each flavour stay distinct while still supporting the whole, displaying a shocking similarity to it’s non crisp counterpart: the humble pepperoni pizza. The Triple Cheese Pizza puts their flavour profile to shame. At first these chips are an absolute symphony on the tongue, beautifully chaotic and beguiling. It’s light, it’s spicy, it’s savoury, but what IS it? Individual flavours bleed together, mesmerising, a kaleidoscopic taste enigma that is as much food for the stomach as it is food for thought. The tanginess of the tomato sauce is the first flavour that hits your tongue, followed by a cascade of cheesy flavour washing over the palate. A kernel of familiarity persists: the Doritos’s classic Cheese flavour. It is the root note with which the 2 other cheeses harmonise. They have achieved perfect concordance; each states their presence assertively, yet subtly. I could not even identify one before I had eaten half a big bag! The second cheese is an oh so soft blue cheese, perhaps a gorgonzola as would be traditional. It is one of the smoothest blue cheese tastes I have had, and it is all the more beautiful for it (even as a fan of big hitting blue cheese flavour!). The third cheese is, I’m sorry to say reader, a mystery to me. Even now as i near the end of this bag of treats the flavour still eludes me, right at the tip of my mind’s tongue. This perfectly encapsulates my experience with these amazing crisps. It is exploration, discovery, the mystery of jazz. This is something so rare, and I am genuinely thankful to Doritos for subverting my expectations with their innovation. Suffice it to say, after the success of their new line of Pizza chips, I will be camped outside Tescos on launch day of their next culinary exploit. In a market so reticent to progress they made something that truly shirked the mould. That alone is a good enough reason to buy a bag, and I can assure you that if you do you’ll be going back for seconds. | Blooch | 8.7 | SM | 2023-09-24 |
| Jack's | Part of the TESCO family (ANY 2 FOR £1.25) | Cheesy Puffs | Any 2 for £1.25 is a deal that's hard to pass up. Counterintuitively, these crisps taste bad initially, but have a nice aftertaste. After eating one you want another, but when you put another one in your mouth it isn't very good. The bag is pretty big, but this doesn't mean much because I'm not sure if I want to finish it. Then again, the bag claims to contain three servings, each of which makes up 8% of your recommended daily intake of fat, so you really are getting good value for money. | some nice orange juice (I don't have any, I'm just imagining) | 3.2 | CW | 2023-09-27 |
| Jack's | Part of the TESCO family (ANY 2 FOR £1.25) | Burger Bites | Pleasantly surprised. These are pretty nice, especially compared to the Cheesy Puffs from yesterday, and I was simply not expecting it. They don't exactly taste of burger, being more akin to the salt / smoke / meat flavour of a more traditional steak flavoured crisp, but they are quite enjoyable nonetheless. The spheres in the bag are both plenti- and flavour- ful, and I would say pick up a packet of these next time you go past a petrol station. Hey, why not pick up 2? | work meeting on mute | 4.8 | CW | 2023-09-28 |
| Darling Spuds | Hand Cooked Potato Chips | Sea Salt and Chardonnay Vinegar | Review copy provided at no cost. I don't have much to add from the previous review, but seeing as I was provided a bag to review, I felt obliged to. Really very nice Darling Spuds are a brand to keep an eye out for. | A bag of free crisps | 8 | CS | 2023-10-01 |
| Brown Bag Crisps | Proper British potato crisps | West Country Farmouse Cheddar & Onion | Review copy provided at no cost. Hailing from Surrey (according to the back of the bag), these are a pretty good packet of crisps - These are similar in flavour to every Cheese & Onion crisp, but both the Cheddar and Onion are strong - You'd really need to brush your teeth before going out anywhere after having a bag of these. The actual crisp is thicker than your standard Walkers, which is pretty different, and i think enhances the experience. These crisps boast that they are made in small batches, and that they were family made, even going so far as to being signed by Phil and Viv themselves after wishing you "Happy Munching". If that wasn't enough, they even provide a phone number and email address. Well, Phil and Viv, I have a few bags of these to review, and you've gotten off to a strong start. Nicer than your average bag of cheese and onion, which admittedly isn't the highest bar to exceed, but none the less, they deliver the promise of happy munching. | Toothpaste and breath mints | 8 | CS | 2023-10-02 |
| Proper x KFC | Popcorn | Popcorn Chicken | I'm not 100% sure if popcorn could reasonably be classified as a crisp, but i'm willing to wade into this grey zone. These are the latest boil on the shambling ghoul of fast food tie-ins with crisp-like products - and much like the other, more walkers-y entries, it feels more like a standard flavour with a chain restaurants label on it. In this case, it's like your standard roast chicken flavour, but with more pepper. But this one is kind of interesting - The tie-in here is obvious - popcorn chicken and popcorn. But to me, popcorn isn't really something thats paired with savoury flavours often. These aren't awful and they promise they're limited edition, so at least they won't be around for long. I can't say i'd get these again, and honestly, if it wasn't for these reviews, I probably wouldn't have touched them, but i'm glad i did. Interesting concept, if nothing else. Get these if you like KFC or don't like crisps, but do like meat flavoured snacks, or if you review crisps as a hobby. | Toothpicks to get the kernel fragments out | 5 | CS | 2023-10-03 |
| Seabrook | Fire Eaters | Scorchin' Hot Trinidad Scorpion Chilli | Review copy provided by boysboysboysboys.com admin. Goodness me these are spicy. If this was a hot sauce review, i think i'd put these at a solid 7 for Spiciness, which is pretty good for crisps. However, this is not a hot sauce review. These crisps indeed spicy, as the bag suggests, but unfortunately, they don't have quite enough going on outside that - if they had been just a little something extra, maybe a cheese or a meat flavour, i think these would be really something special. Also, i rubbed my eye and now they're spiced up. Seabrooks have just missed the mark here. | Eye related spice | 6 | CS | 2023-10-05 |
| Herr's | Cheese Curls | Cheese | Reveiw copy provided by boysboysboysboys.com admin. Once again, I doubt Herr's's claim that these are made with real cheese - these are like wotsits, but bigger and less dense, and with a very different kind of cheesey taste. These build up an incredibly creamy fake cheese flavour, like something you'd squeeze out of a tube, or see poured over some very questionable nachos. However, they are nice enough - I would definitely recommend putting these in a bowl though, because they're very flakey, and the bag builds up a fluffy internal layer of unpleasant, which is then transferred to you. | Washing your hands after | 6 | CS | 2023-10-05 |
| Seabrook | Crinkles | Salt & Vinegar | Pretty middling crisps. The most noteworthy feature is their stiff, very brittle, texture which is neither good nor bad - just different. They are the shape of Walkers' "Squares" (square), but with additional ridges (hence the name "Crinkles"). The salt and vinegar is quite weak, and unevenly distributed. This means that a few of the crisps have the correct amount of flavour, but most have too little. However, these crisps are not actively unpleasant, which seems to be the bar to clear nowadays. Pick these up if you want a change, otherwise don't. There's no shortage of good salt and vinegar out there. | a so-called "weekend coffee" because we've run out of instant | 5 | CW | 2023-10-06 |
| Jones o Gymru | Creision Tatws O Gymru - The Welsh Potato Crisp (blas go iawn!) | Y Ddraig Goch - Sweet Chilli | Y Ddraig Goch is probably the most Klingon sounding crisp possible, short of maybe crisps made out of Gagh - I can practically hear General Martok boasting about Y Ddraig Goch. Moving on. I know very little about Wales or the Welsh - I don't know if the popular crisp brands down there are the same as up here, but i can safely say that these are a nice departure from your standard bags of Walkers. These are thicker and crunchier, and somewhat oddly taste like Sweet Potatoes. I'm not sure if thats due to the flavouring or the (specifically) Welsh Potatoes, as listed in the ingredients. Think less spicy Sensations with a hint of sweet potato. Pretty nice. The bag also lets me know that these were cooked by Satish. Thanks, Satish! | Being born too soon to try alien food, but just in time to review crisps | 7 | CS | 2023-10-11 |
| Doritos | American Blend | Loaded Pepperoni Pizza and Flame Grilled Whopper | I got these from the shop, since they were at the end of their lifespan and both discounted to 60p each for "family" sized bags. A travesty to be honest, as these crisps have endured the test of time during their short lifespan. It truly seems like a shame that they leave our lovely shelves so soon, but it is better to die a hero than live long enough to become a villain (looking at you new york deli tescos sandwich). This experimental duo both arrived on the scene at the same time, and shook the edinburgh crisp scene to an extent not seen since mini cheddars broke out their farmhouse cheeses line. So I thought I'd buy these bags and mix them together to celebrate Doritos culinary tour de force, before it leaves us forever. I've dubbed it the "American Blend" since, barring some horrid apple pie crisps, nothing is more american than burgers and pizza. I won't say anything here that I haven't said in my reviews of both crisps individually, but suffice it to say I shed a tear at this savoury swansong. Both giants of the recent crispscape, these titans of treatery are unfortunately overshadowed by the fabulousness of each other. If either had come out individually they would've monopolised the public consciousness and the news cycle for months, so it's a shame they both came out together and had to share the limelight. Although, what was laurel without hardy? Webb without Mitchell? The greats come in twos, and baby, these crisps are truly great. Innovative flavour profiles on the classic doritos chip is something that is hard to beat, especially when they are both so unqiue. They are a far cry from their peers, the walkers range of pepperoni pizza and texas bbq, a set of crisps that came out around the same timeas """""competitors""""" to the Doritos line. If they were the malformed crisp children kept locked in the basement, the new Doritos are the parents who keep them locked away and fed, out of shame. Doritos, already the giants of the crisp scene, just casually dropped these absolute bangers out of nowhere, and I am eternally grateful. Just when I thought I had ther imitation burger/pizza flavour figured out these crisps slap me across the face and say "There are more things on heaven and earth". Truly food for thought, as well as eating. The Doritos American Blend will sit in my heart forever as a real triumph. I only hope that when I wake up, teeth unbrushed, that the ghost of their flavour still lingers on my tongue, blessing my grody mouth with their angelic memory. | Water (anything else would be an insult) | 9 | SM | 2023-10-13 |
| Tesco Finest | Crinkle Cut | Steak & Onion Chutney | Imagine a bag of cheese and onion crisps but with the cheese flavour surgically extracted and replaced with a weak beef flavour. The crisps themselves taste a little too oily, but have enough flavour to mostly mask it. The flavour got a bit much by about halfway down the bag. Not the best, but at least a little different. | Not a clue | 4 | CS | 2023-10-14 |
| Golden Wonder | Spicy Bikers | Spicy flavour | These are solidly okay. No meaningful aftertaste and texture leaves something to be desired. A little spice build up but mostly tomato. Expected better. | Watermelon | 6 | WH | 2023-10-14 |
| Jacob | Mini Cheddars | Cheese & Pickle | real bizarre ones, the flavour is very similar to regular mini cheddars. It's very subdued to my disappointment, I was expecting a BOMBASTIC flavour from these. It makes sense though, considering how close they are, conceptually, to the cheddar ploughmans mini cheddars, which were BOMBASTIC. These are a very OK base cheddar with the slight sweetness and tartness of pickle, which is a not altogether unpleasant sensation. I would recommend these for the interesting flavour mixture, but its not much past the novelty value. | Coker Coler | 6.5 | SM | 2023-10-16 |
| Darling Spuds | Hand Cooked Potato Chips | Somerset Cheddar & Onion | Review copy provided at no cost. As usual, Darling Spuds deliver an excellent crisp, but are unfortunately let down a little by the flavour. The cheese and onion flavour is pretty standard, nothing fancy. If i was in a shop, and was forced to buy either a bag of Walkers cheese and onion or the Darling Spuds counterpart, i'd probably go for Walkers, as they are likely to be a bit cheaper. Good if you fancy a +1 across the board to your standard cheese and onion experience. | Grinding for lvl 50 | 6 | CS | 2023-10-17 |
| Brown Bag Crisps | Proper British potato crisps | Tiger Prawn with a hint of Chilli & Lime | Review copy provided at no cost. I'm not a huge fan of prawn, in reality or in crisps, but these are really quite nice. The chilli and lime help ofset the prawn taste so as to not overwhelm the prawn novices. Maybe a little bland compared to other prawn crisps on the market, but in my opinion, that's a positive. | A sandwich | 7 | CS | 2023-10-17 |
| Space Raiders | Cosmic Corn Snacks | Spicy | Wowee! I thought they only had pickled onion flavour space raiders, something that im very nostalgic for since I had them on a trip to the UK when i was but a tiny child. Never thought id see a different flavour! It's surprisingly tasty, and a bit less radioactive tasting than the pickled onion flavour. Slightly sweet, a little spicy, these are very nice. They taste remarkably similar to flamin' hot monster munch, moreso when you consider that their textures are very similar, although space raiders are a lot less crunchy. Not bad for 40p. | Arizona peach iced tea | 6 | SM | 2023-10-20 |
| Lays | Deep Ridged | Crispy Chicken Wing | I saw these in the asian store by my house and thought I had to try some crisps from afar. The flavour is a very nice umami chicken, with hints of msg and a slight complex spiciness. Its overeall very pleasant, even if it's not much different to any high end chicken crisp we could imagine. The texture is unreal however, its like they took the deep ridged crisps we have here but made them anemic. They are only 30-50% as thick as the ones we're used to, and it gives them a wimpy, airy kind of mouthfeel. Almost like a prawn cracker. I think this must be true, as the crisps are a solid 10 degrees colder than the bag they're in, presumably speaking to either the crisps excellent propensity for heat dissipation or incredible new chinese crisp insulation technology. Interesting if only for that, wouldnt say these are a buy unless you want what is essentially a chicken prawn cracker. | Sparkling! Melon style drink | 5.5 | SM | 2023-10-22 |
| Walkers | MAX (2 FOR 1 Pizza Hut PIZZA WITH EVERY PACK*) | Pepperoni Feast | I've never noticed a "not actual size" disclaimer on a packet of crisps before, but I'm going to keep my eye out next time. I'm not the world's biggest fan of Pizza Hut, and these crisps manage to capture the sickly sweetness of the sauce. I would say that these crisps are a weird novelty, but not much more than that. Not really sure why Sam liked these so much.
* UK, 18+ ONLY. VALID FROM 00:01 14/08/23. CLAIM AND REDEEM BY 23:59 31/12/23. | Being able to submit - fingers crossed? | 4 | CW | 2023-11-06 |
| Morrisons | Dexter the Dog | Original | Why is it that cheap crisps always seem to rip off Pom Bears? These salty dog-shapes are as tasty as salt (quite), and have the standard tapioca snap. Also, they are dirt cheap, so they get a big point boost there. Additionally, the "o" in "Dexter the Dog" is a paw print. Pick some up next time you're passing through a Morrisons, you won't be disappointed. Anyway, you know what's funny? Originally I gave Pom Bears a 2/10, saying "don't rate these at all". I don't remember what was going through my head at the time, but something was clearly up. It was the day after my birthday, so you would have thought I would have given them a higher score than usual. Despite this, I gave Pom Bears a very low score for what they are. Maybe my tastes have changed in the past 2 1/2 years, because these are the exact same thing and I'm giving them a 4. | working though a backlog of crisps | 4 | CW | 2023-11-07 |
| Jacob's | Mini Cheddars | Basil Pesto & Cheese Flavour | These are pretty horrible. They taste like the cheese and pesto combo has gone off, and the discs have waaay too much flavouring on them. You take one out of the bag, and you can see these massive clumps of flavour powder coating the crisp. When you put it in your mouth, it makes you screw your face up like you're eating something extremely sour. These are just bad, honestly, and there's not much else to say. I feel like basil could be used to make a really decent packet of crisps crisps, but this isn't it. | mouthwash | 1.6 | CW | 2023-11-07 |
| Deluxe | Hand Cooked Potato Crisps | Lightly Sea Salted | The packet has just about no branding on it, and it feels like they are trying as hard as they possibly can to hide the fact that these are exclusive to Lidl. You can't fool me, though. I know these are from Lidl because that's where I was when I bought them. The crisps are kinda OK. They're your standard kettle-like with an even stronger crunch. So strong, in fact, that you basically can't hear anything else over the sound of the munching. True to the name, they are only slightly salted, and I probably would have preferred a bit more flavour. Still, these are a perfectly fine packet of crisps, and would make a good backup if your local supermarket gets turned into a Lidl in some sort of Lidl gray-goo apocalypse. | Wasting time | 3 | CW | 2023-11-13 |
| 1001 Delights | Brown Rice Chips with | Hummus Flavour | Wasn't really sure what to expect from these, but surprisingly, they taste like crunchy discs of brown rice covered in hummus. Pretty alright, i'd be interested to try a different flavour. | Spice | 5 | CS | 2023-11-13 |
| Seabrook | Loaded Curly Fries | Sour Cream, Bacon & Chive | Some really good crisps. The helices in the bag (plural for helix, and let me be clear - this shape is a helix, not a "spiral") are much larger and weightier than I assumed they would be. They are about the size of your thumb, assuming your thumb is about the size of my thumb, and are substantial enough to actually be quite filling. Sour cream and chive is a well used combination in crisping, and here it is executed well. The packet claims that there is some bacon flavouring as well, but this does not really come through. Nevertheless, this is a lovely snack. I would say that this bag is slightly too large for a single serving, so either bring a friend or set these aside for tomorrow when you get full. | schül | 7 | CW | 2023-11-16 |
| Walkers | Festive Edition Sensations | Beef Wellington | No surprises here, this is another good addition to the Sensations line. These have a light beef taste, with some nice boot flavour on top. Like wellington boots. Get it? | Did you get it? | 8 | CS | 2023-11-28 |
| Co Op | Irresistible | Turkey Tikka Masala | Despite some need for clarity as to how to list this brand of crisp, these hand cooked snacks are pretty good. Nice bite size pieces with a hearty crunch, you can tell these crisps have been fried - but in a good way. Quite light on the turkey, but heavy on the turmeric, these crisps are well-flavoured but not overpowering, leaving plenty of room for more. | Charcuterie and scary films | 7.5 | EL | 2023-11-30 |
| Snaktastic | Thick & Crunchy Ridge Cut Potato Crisps | Ready Salted | The incredibly uneven salt distribution makes these crisps a Russian Roulette-like experience. Will it be the saltiest thing you've ever tasted? Will it be as bland as a pack of salt 'n' shake that you forgot to salt or shake? You don't know until you try! Thick is perhaps an overstatement. | pushing away dogs who want to try one | 5 | CS | 2023-12-18 |
| Tayto | Flavoured potato crisps | Wuster sauce | A delightfully funny play on the word "worcestershire", these crisps striked my eye at various cornershops around town recently. Tayto crisps! they're everywhere! sensing some sort of cultural phemonemom i decided to give them a try. They are nothing too special, horrible mackies-esque texture with a pleasant but thin flavour. I believe these to be the new replacements for the Golden Wonder brand, as they occupy the same ecological niche being both cheap and slightly shit. Keep an eye out in stores near you to see if they sell both brans simultaneously, because i'm curious. Other than that there's no real reason to purchase these crisps unless your a bit peckish and strapped for cash. | a cool glass of water | 4 | SM | 2023-12-19 |
| Co Op | Irresistible | Hand Cooked Margherita Pizza Crisps | It's Chtistmas time for all shops and my local Scotmid has started selling all manner of weird, semi-festive flavours. First on my list are these margherita pizza flavoured crisps, which are sort of nice, but not all that great. The crisps manage to capture the pizza flavour quite accurately, but I'm not completely sure this is a good flavour for a crisp to have. The key flavours, consistent with real pizzas, are basil, mozzarella, and tomato. It is said that these ingredients gave the Italian flag its green / white / red colours, and they all really shine through here. The only issue is that you are eating a packet of crisps, not a lovely pizza. If I were to be picky, I would also say that there is too much basil in these, but it's a flavour that is not often used in the crisp world, so I'll give it a little pass. | A Pepsi Max someone left at my flat | 4.6 | CW | 2023-12-21 |
| Nik Naks | NiK NAKS | Scampi & Lemon | Despite the packet being a horrible shade of luminous green, these are pretty unoffensive. The scampi and lemon flavour is quite weak, to the point where the smell is more impactful. Didn't Nik Naks used to be crunchy? | Gaming | 4 | CS | 2024-01-28 |
| Peppa Pig | Lentil Hoops | Sour Cream & Chive | Peppard Pig does not make good crisps (so far). I ate one and I'm not having any others (for now). Flavour is weak. Afterflavour is strong, but bad. Lentil crisps are typically quite shit, and this holds true here. They're probably made for kids, but that's not really an excuse. Bought a 5 pack of these and I don't want any more, let me know if you want them. | Nah | 2 | CW | 2024-02-03 |
| Peppa Pig | Lentil Puffs | Really Cheesy | Another miss from the Peppa Pig line, suggesting that pigs really don't make good crisps. These are your standard "Really Cheesy" flavour and, as such, aren't all that great. The puffs are quite a bit firmer that you might expect, with a reasonably nice mouth-feel. Unfortunately this is not enough to make up for the horrible taste. Still better (shockingly) than the chive rings from yesterday. | better crisps | 2.5 | CW | 2024-02-05 |
| Burton's | Fish 'n' Chips | Pickled Onion | Rate these a lot. I'd have 20 packs in a row if I could. The texture is like that of Mini Cheddars, and they have a very rich, full-bodied vinegar flavour that really hits the spot. In the bag you can find both "fish" and "chip" shapes, but there is no functional difference. Grab a pack of these from Aldi immediately, and have a great time pretending that you're at the seaside eating picked onions. Take notes, Peppard. | 1 glass, water | 7.3 | CW | 2024-02-05 |
| Walkers | Unbelievable! Vegan | BBQ Pork Ribs | Even after eating these I'm not sure whether its a vegan version of a crisp flavour, or a flavour based on vegan ribs. It's very sweet, and very hard on the BBQ, most similar to TExas BBQ pringles. Pleasant, but very thin in terms of flavour concentration. Interesting, but I think the only thing interesting about these crisps is that they're vegan, which a lot of much better crisps also are. | a little cat wee cat oo little baby | 4 | SM | 2024-02-06 |
| Walkers | Sensations | Mature Chedder & Chilli Chutney | This is the usual deal with cheese crisps - a not particularly realistic depiction of cheese, but these have the added layer of "chilli chutney". To me, the chilli is so bland that it just kind of tastes like tomato with the occasional unpleasant sting of chilli. Not the worst, but I wouldn't recommend having a lot of these at once, as the flavour build up makes these taste more like american cheese mixed with Tangy Tom's. | Worf screaming at the camera | 5 | CS | 2024-02-13 |
| Savoursmiths | Potato Crisps | Bubbly and Serrano Chilli | When filling out this form, I realised that someone has already reviewed this crisps as the tabs handily auto filled. I look forward to reading this review, but can confirm that I have not yet read it, and so it has no bearing on the below review.
The bag design itself stands out, in metallic gold, yellows, and burgundy. A cat with human hands tips its top hat and beams at the viewer, while its human torso is squeezed into a bucket that would fit no more than half a body (I assume it's legs have been sawn off.) The body is wearing a shirt, suspenders, and bow tie. Horrific if given more than a moment's thought and more than a little pretentious, but certainly eye-catching.
The bag describes the crisps as "Luxurious hand cooked British snacks with style" which makes me feel like I should put out some union jack decor before eating these. HOWEVER, the texture of these is really quite good. They're crunchy, not too dry but also not too greasy, and are light enough that they're still moreish. The brand has at least two more flavours;Wagyu Beef and Mustard, Desert Salt. Both are unsurprisingly try-hard flavours but the pleasant texture of these crisps make me look forward to trying them.
I'm uncertain how I feel about the flavour of these crisps though. They are as described on the bag; the "bubbly" flavour is quite fizzy, much like those popping candies but more acidic. The spice is definitely there too and it's nice to have a properly spicy crisp for once. Over all, I think this is a nice crisp in moderation, perhaps served to guests at a buffet as a novelty, but not a snack I'd choose to buy again. | Orange juice, vodka, tonic | 4.5 | EL | 2024-02-21 |
| Tayto | N/A | Pickled Onion | These crisps made me realise something about Picked Onion as a flavour. In crisp terms, Pickled Onion is really nothing more than two more well-established flavours - Cheese and Onion, and Salt and Vinegar - meeting in the middle. It seems obvious to me now that, yes, these Pickled Onion crisps taste like "what if onion met vinegar?", but these ones really, really do. They have the sharp tang of both components right at the forefront, and don't attempt to emulate the sweeter attempts of Space Raiders or Monster Munch. Now, while it's true that these capture the flavour of a real picked onion, whether this is a good fit for a crisp is up to your own personal opinion. For me, these are a nice snack, but I wouldn't switch over to them for my main post-evening-meal snack. Pretty good though. | BLT, as usual | 4.5 | CW | 2024-03-09 |
| Doritos | Corn Chips | Extra Flamin' Hot | blessed are we this easter sunday, for doritos hath launched a new flavour for the occasion. These chips are a very strange affair, with altogether too many competing flavours. We have a strange mix of umami, sour, spicy, and sweet, all blending together at different times, which is the strange thing. You eat that chip and bam, first up its umami. tasting like msg, except with slightly more depth, right off the bat you're thinking "hmm, thats complex". Fast forward half a second and you're knee deep in that sweet spice (copyright villeneuve 2024), which is dry, and slightly smokey. The fun doesnt stop there, because while you're still reeling from that first one two punch, the third bloke king hits you from behind. That mans name? sour. You know me, I'm a big evetangelist but this isn't a lovely pickle tang, or even a vibrant fruity tang, but the tang of some seriously dubious milk. That's not to say i dont like it, oh no, this whole thing has got me thinking about all the wasted milk I've thrown out over the years. It's a strange taste that i have mixed feelings about, like if they added a bit of battery acid to the flavour mix, but it turns out you liked battery acid a bit. It's an unwanted visitor to be sure, and it lingers long after all the invited guests leave. Once our good friend umami has left, it's just the sour show, and spice takes a backseat. This is the worst part about eating these crisps. The sour flavour sticks around for ages, leaving this horrible aftertaste in your mouth. The nerve. They obviously relish their part in this ridiculous flavour relay. The THING IS, after sour's had his fill, spicy comes back in full force! it's some sort of 5 alarm chili that comes in after the initial spicy kick? genuinely a bit concerning. These are just about the only crisps where the strategy to enjoying them most is just to cram them in your mouth as fast as possible. This ensures all the flavours are peaking at the same time, and you're never overpowered by the sour. Really can't stress how strange these crisps are, call me a cynic but it seems like these are Doritos response to the popularity of Taki's. The radical-esque branding being dangerously close to a copyright infringement, and the flavour is like pre hotfix takis *. I wopuld describe these as takis if they were a song, but some idiots gone and messed with the sound settings, so it sounds like a whole treble-y ear scratchy mess. give them a go for the novelty but I wouldn't go out of my way to get them again. overall disappointing. Maybe when they were cooking these "extra" flaming hot they should have spent some extra time in the kitchen.
*editors note: this is a conspiracy theory i have, in that takis changed their flavour about a year ago in order to reduce the lime-i-ness of their product. There was a serious improvement to their flavour around that time, and the result was a lot of bags of taki's that were now way tastier. Will their unchecked corporate greed ever be sated? | little cat sniffing them | 4 | SM | 2024-03-31 |
| Walkers | Max | Extra Flamin | Part of a new line of "extra flamin' hot" crisps, the only real difference Bere between these and the domino's is the innate flavour and texture of the crisps. These walkers crisps are a lot less Hardy than doritos, and have very little flavour by themselves. I think this helps the overall crisp, as the doritos clashed with the flamin hot flavour. You can get a really good grip on the flamin hot flavour with these neutral crisps. It's quite similar to those Corner shop chili and lime grills. A bit more paprika, a bit more spice, and quite a bit more flavour. These crisps are simply slathered in flavour, a very big selling point. Overall these assuaged my worry over this new product line. I would definitely say these were a buy, and the doritos not. Excited for the wotsits flamin hot flavour! | Blue gatorade | 7.5 | Sm | 2024-04-12 |
| Golden Wonder | Fully Flavoured | Chip Shop Curry | Rather than tasting of chip shop curry, these taste of chip shop curry sauce. It's a subtle difference in naming, but a very important difference in flavour. These crisps aren't exactly bad, but they aren't exactly good either. If I had to give these a rating, and I do, I would say that they were ok. Probably not good enough for a 5. Probably not bad enough for a 3. It is for these reasons that I award this crisp a 4. The packet cost me £1, which is the most expensive single bag of Golden Wonder I have ever seen. Nevertheless, I enjoyed eating these. | too good to pair with a 3, not good enough to pair with a 5 | 4 | CW | 2024-04-16 |
| Walker | Wotsits | Extra Flamin | The third and final variant of the new "Extra Flamin' Hot" line I think these might be big winners. The flavour is the same spicy limey flavour seen in the others so i shant waste your time recounting that here. What really stands out is the texture of the wotsit and how that lends itself to the flavour. These nobbly little corn extrusions are simply maximised on surface area, meaning that these things pack a PUNCH of flamin' hot flavour. On top of that the flavour of the corn puff is suttler than the corn chip, but actually with some flavour unlike the potato crisp, and this complements the spice well. This is one lovely thing about releasing these products together, in that you get to experience what the crisps are actually like. I thinkthis has made me appreciate wotsits more, never knew they were actually quite nice. Overall very happy with these crisps and this crispline, I really hope this is something they do again with different crisps and a new flavour. Sorry marx but this is one advertising strategy that has got me praising the corpo crisp giants. | lucozade sport (blue) | 8 | SM | 2024-04-18 |
| Pipers | Made by Farmers | Anglesey Sea Salt | These are pretty decent crisps. They have the firmness of Kettle crisps, while being slightly more flavourful. Moreover, the back of the bag contains a fascinating fact. Did you know that Anglesey is Britain's only protected designation of origin sea salt? The wording on this fact is a little bit odd, but I think I know what it's trying to say. Also, you might have thought that the salt in the sea around Anglesey would taste the same as the salt in the sea anywhere else in the world, but maybe I'm wrong on that one. Nevertheless, a lovely packet of crisps. | something like gammon maybe? | 6 | CW | 2024-05-02 |
| Pipers | Made by Farmers | Burrow Hill Cider Vinegar & Sea Salt | I was excited for these after the Sea Salt crisps from earlier, but these ones are not as good. The vinegar is a little bit sour, and honestly not all that nice to eat. The mouthfeel is still strong in these crisps, but the flavour isn't all that. I would say to avoid these in favour of the Sea Salt ones. | Sea Salt | 3 | CW | 2024-05-02 |
| Seabrook | LOADED FiRE EATERS | Trinidad Scorpion Chilli | The last time I had a Trinidad Scorpion Chilli flavoured crisp, it was also by Seabrooks, as part of the same range. But these are apparently LOADED, which might make them a different crisp. It's possible this was simply omitted. Sadly, this information is lost to time. However, even if they weren't, I would still be writing this review, despite having done them already. This is because if these crisps are indeed unchanged from the last time i reviewed them, I did them a terrible disservice. If they are changed from last time, then it's a major step up. These crisps are much more flavourful than just spice. They have a nice level of sweetness, which builds alongside the spice. And the spice certainly does build. The actual crisp formation is good, with plenty of the all important flavouring. Overall, these crisps are a lot nicer than my previous review gave them credit for, unless they have changed in which case they're nicer than they were at the time of my previous review. Who can really say? | Review related confusion | 8 | CS | 2024-05-07 |
| Golden Wonder | Fully Flavoured | Tomato Ketchup | These are sort of under-flavoured, which is not unusual for Golden Wonder. Some of the smaller crisps in the bag have a lot of flavouring, but overall the crisps are a little bit too bland for me. Despite this, the packet is quite enjoyable as a snack. The inconsistent flavouring leads to a kind of lottery effect, where all the gambling-related neurons in your brain fire when you pull a particularly good crisp. As always, the firm nature of the crisps make Golden Wonder pleasant to munch. Get them or don't. See if I care. | Memories of Childhood | 4 | CW | 2024-05-14 |
| Walkers (Originally Smiths) | Salt & Shake | Salt / Nothing | These crisps presumably come from a simpler time - a time before flavour was an integral part of the crisp. I'm sure you already know this, being so very knowledgeable, but these crisps come unflavoured; the titular "salt" comes in a bag, "&" must be "shake[n]" through the crisps manually. This is practically impossible to get right with your human hands, and comes across as a little bit lazy on the crisp makers' end. Like, what, are we meant to only use half the bag? Salt to taste? Who would do this? And why? Moreover, the bag claims that each bag has <1%* RDA salt (*but the packet is 10%), which is just fucking misleading. I know this is how crisps would have come in the golden olden days, but too much childhood computer gaming has made me impatient, like everyone else in my generation. This format results in basically half the bag being tasteless and the other half tasting very strongly of salt. Not much a fan of these crisps. | Kitchen floor | 3.5 | CW | 2024-06-05 |
| Doritos | Saveur | Paprika | Hmm boy howdy, these are not what I was expecting here on the continent.ive long been a detractor of paprika flavoured crisps for their ubiquity and lack of innovation, but these are the first ones I have really enjoyed. Wvery chip is packed with flavour, almost furry with dust. The taste is beautiful, sweet and savoury ij such a perfectly balanced way, they really are the platonic ideal of a paprika chip. I could not see this flavour doing half as well on a regular potato crisp, I think the dorito is essential to its balance. Overall remarkable, I really expected nothing from them and am blown away by how balanced, flavourful, and moreish they are. We should immediately import these to the UK | Beer in the sun in a nice hammock | 9 | Sm | 2024-06-18 |
| Seabrook | Loaded Nacho Chips | Chipotle Sour Cream | Close your eyes and imagine eating a Doritos Cool Original crisp. Now open them and continue reading thus review. Now close your eyes again and imagine that your Dorito Cool Original crisp was smaller, and had a bit less flavouring on it. You have just experienced what a Seabrook loaded nacho chip Chipotle sour cream crisp is like. Not terrible, but not really anything new. | Crabbies Raspberry Ginger Beer | 5 | CS | 2024-06-24 |
| O'Donnels of Tipperary | Hand Cooked Crisps | Fire Roasted Buffalo Wings | (Review copy provided by Third Party) First impressions with these crisps are very strong - They smell great, are lovely and crunchy and have a nice burst of flavour. There's a lot going on with these crisps, but unfortunately you don't really have time to consider the flavour profile, as it's quickly replaced with a very familiar and unpleasant taste. The taste of a particularly watery or soggy bolognese. Not inedible, and if you go through them slowly, taking breaks to avoid the Bolognese Build-up (like walking through a poison swamp in a FROM game), then they're pretty nice. I don't know what makes these Fire or Roasted or Buffalo or Wings, so it loses points for lying. Just call them Soggy Bolognese crisps. | A strong flavoured drink (antidote) | 5 | CS | 2024-07-12 |
| The Real Pork Co | Hand Cooked | Golden Crunch | Disclaimer: These are pork scratchings. While I do believe that they count as crisps, I felt it would be dishonest to not put this disclaimer at the start. Ok, on with the review. These pork scratchings are on the delicate end of the flavour spectrum, which is maybe a polite way of saying that they don't taste of much. Usually, pork scratchings are incredibly salty and in-your-face, but these just aren't. They taste alright, just not as "WHAM!" as I expected. Despite the flavour letdown, these have just about the perfect texture and shape. The crisps (and I maintain that they are crisps) feel like little, fat prawn crackers. If only they were slightly better. | A cool, dry place away from lights and strong odours. | 4 | CW | 2024-07-12 |
| Tasters Manufacturing Ltd | Twistees | Cheesy | Not sure why these are called Twistees, because they aren't twisty. It's not because they are a twist on an old classic bacause, as the bag claims, these are "the original baked snack". Regardless, these are actually pretty nice. They have the form of Nik-Naks, and one of the nicest fake-cheese "queso" flavours I've ever encountered. There's something about the knobbly shape of the crisps that lends itself to this flavour. I would highly recommend these, especially at the price point of €1.80. The bag says "store in a cool dry place under 25°C", which is pretty funny. | Being bright red on day 2 - skin not sore yet, but it will be | 7 | CW | 2024-07-29 |
| Lays | Max Strong | Chilli & Lime | I was very excited that a new corner shop opened up near me, with very strange crisps from around the world. Today the new polish lays (read:walkers) caught my eye, as they were our favourite max strong brand but in a new shiny flavour. I was very excited by this, but was promptly let down. For one these are missing the "heat" level so important, or at least I feel, to the max strong line. Everyone can recall that sweet agony one feels after eating just one too many jalapeño and cheese crisps. These are "chilli" in the sense that they taste like chilli con carne, a very basic spicy tasty Mexican sludge. There's also a bit of a tang in there, and, if i may say so, expertly balanced. Shockingly so, these are quite good crisps just lacking in heat. I am a bit upset that eastern Europe has ONCE AGAIN tricked me into eating paprika crisps, because these are OVERWHELMINGLY paprika flavoured. I GET IT, PAPRIKA IS NICE. I do not want it on EVERY CRISP. Jesus christ | Worter | 7.7 | Sm | 2024-07-30 |
| Pringles | Pringles | Pizza | There has been many a pizza-flavoured crisp review posted to this blog. However most of them at least try to chase a specific type or array of toppings. The good people at Pringles laugh at this notion. Here it is: Pizza. Perhaps the most famous Italian cuisine boiled down, in its entirety, to put on a perfectly formed sliver of reformed potato. And what does it taste like, you ask? Well, dear reader, it tastes like Oregano. That's it. A slight undertone of cheese powder if I am being very charitable
It's very difficult to review a product that doesn't clearly set out what it is trying to be, so I suppose it has fulfilled it's goal of taking two things commonly found on pizza and distilling them into a powder, but I did expect more, one, given the princely sum of 4.40 of Brussels finest euros, and two, because of the broad canvas of ingredients available to draw inspiration from, and what's presented is perhaps the most generic two. A tangy note of tomato or a zing of spice wouldn't have gone amiss.
They did all get eaten however, so I can't be too harsh. They're just bland - haunted by what they could have been instead of rejoicing in what they are. | Tuna baguette and a Mythos lager | 5 | WH | 2024-07-30 |
| Sunshine Snacks | Krips Potato Fries | Salt & Vinegar | These are kinda poor to be honest. They're made of the same reconstituted potato stuff as Squares and, like Squares, they are square. Unlike squares, however, is their flavour, or rather lack thereof. These don't really taste like salt and vinegar but also don't really taste of potato either. They're sort of flavourless, crunchy slices that I wouldn't advise getting. They let me spend all of my 20¢ coins though, so not a complete waste. | Boiling hot laundry room | 3 | CW | 2024-08-03 |
| Co Op Irresistible | Hand Cooked | All Dressed Seriously Saucy Crisps | Nowhere on the bag does it even attempt to explain what flavour they are going for in this crisp. "Seasoned with a blend of your favourite sauces" it says - what on Earth does that mean? The back doesn't help either. "Every potato we use to make..."; blah, blah, blah, blah. "For best quality, once opened..."; yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. "This bag could cause suffocation, keep away from..."; WHATEVER! What are these crisps supposed to be? Anyway, I digress. These crisps are really good. Really, really good, actually. They make good on their promise that they are seriously saucy, despite not really resembling any specific sauce. Closest that I can put my finger on is Walkers' Tomato Sauce, but don't let that put you off. Co Op Irresistible has a very good crinkled form, and a pleasantly crunchy mouthfeel. This suits the flavour of the crisp very well. The "sauce" flavour. The flavour of "sauce". "Seriously Saucy Flavour Seasoning: 7%". | absolutely shocking work meeting | 7.8 | CW | 2024-08-08 |
| PROPER chips | Chickpea Chips | Kastu Curry | I like Katsu Curry, and I like the chickpea crisps, which have a lovely crunch and a fun shape. I'd say that they could maybe have used a bit more flavouring, because some of the crisps end up just being chickpea-y. However, the bag boasts that they're "Mild & Moreish", so maybe that would defeat the purpose. This lead me to looking more into what Katsu curry actually is, and I wasn't really able to find any significant differences, at least in the flavour department. Turns out the Katsu just refers to the fried and breaded cutlet of meat typically served with the curry. So in reality, this is curry flavour. Unless the intention was to have it be flavoured like the meat cutlet, but what kind of meat? Unfortunately, at the time of this research, I've already finished the bag, with further investigation into the remains has been inconclusive at best. The bag smells like curry powder. So is this just curry powder flavour? I continued my investigation by tasting some of the curry powder at the back of my cupboard, but it was more spicy. So at least it isnt sainsburys own brand medium curry powder flavour. I cannot take my research any further, so come away from this review knowing that these are sweeter and have a more complex flavour than sainsburys own brand medium curry powder. Also it turns out my curry powder was expired. Oh no. | A drink to wash down the curry powder | 7 | CS | 2024-08-19 |
| Flying Goose Brand | Kroepoek Garnelenchips Prawn Crackers | Sriracha Orignal | Prawn Crackers are pretty underutilised when it comes to innovative new flavours. Maybe people feel they're fine as they are. Maybe the masses aren't ready to accept new kinds of Prawn Cracker. Either way, these Sriracha prawn crackers are pretty nice. The Sriracha flavour doesn't overpower the base prawn cracker, and vice versa. Pretty nice crisp-like. I feel theres untapped potential in this market. | Scott Bakula | 7 | CS | 2024-09-14 |
| Walkers | LIMITED EDITION Potato Crisps | Sausage Sarnie WITH flavour HEINZ ESTd 1869 Tomato Ketchup | Ignoring the nonsense text lay-out on the bag, these crisps really capture that feeling of making a really stodgy Sausage Sandwich. Through the intense ketchup flavour you can barely catch hints of the that mid-price sausage (mid price isn't really a compliment, because low price sausages shouldn't even be considered food - Fuck you Richmonds, if you're Britains favourite then I want out of this country.) I'd say these aren't really worth picking up. Walkers seems to be really struggling to innovate recently, as these are really just ketchup crisps with a bit extra flavouring to justify a limited edition tag. But like always, it worked on me, so maybe things are going to plan. | Farming camps | 5 | CS | 2024-09-20 |
| Nongshim | Snack | Cuttlefish (오징어집) | These are pretty bland crisps that are shaped like cuttlefish. They are hollow, like flying saucers, which is usually a good format to convey the flavour. Unfortunately, these crisps have very little flavour, tasting of very slightly fishy maize. The crisps printed on the packet are multicoloured, but inside the bag they aren't. Not a huge fan of Nongshim's debut in the crisp world. They should probably just stick to what they know. | Anticipation for the film Renfield | 3 | CW | 2024-09-22 |
| Co Op | Irresistible | Hand Cooked Chicken Shawarma Crisps | The first bite of these crisps has a faintly cheesy taste, not unlike a quaver, but with the classic "Hand Cooked" range's texture. After the mild cheesy hit (more like a passive tap), there are notes of mild spice, tang, and a chicken-ish umami. It's not necessarily a bad crisp, one that I would eat if it were at a buffet, but I'm not getting Chicken Shawarma from it. | Thatchers "Katy" | 5 | EL | 2024-09-23 |
| Wumingxiaozu (无名小卒) | Crackers | Crayfish Flavour (脆锅巴, I think) | Every now and again a crisp will come along that changes your perception forever. Sometimes, when you eat a crisp, it causes you to reevaluate every score you've ever given out. These crisps make me think "Could Hot Shot! Hot Dog! actually have been a 2? Could it even have been a 3?" These crackers are actually disgusting. Actually disgusting. I ate just one of these and instantly had to put them down again. I have had a total of 2 of these, for review purposes, and I will not be having any more. In fact, I had to open a packet of "Walkers Sausage Sarnie with Flavour Potato Crisps Heinz Estd 1869 Tomato Ketchup" just to eat something, anything, else. These taste very sweet and slightly liquoricey, and make you want to spit them out immediately. The crackers are limp, and they even small awful. I would avoid Wumingxiaozu (无名小卒) like you would avoid a swimming pool with a shark in it. | Walkers Sausage Sarnie with Flavour Potato Crisps Heinz Estd 1869 Tomato Ketchup | 0 | CW | 2024-09-26 |
| Walkers | Limited Edition | Sausage Sarnie WITH flavour HEINZ ESTd 1869 Tomato Ketchup | Barry mentioned this is his review, but the layout on the front of the packet makes no sense. Read from top to bottom, in the most intuitive order, the packet reads "Walkers Sausage Sarnie with flavour potato crisps", then over to the right it reads "Heinz". The Heinz logo isn't even in line with the rest of the text. I know they say "don't judge a crisp by its packet", but this really is a poor effort. The crisps themselves are not too bad, but not too great either. The tomato from the Heinz comes through quite strongly, accompanied by the faint taste (if you close your eyes and imagine) of sausage and bread. Unfortunately, these are a little bit too sour and sharp for my liking, but I appreciate the one-off flavours that Walkers brings out. It's also nice to see Walkers and Heinz collaborating again after their big falling out (that I closed my eyes and imagined). Time heals all wounds. | NOT 无名小卒脆锅巴小龙虾味, ANYTHING BUT 无名小卒脆锅巴小龙虾味 | 3 | CW | 2024-09-26 |
| Walkers | Limited Edition | Cheese Toastie with flavour HEINZ BEANZ | If you've ever wanted to eat a crips that tastes like Heinz Beanz then this is probably the crisp for you. I didn't really pick up much of a cheese flavour, so a little underwhelming in that regard. Overall they're alright, just not really my thing. Fix the packet layout, Walkers. | Babylon 5 | 5 | CS | 2024-10-08 |
| Walkers | Limited Edition | Cheese Toastie with flavour HEINZ BEANZ | a very interesting flavour. They've managed to capture the syrupy saucey flavour of heinz beans, which makes me think that this tie in goes deeper than just name level. I don't know why they didn't call these heinz cheesy beanz flavour since the toast doesnt add anything except yes i do, it's to excuse the quite sparse distribution of flavour. The potato and bread flavours are really just there to explain how dilute it is, because i think it would put people off if these tasted much more like beanz. I quite like it though, so i'm a little disappointed they aren't more punchy. The flavour is unique and definitely carries the packet through to the end, but would i buy another? hmmm... no I don't think so. But I would defdinitely eat them if they gave me them for free. Overall quite interesting, and absolutely worth it as a gimmick buy. A solid 5 from me, this is one of the crisps of all time | water when you're really thirsty | 5 | SM | 2024-10-16 |
| SERIOUS PIG | HAND COOKED IN YORKSHIRE | SAUSAGE | Review copy provided by a third party. This is the first in a series of christmas crisp reviews, sponsored by a very generous Auntie. When was the last time you had a sausage crisp? The last one i had was the pretty disappointing Walkers and Heinz crossover. These SERIOUS PIG crisps blow those out the water. I don't think I've ever had a meat crisp that tasted so similar to the real thing. These crisps are almost perfectly flavoured - They emulate the Sausage experience so closely. Extemely tasty seasoning. General crisp feel is also good, with nice and crunchy vessels. Lovely. Come over and try some, I've got a few left. | Some Local Sausage, and not hearing the end of it for well over a decade | 9 | CS | 2025-01-23 |
| Arnotts Shapes | Cheese and Bacon | Bacon | Possibly the best shapes flavour, these ones taste like pure bacon and sharp cheddar. They make the crumbly gummy mini cheddar sensation in your mouth but much tastier. | James Boag Lager | 8 | MP | 2025-01-26 |
| Arnotts Shapes | Pizza | Pizza | Does what it says on the box - 'flavour you can see', The flavour dust is next level, delicious Pizza dust that makes me happy | Kirks Pasito | 8 | MP | 2025-01-26 |
| Doritos | Corn Chips | A Minecraft Movie The Creeper Vinegar | When I bought these the other day from my local Tescos, I thought of the past where you had to actually present the things you wanted to buy to a cashier. Thank god we have things like self-checkout now, otherwise there's a chance I might have been too
embarrassed to buy these A Minecraft Movie The Creeper flavoured doritos. Also, I saw a picture of a review of a Sims 2 H&M expansion (google steve hogarty sims 2 H&M), and it made me wonder how these promotional products happen - Did Minecraft commision these Dorito flavours? Was there a bidding war? Did Doritos have to "develop" this crisps concept, or did they have it lying around and they used the crossover opportunity to test a new product? I'm sure these answers are out there, but I think I'm still too human to delve into the dark world of marketing. Onto the crisps themselves - They are vinegary. Extremely Vinegary. They don't pretend "Oh actually we're salt and vinegar, look, two flavours!" No, these crisps are just vinegar. I'm sure vinegar fans and self-proclaimed experts could really delve deep into the taste profile or the complexities that come with vinegar, but to me, these are vinegar. I don't like the weird furry Creeper on the front of the bag. Personally, I wouldn't get these again, but I don't regret falling for the marketing ploy. | A taste stronger than vinegar to overpower the vinegar - Or maybe some Minecraft? | 6 | CS | 2025-01-31 |
| Slabs | Thick & Big Chunky Potato Crisps Hand Cooked & Batch Fried | Salt & Malt Vinegar | Like the name suggests, these are large. They are thick, wide, and deep, making them larger than the average crisp in all three spatial dimensions. Even the bag is large and it came over-inflated with air to make it appear even larger. This made the bag difficult to open, but didn't affect the experience much beyond that. Eating the large crisps is quite fun. On to the flavour. The salt and vinegar flavour is quite strong, but it leaves an odd aftertaste that isn't that pleasant. All in all, the crisps are quite nice, but are carried quite hard by the size gimmick. Had these been a conventional size, they would have scored much less. | Salzmalzessiggeschmack | 4 | CW | 2025-03-28 |
| Doritos | Dinamita | Extra Flamin | There is now an ongoing product war between doritos and takis. They were right up to the line with their flaming hot series appropriating a takis-esque flavour, and i forgave them because the enemy of my enemy etc. But these are a step too far, they made me really appreciate takis. theyre the exact same style of chip but the texture here is very flimsy and easily snappable. I believe (dont know) that takis are deep fried and have a sort of flavourful fur that surrounds them, adds to the crunch and supports the chip. Ive had some really bad ones specifically because of the fur factor but i think the average experience was elevated by them after sampling these. You can also see little overhangs where they haven't rolled the chip up all the way, disappointing. These remind me more of chipstix (?) or whatever the flimsy yet hard shelled sticks are (and not the fluffy ones from sainsburys). Flavourwise these are very mediocre. Quantity? non-existent, theres an insipidly thin coating on even the most laden chips, and while it is the exact same "extra flaming hot" flavour seen on others in that particular cabal, its so dilute i couldnt possibly recommend them. what was promised from the packaging (A series of doritubes flying more or less directly towards the viewer, surrounding by the rippling flames of a hellish inferno) woefully overhyped these for me. If you're going to release as close to a taki as copyright suits will allow, you better bring something new or tasty. If i were takis i wouldnt even bother with the paperwork. | Eating something else | 3 | SM | 2025-04-02 |
