Bénénuts Fritelle Goût Bacon

And yet another choice from the lovely motorway service stations of North Eastern France. OK, mostly they aren't that lovely but they do feature interesting shopping: car accessories (especially faux Ferrari stickers*), maps, produits du terroirs, lots of drinks, and many crisps.

According to an online dictionary, fritelle are sweet fried rice cakes eaten on St Joseph's Day in Chianti. That's interesting because these fritelle look like chips or fries such as you might eat with steak, but made of maize meal and potato powder; pommes frites... only not. I am, however, comparing an Italian fritelle with a French fritelle so let's ignore this little excursion into etymology.

The packet calls them bâtonnets soufflés which is a pretty good description so perhaps we'll stick with that.

Well.... lovely texture. It's a very nice crunch and not as dry as some products like this. But I'm not crazy about the bacon flavour (since when was 'bacon' a French word anyway?) which is a little too smokey for my taste. The reluctant taste testers ate plenty so I suppose it must just be me.

I think I'd try these in another flavour if I could find it.

* Why would you want a Ferrari sticker on your Ford Ka or your Volkswagen Up!? I imagine the Chef would get pretty upset if I suggested putting one on his Audi.

Vico Curly Cacahuète

Another purchase from a French motorway service station, this 60g packet calls itself "Format Pause" which roughly translates as break size.

The packet tells me that Curly have made crunchy crispy snacks for more than 50 years: de delicieux produits soufflés et croustillantes, pour des apéritifs conviviaux et des pauses gourmands, depuis plus de 50 ans. What really puzzles me though is that they've called themselves Curly for more than 50 years when the products are not. A little curved perhaps, but not curly.

I bought a massive load of crisps on our way through France. The Chef has described me as rushing into the shops and buying everything in sight. No rushing was involved in my shopping but I confess I didn't always pay very close attention to what I was buying. So I didn't even notice that what I'd bought was not a cheesy maize snack, but a peanutty maize snack instead.

After the initial surprise (I should have noticed really because the flavour "cacahuète" is a bit of a giveaway) I thought these crispy, and quite crunchy, snacks were rather good. The reluctant taste testers at work finished the packet with no trouble at all so I guess they rather enjoyed them too.

A really interesting peanut snack. Very similar texture and crunch to the usual cheesy maize snacks, with brown sprinkles rather than orange flavour dust. You can also buy Curly Les Maxis, Curly Les Minis, and Curly Les Balls. None of them particularly curly. Deary me! Miles Kington, the late lamented godfather of Franglais, must be enjoying this.

In case you feel the need of a Curly website, here it is. Apparently there's a whole Curly community you can join, and even a Curly Bro' University! I'm sorry to say I haven't really investigated. But you may like to.

Zweifel Snacketti Hearts Lovely Salted

What? I kid you not. This crispy snack flavour is called "lovely salted". I checked that the snack isn't called Hearts Lovely, and the flavour salted. But no.

So here we have a rather charming extruded potato snack (potato starch and potato flour) fashioned into a lattice and then folded into a hollow heart shape. The flavour is made from salt, onion, natural flavours (which natural flavours we wonder yet again?) and seasoning (which contains sugar and flavour enhancers). A bit of a mystery then.

However, it is a very nice slightly salty crunchy snack. For British readers, they're a little like Quavers in texture but you can't burst the bubbles on your tongue. And I can't quite work out what the lattice reminds me of.

I probably would not have tried this crispy snack if I hadn't been on the lookout for interesting Swiss crisps. And then I would have missed a tasty treat. I'm not crazy about the masses of people on the packet all waving their arms in the air. Is this a snack to be eaten at a rave I ask myself? Reserved for people at festivals? Who can say. But it looks as though Snacketti is Zweifel's brand they aim at younger snackers and I guess the packaging is designed with this in mind.

What I can say is that I enjoyed this little heart-shaped snack and would buy it again. Perhaps not a product for your posh cocktail parties, but while watching NCIS or Alerte Cobra on the screen of your choice? Absolutely.