Tyrrell’s Hand Cooked English Crisps Coronation Chicken

 

We went for dinner with the Ski Instructor and the Farmer’s Daughter and they produced a bowl of crisps. To be honest I couldn’t decide what flavour I was trying. It seemed like Roast Chicken, but perhaps not, and obviously it turned out not.

A tiny bit of curry flavour, a smidgeon of chicken, I’m not certain this is a true representation of Coronation Chicken, but not to worry, it tastes perfectly pleasant even if you can’t work out the flavour on the packet.

Obviously we have had a coronation here recently. I don’t think I would have chosen this crisp as part of the celebrations.

Tyrrell’s Hand Cooked Ham & Cranberry

Another ravishing packet design from Tyrrell’s for this interestingly flavoured crisp. Ham as a flavour? Perhaps. But cranberry? That’s a bit unusual isn’t it? And as Slightly Red Haired Bristolian agreed, isn’t this more of a Christmas flavour than March/April?

Actually none of the reluctant taste testers could discern the cranberry flavour. The crisps do have a dusting of cranberry powder, but also (slightly weirdly) blueberry and raspberry powder. Honestly I am not convinced these exciting powders contribute to the flavour... but obviously I haven’t tried without.

This is a tasty crisp. Lots of flavour dust, and richly coloured but somehow not really tasting of ham. I saved this packet until Tech taste tester came back from his energetic holidays. He loves meaty flavoured crisps, as does Slightly Red Haired Bristolian, and both were big fans of this crisp. As were Cliffs of Moher and Tall taste tester. Very popular. Almost all of the great big packet was eaten.

Nothing rouses the senses quite like this blissful marriage of scrumptious roast ham and that most triumphantly tart of fruitlets, the cranberry says the packet. Hmmn..... that sounds good doesn’t it?

Even if I didn’t think the crisps tasted of ham there’s a wonderful hammy aroma from the bag.

Quite unusual. But popular.

Tyrrell’s Hand Churned Ice Cream

Here's a thing that popped up on my Facebook page recently: ice cream from Tyrrell's. And what’s so interesting about that you ask? Well, if you’ve been paying attention to the crispy snack shelves in any supermarket near you, you’ll know that Tyrrell's make crisps and popcorn.

But this new departure, available in three flavours, is... well I’m not sure if I fancy the idea because it seems a little weird to me. The ice cream will be available from April (from farm shops and delis) and will come in Caramel & Sea Salt with lightly salted crisps, Strawberry & Black Pepper with black pepper crisps, and Chocolate & Sweet Chilli with sweet chilli crisps.

Here’s the scoop from the Tyrrell’s website.

To be honest, I’m not mad about ice cream so we never really have it home. So I have missed out on pairing ice cream with other stuff; it’s obviously a thing. And I hardly had to look at all to find this interesting book A la Mode: 120 Recipes in 60 Pairings available from Amazon (and other book sellers too I’m sure). I don’t think the book pairs ice cream with crisps but as I said, pairing is obviously a thing.

I haven’t tried any of these ice creams with added crunch. But you might like to seek them out and try  for yourselves. And let me know what you think?

This picture is copyright Tyrrell's

A Visit to Sion in 2017 (Switzerland)

This is the crispy snack shelf in Co-op City in Sion (which is the capital of Canton Valais) in the French speaking part of Switzerland. The Co-op has quite a big food department downstairs, and upstairs they sell pots and pans, and bedlinen, and a surprising number of scented candles.

This is one of the largest packets of crisps I've seen for a very long time... and such a large pile of them too. Zweifel Nature (basically what we used to call ready salted). A really fabulous crisp but I don't think I would buy a packet this huge. Not even to please the reluctant taste testers.

There are lots of crisps in this photo from Swiss crisp giant Zweifel; can you spot the fabulous Provencal flavour which is one of my absolute favourites?

But you can also see lots of packets from UK crisp company Tyrrell's, and those Eat Real Lentil Chips? I can buy those just across the road from the office. There are Pringles tucked up in the top right corner too. 

I always find it odd that in France and Switzerland you can buy crisps from all over the place (Belgium, Spain, the UK) while in the UK it's almost entirely UK made crisps for sale. Of course here in North London I have access to a vast array of kosher crispy snacks, some of which come from the United States, and others from Israel. Then there are the local "Indian" corner shops selling loads of spicy snacks, the local "Turkish" shop, which may be Kurdish, and sells snacks from Eastern Europe, and the myriad Japanese shops. Plus Polish... don't forget the Polish shops and there are lots of them.

But I think you get my drift. For the most part the crispy snacks available in Britain are British. But since we are obviously invading the continent with British crisps it seems a shame we can't get continental crisps here.

Tyrrell's Sweet Chilli & Red Pepper

What a great fireman photo! Perhaps spending the entire budget on gold helmets was a mistake it says on the packet. Of course the photo is black and white so the gold helmets have to be taken on trust. The packet is a lovely dark red too.

And here's an interesting hand cooked English crisp. With ingredients I don't actually like. No - I'm not mad for chilli and I actively dislike peppers. But I masochistically bought this packet of crisps anyway.

And you know what? Not bad.

Lovely crisps with the skin left on, nice crunch, slightly hot (but not very) chilli taste. As so often I tried these out on the reluctant taste testers at work and we quite liked them.

Bit of a surprise really.

The packet advised us to extinguish [the heat] with a glass of iced tea. But I don't think we really needed to. Vegan friendly. I'm afraid the packet got a bit scrumpled.

Senior taste tester bought himself a packet at lunchtime the other day and set out a bowlful. Tall Elegant taste tester likes Sweet Chilli as a flavour a lot; I don't really. But check out the fabulous new packaging! It really is gorgeous. 

So on account of the fab new packaging I am reposting this crisp from February 2015 (2 years ago.... my goodness, so long ago, who knew?)

Tyrrell's Hand Cooked Coronation Chicken

A special summer edition. The British culinary triumph that is coronation chicken brought to life in a crisp form: a right royal union indeed, and surely a moment for a reverential pause. So says the packet.

The country has been celebrating the 90th birthday of Queen Elizabeth II this summer (and the 95th birthday of the Duke of Edinburgh) and we've been enduring the usual lovely chill wet weather to go with the picnics and street parties, so I suppose this summer seemed a good time to launch a Coronation Chicken flavoured crisp.

I have read that cold wet summer weather was named Queen's Weather because the summer of the coronation (June 1953) was so dreadfully cold and wet. However, I have also read that Queen's Weather indicates a fine day for a fete because Queen Victoria was usually blessed with good weather when she appeared in public. Mind you, that comes from the 1894 edition of Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. So we've had one or two queens since then.

If you take the first meaning of Queen's Weather you'll probably agree it's not a bad description for this June. In London anyway. We also have Glastonbury (famous for mud) and Wimbledon (famous for rain) fast approaching so I see no reason for the weather to improve any time soon. A pity because much of May was lovely.

Anyway, whatever the weather we can all enjoy a packet of crisps now and then, so why not give these a try? Dutch taste tester really rather enjoyed them even though she doesn't like coronation chicken, and History Graduate was spotted in the kitchen several times. He thought the taste was mostly chicken without the coronation.

Myself, I thought the taste was mostly chicken with a handful of curry flavour chucked in. But isn't that more or less how you make Coronation Chicken?

Quite a tasty crisp with rather a hard crunch. Not bad. And we really liked the packaging design.

On this day that Britain has voted to leave the EU, and the Prime Minister has resigned (or announced he will step down), it seems appropriate to offer you a crisp that commemorates one symbol of stability in this country: the Queen.

Tyrrell's Furrows Sea Salted

Tyrrell's have produced an amazing crinkle cut crisp with the deepest crinkles I ever saw.

Lovely old-fashioned aroma of properly fried crisp, great crunch, super deep crinkles, and a nice lightly sea salted taste.

Amazing.

I don't know what else to say. This is a pretty good crisp. And in keeping with the Tyrrell's tradition; the packaging design is as bonkers as ever. Aren't those ploughing camels great?

The reluctant taste testers reckoned that Tyrrell's are right, and this crisp would would very well with a dip. Maybe hummus, maybe something else. But we ate them all before we could try.

Tyrrell's Hand Cooked English Crisps Mature Cheddar & Chive

This is the second packet of crisps bought by the Chef for his committee meeting. Good choice!

Of course, this is really yet another take on the traditional cheese and onion.

Anyhow, it's another very tasty crisp from Tyrrell's. Wonderfully cheesy. I mean, a truly cheesy taste. So many allegedly cheese-flavour crisps taste of I don't know quite what - but not cheese. This cheesy taste however... well, I shouldn't run round repeating myself too much.

The chive part of the taste is interesting though. If, as legend has it, the ingredients list goes from most of this (potatoes) to the smallest pinch of that (natural colour - paprika extract), then there is more onion and garlic in the recipe than chives. But Tyrrell's have done something to make the oniony/chiviness not too strong. Maybe it is to do with the chives. Who knows.

These potatoes are called Valora and were grown in Herefordshire. And hand cooked in small batches. Delicious.

Tyrrell's Sea Salt & Black Pepper Hand Cooked English Crisps

This packet of classic flavour Sea Salt & Black Pepper crisps was bought by the Chef. Not to taste test, but actually to eat. At a committee meeting.

Luckily, I noticed that although I had tried this flavour in the past, I hadn't got around to writing about it. So I rushed some of the crisps into a bowl for a photo opportunity before they all got eaten up.

What a great crisp this is. Sea Salt & Black Pepper is a very strong flavour, but it's a simple flavour; not too complicated. And because it's not too complicated, it's a flavour to go back to again and again. Tyrrell's call it a time-honoured marriage: sea salt and that most cracking of spices.

Very nice.

And what handsome packaging. I love the black and white bag with the rich red typeface and pepper pot! It's great.

These crisps are made with the finest Herefordshire potatoes, complete with jackets, hand-cooked on the farm in small batches and spun to achieve our signature crunch says the packet. No artificial ingredients, free from gluten, suitable for vegans. And there's a great taste gold award 2014.

We have since tried it again with a guacamole dip. Very nice indeed.

And here's the previous packaging. Pre-blog we had a packet with our picnic by the glacier up past the Lac de Moiry above Grimentz. As I went to the trouble of photographing the packet it seems a shame t waste the picture.

Tyrrell's Hand Cooked English Crisps Summer Butter & Mint

Dear friend the teaching taste tester came for supper with the Chef and me and asked what she should bring? Interesting crisps of course I said. So generously she brought three packets of crisps and here's one of them.

Butter & Mint flavour crisps? Sounds weird eh? Well, Tyrrell's are usually good at unusual flavours, and they also seem keen to produce limited edition seasonal crisps. There's even a button on the Tyrrell's website where you can suggest new flavours. I wonder....

Anyway, after supper we quickly opened this packet and tried it out. Legal adviser and the senior taste tester (plus dog) had come to supper too so we all (including dog) tried a crisp.

Sounds a weird crisp flavour. Tastes weird too. Definitely weird.

The crisps have a faintly citrus aroma which is not unpleasant. Mostly they're smallish with a lot of herby flavour dust and a good crunch. They look really tasty. And you can quite clearly taste the butter; it has the same kind of breathy feel on the palate as crisps flavoured with sour cream only I'm not at all sure it works as well as sour cream.

Then there's the mint. We weren't really sure about the mint at all. In fact two of us felt the taste was peas. Perhaps it's an association of flavours because after all, it's traditional to cook peas with mint.

These are Lady Valora potatoes grown in Herefordshire. There are no artificial ingredients, no gluten, and the crisps are suitable for vegetarians. Summer butter & mint says the packaging, the finest spuds, a dab of butter, a snippet of mint - summer's holy trinity.

It is quite a fresh flavour, and so suitable for a summer snack. But is is a very unusual flavour for a crisp and I think perhaps (very sorry Tyrrelll's) we found it a little too unusual.

But these are definitely worth a try if you can track down a packet because it might just be us. You might find them the best crisps ever.

Lovely packaging design though.

Tyrrell's Poshcorn Sweet & Salty

We seem to be on a bit of a popcorn kick just now, and today noble friend donated a tiny 12g bag (only 62 calories) of Tyrrell's Poshcorn.

I'm not certain exactly what qualifies this Sweet & Salty popcorn to be Poshcorn. It does come in a very swanky pink bag. So it could be that. And it is very nice popcorn with hardly any of those annoying little unpopped bits of corn that get stuck in your teeth.  So maybe it's that. Who knows?

Anyway, this is pretty good popcorn with a not half bad taste. Lovely gentle sweetness, not too much saltiness. So a very nice flavour. And only 62 calories in this little bag.

Of course if you buy this bag you also buy all the other little bags that come in the multi pack. But hey! you don't have to eat them all at once. If you buy a normal size bag you get a lot more temptation.

So let's avoid temptation and enjoy this tiny amount of popcorn.

Now I've had a bit of a rant recently about crispy crunchy snacks aimed at children, and the Real McCoy's range aimed at men, and wondered why there didn't seem to be any aimed at women. And I'm wondering now; do we think this Poshcorn is aimed at women? I'm fairly sure the answer to that question is yes.

Well, OK. I'll go with that. Only, why is the packet pink? And why is the number of calories printed on the front of the bag? Thinks.....

Really? I mean really? Do the marketers really think that women will only buy something that's low calorie and comes in a pink bag? That's so tragic. Plus, of course, it means that Tyrrell's don't expect to sell any of this Poshcorn to men.

Tyrrell's Hand Cooked Beach Barbecue

Well this is an odd flavour and no mistake! What is a beach barbecue supposed to taste of? Sausages that you take to the beach along with an elderly frying pan? Seafood - things in shells and other things with claws - that you buy from a seafront fishmonger, or even forage for yourself?

A smoky seaside special to warm the cockles (of your heart I suppose) says the packaging. And also Windbreaks at the ready! Here's a suitably smoky tribute to the jolly optimism of the English seaside barbecue. Chin up chaps, it might not rain. Well, I do wonder if the English seaside barbecue really is an English tradition? I guess maybe I know the wrong people because as far as I know none of us indulges in a beach barbecue.

Interestingly in French and German and Dutch and so on, the crisp flavour is called Summer Barbecue. Now I know quite a lot of people who have barbecues in their back gardens in the summer (spring and autumn too). Not the Chef and me because for some odd reason we like to cook and eat indoors; but the next door neighbours (very enthusiastic barbecue chef our next door neighbour - and I'm sure his wife encourages it) and a bunch of friends are at it all the time.

However... however, I don't think these crisps taste at all barbecue. The flavour is made from a mass of spices including chilli, smoked paprika, ginger, cayenne and cumin, with onion, garlic and tomato. And sugar and sea salt. Also the top favourite "natural flavouring". Naturally. So what you get is a mass of dark orange flavour dust on these very crunchy crisps. I felt there was so much flavour dust it was a little like eating a picnic lunch on the beach where so often you get sand in your food and on your face. So a little bit Beach Barbecue. But then we have the alternative Summer Barbecue name....

We quite liked them. But we couldn't work out what they actually taste of. Tasty. But it's a mystery taste.

Sky blue is quite an unusual colour for food packaging and works nicely with the bonkers picture of the donkey kissing that woman some time in the 1920s. And I very much like the scalloped top of the packet design. It's a little bit beach hut. I've checked the Tyrrell's website and none of the other flavours have this pretty trim.

These crisps are gluten free and vegan friendly. Vegan? That's very unusual. Amazing.

Tyrrell's Proper Popcorn Mature Cheddar Cheese

And here we have an amazingly yellow packet of cheese flavour popcorn. Which is sadly not cheesy yellow in colour but just ordinary white like ordinary popcorn.

But very cheesy tasting. In fact, a good deal more cheesy tasting than the average allegedly cheese flavoured crisp. Which, in my surveys, I have noticed don't really taste terrifically cheesy.

Nice popcorn. Well popped and fluffy with no unpopped kernels at the bottom of the bag, and only a few really small chunks of popcorn. So, top popcorn.

I really wasn't sure how mature cheddar cheese and popcorn would combine but the answer is (drum roll please) extremely well. Huzzah!

Unfortunately of course this means that when carrying out my scientific taste taste I failed to stop at "that's enough" and carried on regardless. Let's hope popcorn counts as one of my five-a-day.

Tyrrell's have helpful (and fun to read) info on alternative five-a-day choices. And the best thing is they suggest there is nothing terribly wrong with steamed broccoli, herbal tea or sit-ups (in moderation). But there is such a thing as taking it too far....

Less than 100 calories per serving (but I'm not sure what a serving of popcorn is... oh wait... 21g which is 0.74 oz which sounds like noting at all except of course popcorn is very light); nothing artificial (no funny stuff whatsoever); gluten free (in case you were wondering), vegetarian friendly (free from animals). Avoid embarrassment, serve Tyrrell's.

And another frankly bonkers packaging design from Tyrrell's who just can't stop printing weird and wonderful black and white photographs on their packets. On the bag it says : Head cheesemaker Doris was known for being highly mature.  Yes. That's under the photograph of a nurse leapfrogging over a milk churn!

Tyrrell's Hand Cooked Lightly Sea Salted

I thought perhaps these lightly salted crisps might be a good antidote to over-complicated flavours like Tesco's goat's cheese and sticky chilli jam or the weirdness of M&S kale crisps with cashew butter.

Perfectly ordinary-looking potato crisps, hand cooked with a nice crunch; the only thing wrong with these very pleasant crisps is that they don't have quite enough taste. In fact the Lightly Sea Salted flavour does not have quite enough salt for me.

I read somewhere that some people have more taste buds than others. I know. It is terribly tempting to fancy yourself to be suffering from whatever ghastly ailment you read about online, but honestly I think this might be me. I have always wanted to add extra salt or more parmesan or another squeeze of lemon to whatever I am about to eat. And being me, I've done just that.

I always loved the little blue baggie of salt you got with old fashioned crisps. You could add as much or as little salt as you wanted. But you can't really add salt to modern lightly salted crisps. It doesn't seem to work. Anyway, I'm supposed to be taste testing these as they are and not mucking about with the flavour to suit myself.

So, the verdict? Very nice crisps. Tyrrell's make great crisps. But not enough saltiness for my (probably over-worked) taste buds. And needless to say I failed to win the uncomfortably long handshake - or even the £25,000 prize in the online draw. Typical.

M&S The Big Crinkle... Hand Cooked Sea Salt & Cider Vinegar

This was another crunch at lunch choice. And a good choice at that. Delicious.

I tried Tyrrell's Hand Cooked Sea Salt and Cider Vinegar crisps only the other day and now here we have another Sea Salt & Cider Vinegar crisp. This time with crinkles. The taste is completely different.

As a broad sweeping generalisation I usually prefer flat crisps to crinkles. Not always of course, and in this case not: these crinkles are brilliant. The taste is not too harsh, not too cider vinegary, a little bit sweet. I was licking the flavour dust off my fingers. The crunch is just right, the taste is just right, the size of the bag is just right. A little bit Goldilocks and the three bears.

And in fact the right size bag is quite unusual these days. So many crisps come in gigantic sharing bags or six packs it's hard to buy a small bag of something new to see if you like it or not. But it is a little weird that this quite small bag (55g) is described as a big bag.

No artificial colours, artificial flavourings or added MSG. Suitable for vegetarians. And the potato variety is Hermes. Pity about the packaging which I don't like very much but you can't have everything, or so they say.

This is a great crisp. And I'd almost eaten the lot before I remembered I needed to take a photograph. It didn't take long at all to finish the bag, and the reluctant taste testers at the office didn't get a look in.

Tyrrell's Hand Cooked English Crisps Sea Salt & Cider Vinegar

These Hand Cooked English Crisps from Tyrrell's are a very gentle variant on the usual salt & vinegar. It's not a bad taste; the cider vinegar gives a much softer flavour than malt vinegar which can sometimes give a very harsh flavour. No surprise perhaps, but it makes a bigger difference than you might suppose.

The crisps have quite a hard crunch; harder, say than your average M&S hand cooked crisp. And the potato skin is very obvious which is a nice detail. I don't know though. I'm not very excited about these perfectly inoffensive crisps and I can't work out why. I don't know what it is but I cannot summon up any enthusiasm. Very sorry Tyrrell's.

The most exciting thing about Tyrrell's crisps is the packaging. They have a very nice selection of black and white photographs and encourage their audience to submit silly captions. If you fancy entering their caption competition you can do so here.

Tyrrell's are currently running a competition. This bag offered me the opportunity to win my own theme tune. Or £25,000. Needless to say, I won neither!