Phileas Fogg French Style Crispy Squares Cheese & Caramelised Onion Flavour.

Searching out new flavours of crisp certainly broadens the mind. I mean, what exactly is it about these little crispy puffs of tastiness that makes them French style? Swiss style I might be able to accept (see many many jokes about the holes in Swiss cheese), but French style?

Did Messrs Phileas Fogg (a disguise for KP Snacks) ask the French about this? I suspect not.

New! says this 150g packet. Inspired by the cheeses of France (hang on... what about all those Swiss cheeses? Yes, you can tell I'm not going to be able to let that one go), these French Style Crispy Squares are three-dimensional, with a surprisingly light and crispy texture, which melt in the mouth making them an irresistible snack.

So this is quite a nice crispy snack. Although I find it not cheesy enough for my taste and a little bit too oniony. But the bite is undeniably light. Wonderfully crispy. Lovely texture. And holes. Lots of holes. A very interesting new design of crispy snack.

But here's another beef; three dimensional? Aren't all crispy snacks 3D? I mean, isn't pretty much everything in real life three dimensional? I guess Phileas Fogg is doing his best to tell us that we have little pillows of crispy snack here; not flat things like crisps. Sorry Mr Fogg. Call me picky (the Chef certainly does) but I'm going to mark this crispy snack down for misuse of language.

The taste of these lovely squares isn't exactly what I'd hoped for. And the Chef kind of agrees with me. But the texture is great. And the design really is great. You might like these a lot.

Don't let us put you off. If you find a packet give them a try.

Phileas Fogg Louisiana Sweet & Smokey BBQ American Style Bubble Chips

I was in Tesco the other day looking for their Christmas 2014 crisps and because they were hidden in the special Christmas aisle next to all the chocolate reindeer and Santas I looked rather hard at the non-Christmas crisps. And I found these.

Interesting purple packet isn't it? And what distinguishes a Louisiana BBQ from any other I wonder? From reading The Pelican Brief I got the impression that everyone in Louisiana eats nothing but shrimp. No shrimp here. Obviously simply reading a book (and watching the film of the book several times) isn't exactly in depth research but I'm scrabbling around for a why or a wherefore on the naming of these crisps. Could it be that it simply sounded good?

I was a bit disappointed that these bubble chips weren't as bubbly as I was expecting. Like the Cheese & New York Deli Relish flavour these crisps aren't made from slices of potato but from dried potato formed into fairly regular oblongs. But with fewer bubbles. Although with just as crazily complicated a flavour.

So what have we here? A slightly sweet smokey flavour (not sure about the BBQ part), quite a lot of vinegar and something sour too. Like I said; complicated. And this flavour is created from clove, coriander, cumin, red chilli, onion, garlic and tomato. Not to mention the usual suspects natural flavourings and spices. And herb. Twice.

The reluctant taste testers at work seemed to like these quite a lot. Two bowls were noshed down really rather quickly and I brought the remainder home for the Chef to try. Like me he wasn't madly impressed. I think we have discovered through a lot of trial and error that neither of us really likes the over-complicated flavours.

Hmn... the last packet of Phileas Fogg crisps I had were made by United Biscuits, and Wikipedia tells me that UB owns the brand. But this packet says KP Snacks on it. I'm not feeling energetic enough to investigate further today!

Phileas Fogg Cheese & New York Deli Relish American Style Bubble Chips

I'm not attracted by the bright mustardy yellow packaging but the crisps themselves are very tasty. When I opened the packet I really wasn't sure so I sealed it up and came back to it a week later. And? You know what? These are really rather good.

I've not tried American style bubble chips before although increasingly I see them around, so I was interested to see what makes them different.

And what you get is an oblong crisp with bubbles in. The crunch is pretty good, the colour a bit more orange than your average crisp with a good bit of flavour dust some of it quite dark. I was disappointed that there was quite a lot of breakage; these crisps look robust but seem to be quite delicate and not as many as I would have liked survived the bus journey home from the supermarket.

Not at all sure what effect the twice cooking has. Make them more expensive?

And I'm not certain what sort of flavour Cheese and New York Deli Relish is. Is it a dip? Is it a thing you put on a burger to create a cheeseburger? Or a hot dog? Is it a... well I don't know. Well, anyway, it really has a good taste.

These crisps contain no artificial colours or flavours, and no MSG. Made with 100% sunflower oil. Suitable for vegetarians. And Phileas Fogg crispy snacks (obviously named for the hero of Around the World in 80 Days) are made by United Biscuits (UK) Limited.

It is a bit annoying that the ingredients list includes dried bell pepper. Why can't it say dried red pepper? As shown on the packaging. No-one in this country talks about bell peppers. I can only suppose that the brand is trying to make this UK crisp sound as if it is a US potato chip.