Bret’s Saveur Bleu Pancetta

 

Interesting. I first bought a packet of Bret’s crisps in 2013 and they were fabriqué dans le Morbihan (which is in Brittany),  then they were produit en Bretagne (which is Brittany) and then they became le chipsier français, and somewhere along the line they lost an apostrophe. So you can tell the reluctant taste testers and I have tried quite a lot of their catalogue.

I was rather pleased to find a brand-new-to-me crisp flavour. Blue cheese and pancetta eh? We’ll give that a go.

Unfortunately I thought these crisps quite disgusting. Blue cheese crisps might be OK; pancetta crisps could be tasty. But not both at once. No. The blue cheese taste is certainly there but then the pancetta flavour leaps up and interferes. 

Cliffs of Moher taste tester was not impressed. Even the Chef who can pretty much be convinced to eat anything (and he did) opined that this crisp flavour is all wrong.

Sorry. But no. The crisps themselves are exemplary.

Bret’s Au Fromage du Jura

Another big packet of crisps from Breton company Bret’s. With a Breton workforce growing French potatoes (possibly even Breton potatoes) for a family company and caring for the the Breton environment you can see this is a very Breton crisp.

Except for the cheese which comes from quite a different part of France. And what a tasty cheese this must be, because this is a fabulous crisp.

Just for a change every single reluctant taste tester really liked this crisp. A lovely subtle cheesy taste and a nice fine crinkle cut crisp. We all liked this crisp very much, and the Chef was pleased to approve too.

Interestingly Bret’s have previously marketed a crisp “au Comté” which is a cheese from the Jura. The Chef and I enjoyed them while driving through France several years back. Comté is a tasty, and well known, AOP cheese from the Jura. And I note from the list of ingredients that the cheese used here is in fact exclusively Comté. So why has the name changed? Could it be that name checking Comté on the packet required a licensing agreement of some sort?

Or is this a different recipe?

Well, whatever the truth of it, this is a very nice crisp. But you have to go to France to buy it. Or possibly an Arabic speaking country (ingredients in English and Arabic as well as French).

A Visit to Reims in 2016 (France)

In fact despite me begging the Chef to stop in Reims because I long to visit the cathedral, we actually stop at Tinqueux which is a suburb of Reims. And 2 minutes walk from the very comfortable Novotel there is a giant Carrefour supermarché. And we pass through Tinqueux at least 4 times a year.

I love it. I enjoy shopping a lot and all the more if I don't actually need to buy anything. And frankly I don't need to buy crisps or crispy snacks. I just do.

Check out the huge array of crisps. I am certain the crisp market in France has got noticeably larger in the last 4 years, and certainly the range of crispy snacks was larger last year than in previous years.

I can see Pringles here, and the Carrefour own brand version, about 12 different flavours by the look of it. Also tubs of hula hoops which in the UK come in packets not tubs. And then to the left of the Pringles we move into the Biscuit apéritif section where the products are usually packaged in boxes.

I have scrutinised this photograph very carefully and have determined that there are 13 different Lay's flavours on the shelf; Poulet Rôti (roast chicken), Fromage (cheese), Cheese & Onion (yes, that's French for cheese & onion), Jambon Braisé (braised ham), Paprika, Bolognaise, Spicy (French for spicy), Barbecue, Moutarde Pickles (French for mustard and pickles, a very weird but rather fabulous flavour if you ask me but I have only tried the Bret's version), Saveur Giant (bonkersly this appears to be French for cheeseburger flavour these days), Salt & Vinegar (you guessed, French for salt & vinegar), á l'Ancienne which is a sort of old fashioned style of crisp the French seem to be very fond of, and Deep Ridge Barbecue. Phew. 

Lay's crisps of course are not available in the UK. We have Walkers instead with a rather different selection of flavours. We have Cheese & Onion but not cheese flavour. Salt & Vinegar but not Spicy or Moutarde Pickles. As for Saveur Giant! I have tried a number of these so I'll put some links in for you.

We also have Market Deli crisps in the photograph (2 flavours on the shelf), and Kettle Chips (2 flavours) and Tyrrell's. I wonder what the difference is between Sea Salt & Black Pepper and Sea Salt & Crushed Black Pepper? (4 flavours).

Then there are the French crisps. Vico Grillade aux herbes. I haven't tried this flavour and it sounds rather good. I haven't tried á l'Ancienne either but I can live with that because I think it's a rather dull kind of crisp. There are 3 kinds of Carrefour own brand crisps and then the Bret's crisps. Bret's crisps come from Brittany and feature flavours that are a little bit different; Chèvre (technically goat, but in this case probably goat's cheese), and au Comté which is a very nice French cheese and Chocolat Piment (chilli chocolate).

If you stand back, or in my case sit down, and list all the crisps in this photograph which is obviously not all the crisps in the store, it adds up to a vast number of crisps and crispy snacks. Huge numbers of crisps and snacks in dozens hundreds of flavours are manufactured all over the world. Tall taste tester suggested the other day that I should write a book about crisps but I think this is it. I have posted 741 different crisps and articles about crisps and photographs of crisp packets and reviews taken from magazines and newspapers. 741!! I guess I didn't look at the numbers recently. That's amazing. But it still doesn't qualify me as an expert when there are so many crispy snacks out there.

Here's what I bought at Carrefour in August 2016. See the Lay's Saveur Giant at the front? Oh dear. What a grumpy review I wrote abut that crisp.

Bret's Saveur Chocolat Piment

Honestly, how could you resist? Chocolate and chilli flavour potato crisps. Gotta try these yes?

Well obviously. But what you get is not a potato crisp that someone has carefully grated chocolate on to create a gorgeous effect. You get a crisp with such a dark brown flavour dust that Dutch taste tester was afraid she was being asked to try Marmite crisps (she hates Marmite), and others thought it was beef or ... I don't know quite what. But no-one looked and thought aha! it's a chocolate crisp.

The crisps do smell of chocolate. Potato and chocolate. Weird eh? And they kind of taste of chocolate but only if you expect them to. With a little bit of chilli heat to follow. I have to say the reluctant taste testers were not that impressed, and nor was the Chef. But I think they would all have been disappointed if I had left these crisps on the supermarket shelf in Reims.

Bret's Saveur Fromage Frais Fines Herbes

We visited the Aletschgletscher yesterday. Took two large cable cars up from Fiesch to the Eggishorn and basked in the most amazing sunshine. This is the biggest glacier in Europe. We've been before - but that was before the days of massive megabytes and digital photography a gogo. And in fact, I think the weather was not so nice last time we made this journey.

A wonderful wonderful treat to see such an impressive piece of geography. The views are absolutely stunning. We are very lucky to be able to leap in the car whenever we fancy to visit such a great place. I remember learning about glaciation at school but never thought I would have the opportunity so see so much of it.

But an excess of sunshine is very tiring so today we are staying home. I have a load of washing drying in the garden, the Chef is doing chores (washing his ski suit, pulling up that small willow tree growing on the terrace, recharging the battery on the car etc), and I can write up a crisp or two.

This is another crisp bought in Rheims, and another packet that weirdly blows up like a ballon when it gets a little bit warm. It is a mystery to me why some crisp packets do this and others don't. Maybe one day I will discover the science of crisp packets.

Anyway, here we have another flavour from Bret's of Brittany. Of course Bret's are very fond of this fine crinkle style of crisp, and here they have created a very fresh flavour with an interesting combination of cream cheese, and parsley, chives, dill and mint. Interesting. And I think rather tasty.

Nice crunch, typical rather pale Bret's crisp, lots of green herbyness going on. Does this qualify for a yum? Pretty much I think.

And does the Chef approve? Yes he does. And I will try to take some home for the reluctant taste testers to try. I think these crisps are rather good.

Bret's Frites Goût Salés

Another of these slightly weird (but tasty) Frites from Bret's. We tried the Goût Crème Oignon before... oh, wait, it was the Chef and me in Switzerland who tried those. So the reluctant taste testers had not seen this style of crispy snack before - well, it's all cut into strips - you can't call it a crisp.

It isn't a crisp, it isn't one of those square extruded snacks masquerading as a chip (that's a french fry not a crisp), it's a flat strip of crispy potatoeyness (not sure that's a word). And it's quite tasty but also quite weird.

And it isn't so easy eating flat strips of crispy snack. You really have to concentrate to pick them up in smallish, largish (but not too greedy-looking) fingerfuls. Or one at a time. Maybe this uses up more calories than you might suppose and thus creates a healthier snack? Who knows.

However, the reluctant taste testers and I thought this quite a pleasant plain salted crispy snack. Somehow rather plainer than the rather fabulous packet design, but nonetheless an honest and tasty snack.

Bret's Les Aromatisées Saveur Carbonara

Here's another packet of crisps brought home from the supermarket outside Reims. And we think they are pretty tasty.

Bret's usually made a pretty good crinkle cut crisp and this is very nice. The reluctant taste testers and I were a little puzzled at thought thought of Carbonara as a crisp flavour, but somehow it works quite well.

I gather that France and Italy have been having a bit of a spat recently about how you should make a Carbonara sauce (rows about recipes are nothing new but this seems to be working up to be quite serious) however I have no idea at all how this crisp flavour has dealt with that super important issue. Or not. I'm guessing probably not.

I have a problem with Carbonara as a pasta sauce flavour simply because it is so very creamy. And then there's the creepy way some restaurants serve it with a raw egg (in the shell) on top. Ugh! I can't bring myself to fancy that. I know you are supposed to mix the egg into the creamy sauce but I'd rather not.

OK, so some of the reluctant taste testers liked this crisp flavour a great deal. And some of them didn't. So I guess you have to try them for yourself. But I liked them. I thought they were pretty good. And no raw egg!

The finely cut crinkles of Bret's crisps are as good as ever, and the crunch is nice. And you really can taste a combination of creamy sauce flavour and bacon flavour. Not suitable for vegetarians.

Not bad.

Bret's Frites Goût Crème Oignon

Well, this pop art style of packaging is a new departure for Bret's. But then, these "frites" are a new  departure as far as I am concerned too.

I was expecting one of those square crispy cunchy snacks, shaped like a chip (french fry), you know, extruded from some machine. But this is a strange flat strip of crisp instead. Bâtonnets de pomme de terre it says on the back of the packet. Never seen nothing quite like it before. And I'm wondering about the flavour too. Is it cream and onion? Or perhaps a sort of cream of onion soup flavour? It's hard to tell.

Incidentally, did you know that the French have recently decided to change the spelling of onion? The French word for onion obviously. They can change la langue de Molière if they must, but no messing with la langue de Shakespeare please. The English/Americans can do that all on our own thanks very much.

Anyway, the spelling of onion has previously (and for goodness knows how long) been oignon. But oignon is henceforth to be spelled ognon. Doesn't that look odd? Here's an article from The Guardian you may find interesting.

Not a bad crispy snack, good crunch, quite a lot of flavour dust and a good creamy, oniony flavour. Just a bit of a surprise.

Bret's Saveur Chèvre & Piment d'Espelette

This is a really lovely crisp. The reluctant taste testers and I liked it a great deal. Even tech taste tester and the tall taste tester who say they don't like goat's cheese. Noble friend, who says she really hates goat's cheese, didn't try. But that's OK. It's not obligatory to try something you don't fancy.

Seriously. This is a wonderful crinkle cut crisp. Quite small, lovely crunch, and a very genuine taste of goat's cheese but with a fantastic touch of chilli that stops the cheese flavour being too bland.

I don't know how they got such a realistic goat's cheese taste but they did. Fantastic. Yum.

Interesting. The packet tells me we can discover Le Pays Basque by eating these crisps: partez à la découverte du Pays Basques avec les chips Chèvre et Piment d'Espelette. Leur saveur vous emporte vers les collines douces et parsemées de troupeaux de chèvres puis vous invite à découvir les villages intérieurs, aux façades rouges come le piment, cette épice au goût à la fois subtil at puissant.

Highly recommended if you happen to be in France or indeed Le Pays Basque. And you like goat's cheese.

Bret's Les Natures Classiques

A lovely simple basic sea salt flavour crisp. Kindly contributed by noble friend who found them in Italy. Although they were made in Brittany.

Simple, tasty, nice light crunch, nothing fancy, nothing exciting. Just a nice basic crisp. I wonder if these are sold in Italy because the flavour is so simple - most of the crisps we have found in Italy have a light, uncomplicated flavour.

Somehow many of today's crisps are a little too fancy and it seems the real skill is producing a top quality flavour which isn't too over the top. And doesn't sound like something in the menu of a Michelin starred restaurant.

What we have here is a very nice sea salt flavour. Sea Salt from Brittany (obviously). Nothing fancy though. And the reluctant taste testers and I liked this pleasant little crisp a lot.

Bret's Saveur Cheddar Oignon de Roscoff

What a great crisp flavour!

Basically this is a crinkle cut version of cheese and onion. And rarely have we tasted one so good.

The aroma on opening the packet  is fabulous. The taste is a wonderfully gentle cheese and onion. Yum! Top quality flavour.

Bret's tell us that Roscoff onions were a great success in England in the 19th centuary because they taste so good, and last so well. French "Johnnies" used to bicycle around England to sell onions until at least the 1970s. My mother used to buy onions from a Frenchman with a bike (although we never saw him ride it), but the Chef's mother definitely bought from bicycling Frenchmen.

And Bret's also tell us that these wonderful onions make a great culinary partner for Cheddar fromage au gout pronounce originaire de Somerset en Angleterre.

We think they're right. Although the Chef doesn't much care for crinkle cut crisps and would prefer the basic flat crispy shape. He thinks, and he's right really, that crinkle cut crisps have a harder crunch. And really and truly a lighter crunch would be better. More fabulous. In our opinion.

But still. A five star crisp.

And I know you are going to want to see the view from the restaurant where we had lunch on Friday. Stunning eh? This is Arolla in the Valais. Flowers courtesy of the Hotel Restaurant du Glacier. We had an Assiette Valaisanne and a cherry & edelweiss ice-cream! The mountain is Mont Collon.

Bret's au Comté

Another tasty packet of crinkle cut crisps from Breton company Bret's.

These are flavoured with Comté cheese from the Franche-Comté region of Eastern France. And although I do not remember ever trying Comté cheese it must have quite a distinctive taste. You can certainly tell these crisps are not flavoured with Cheddar (say) or Edam. What you get is a proper cheesy taste.

Apparently Comté is considered one of the finest cheeses in France. I read that you may only use the milk from 2 breeds of cow to make this cheese, and if you fancy learning more about it, there are many websites including a wiki page to help you out.

Rather good crisps. The Chef and I liked these and could probably have ever so gently eaten rather more than is good for our diet.

The packet features the distinctive bell logo which indicates the highest quality of Comté cheese. If you don't get the bell you are buying an inferior product.

I rather like Bret's. I like their crinkle cut crisps which aren't so terribly crunchy as some crinkly crisps. And I like their philosophy of employing local people and supporting local farmers. And they are doing their best to reduce their impact on the environment. Good for them.

Because we have just been driving through France here is the grand gateway and some of the other buildings at Arc-et-Senans which is the grandest salt mine you could ever wish to see.

Bret's Les Aromatisées Poulet Braisé

I remember years ago there used to be rather a good roast chicken flavour crisp I was very fond of. Only I can't remember who made it (this could have been 30 years ago so perhaps that's not so surprising). But then recently I tried two different roast chicken versions from UK crisp juggernaut Walkers and I wasn't impressed with either and I haven't yet found another UK chicken flavour crisp to try.

So, thinking of the Walkers versions,  it was with a certain amount of trepidation that I tried this French crisp.

Produced by Bret's of Brittany, found as usual at a French motorway service station, and tried by the reluctant taste testers at work and the Chef at home. And we thought these were rather good.

The initial aroma was not terribly tempting but, after all, most people don't sniff their crisps as though they were a glass of swanky wine (just me), so this is not too much of a hurdle especially as the taste is so good.

Crinkle crisps, obviously, a good not too thick, not too thinness of crisp with a good crunch, and a nice degree of very roast chickeny taste. In fact, we thought what we had here was a packet of crisps that taste of spit-roasted chicken. There is a definite hint of properly crunchy spit-roasted chicken skin. Which I don't eat because I don't like skin, but it does make the chicken taste good.

Although, "braisé" does not, of course, mean roast. It means braised. As in, fry lightly and then stew slowly in a closed container. Still tasty though.

Not suitable for vegetarians because these crisps do contain chicken meat powder. It's obvious really that crisps get their flavour from power. Because otherwise you'd have a small potato crisp with a lump of chicken (or cheese or whatever) gummed to it which would be silly. Or perhaps you'd coat your crisp in a chickeny gloop as chocolate digestive biscuits are coated in chocolate... But it is unfortunate that "chicken meat powder" sounds so nasty. And I really don't want to know how that powder is produced.

However, this is a very tasty crisp and if you have been disappointed by your local version of roast (or braised) chicken crisps, and you happen to be on your way to France, I recommend you try these.

Bret's are very keen on their local environment (good for them) and work with local Breton farmers not only to produce locally grown products but to reduce their impact on the environment. Perhaps because of this policy (food miles I imagine) you cannot buy their crisps in the UK. Or not anywhere I have looked (I've not been shopping in Cornwall recently....). Which is a mighty shame because loads of people here eat lots of crisps and you have to suppose it would be a good market for them.

Bret's Les Aromatiseés Moutarde Pickles

To be absolutely honest, I bought this packet of crisps thinking that moutarde pickles would be the most disgusting flavour in the history of crisps.

And how wrong I was.

Moutarde is of course French for mustard. Which I don't really like much. Pickles is not French for pickles at all. According to the back of a Lay's packet (they also do a moutarde pickles crisp), French for pickles is condiments. But in any case, pickles could be absolutely anything that has been pickled.

The ingredients list has mustard (a good start), pepper, turmeric, onion, garlic, sugar, carrot, cauliflower and cucumber. And salt of course. There are acidity regulators, acidifiers and citric acid too. And all suitable for vegetarians.

And the flavour? Somehow it's amazing.

Apart from one of them, the reluctant taste testers at work thought this was a really good crisp. They finished most of the 125g packet in no time at all. I took the rest of the bag home for the Chef to try. The one person who didn't really enjoy these called the taste "alarming' but she has a conservative taste in crisps so I'd trust the opinion of the rest of them. Some of them thought the taste was very mustardy, and some of them thought it was very pickley. But they all seemed happy to tuck in.

As usual with Bret's the crisps have a fine crinkle and a light crunch. There's not too much loose flavour dust but the taste.... it's really astonishing. Wow. Not for every day perhaps but certainly one to try if you spot a bag on your way through France.

Check out the Bret's website for more flavours.

Just for fun, here's a rose from my garden.

Bret's Indian Curry

A wonderfully brightly coloured packet might make you think these "curry" flavoured crisps will be tastier than they actually are. Yes, I know; not a very promising start.

I have learned to sniff each new crisp flavour as soon as I open the packet, and in this case I was irresistibly reminded of dreadful school curries. Chock full of raisins and almost too hot for the untutored palate to cope with (remember this was the 1970s long before chicken tikka masala became the national dish of Britain), school curry was not very nice. And then we had curried eggs, which was basically hard boiled eggs in a bed of plain boiled rice with a skin of curry sauce on top. In fact, that wasn't too bad provided you could add butter to the hot rice to fake a little sauce.

Anyhow, these crinkly crisps from the Breton company Bret's don't taste right to us. I wonder if this is what the French crisp consumer expects when he/she is offered a curry flavour? I can't help feeling a British curry flavour crisp would be quite different.

The crisps themselves are pretty good. Bret's do a good job with their Breton potatoes cut to a fine crinkle. Nice crunch. Shame about the flavour though; it's all in the dark flavour dust and not in the crisp and it doesn't work for us.

Partagez un instant de plaisir et craquez pour le gout unique des chips Bret's suggests the blurb on the packet. Perhaps not.

The ingredients listed (handily in English as well as French and Arabic) include coriander, cumin, ginger, sweet pepper, turmeric, garlic and clove. But not apparently star anise which is shown on the packet. And I wonder how they have replicated the taste of those raisins in the school curry?

Not at all unpleasant but I don't think I'd get them again. That sounds a bit mean doesn't it, but I don't think I'd try these crisps again. We didn't finish the packet.

Bret's Les Aromatisées Saveur Carbonara

Crisps tasting of spaghetti carbonara? Well, why not.

Travelling through France on our way to Switzerland we stopped at three service stations and I picked up a packet of crisps or two. Or, as it turns out, a packet of crisps or16. How could I possibly resist? After all, there were so many fascinating flavours to choose from.

So here we have carbonara flavour. The ingredients include milk, cream, cheese, onion, garlic and actual viande de porc (albeit in powder form). So not suitable for vegetarians. Real meat eh?

These crisps have a nice fine crinkle. The colour is a pale golden and they taste pretty much the same as they smell which is more unusual than you might suppose. And quite nice crunch.

I rather liked these crisps. I thought they had a pleasant light flavour; a crisp I would happily eat again. Another taste tester thought it a very heavy flavour. But tasty he said. He didn't think he would buy them again though. Which is fine because he didn't buy them in the first place!

Bret's is a Breton company very proud of its work force (200 agriculteurs breton) and its commitment to reduce its impact on the environment. The company is based in the Morhihan, which is in Southern Brittany. I looked it up on a map and the almost inland sea with all the little islands does look rather lovely.

I have more crisps from Bret's to try so we'll see how we go. But I think these are pretty good. Especially considering I'm not mad about spaghetti carbonara in the first place.

Bret's Pizza au Feu de Bois

Now these I found in a motorway service station in Alsace. I think it was the place with all the storks menacing the lunchtime picnickers. Dirty great big birds storks. I was just saying that I'd never seen a stork and there they were - a great big flock of them.                                                                               

 I really wanted to like these crisps. The company is based in Brittany and makes a big deal about employing local labour, growing proper potatoes in a traditional way and generally having a proper ethical, er, ethos. But to be honest, I'm not mad keen on the way they use an image of a crisp instead of an apostrophe. And then there is the flavour.

Pizza cooked in a wood-fired oven. Yes.... as a flavour it's a bit vague really. I could have got kebab (I think it was kebab not barbecue) but I thought that pizza would be nicer. And, indeed, these crisps do have a pleasant flavour. A bit heavy on the oregano perhaps, but in a good way. Only, the wood-fired oven is a bit fugitive. 

If you pay really close attention you get a hint of slightly overcooked pizza crust (the bit I never eat) on the very first bite. And that's about it for the pizza flavour. I did think at one point that I'd caught a hint of mozzarella coolness but I can't be sure. 

They are tasty and I think they'd work well with a sour cream and chive dip but I'm not certain I'd buy these again.

So here are some pictures of storks.