Takis Volcano Cheese & Chilli

We found this little 100g packet of Spanish snacks in a big branch of the Co-op in Switzerland. Made by a company rather bonkersly called Bimbo Donuts, this little packet of maize based Takis (one taki, several takis perhaps?) is a nice surprise. Basically rolled up corn chips dusted with heaps of quite hot cheese and chilli flavour dust. Yum. I couldn’t stop eating. Quite a hard bite, but you expect that with corn chips so I’m not complaining.

The bar code is shaped like a chilli so if you are paying attention that’s a bit of a giveaway. It’s always nice when the design incorporates details like that.

I don’t think I have ever seen a Bimbo Donut product before. I checked the ingredients list and it comes in English, Turkish, Swedish, Polish, Italian, German, French and Dutch. So plenty of opportunities for you to pick up a packet. The purple and orange is quite noticeable so you may be lucky to find some. I’d buy these again… and the poor Chef wasn’t feeling too good and didn’t get a look in. I scoffed the lot. We better get some more.

Belin Les Super Z'Héros au Fromage

It feels weird for an English person to type "Z'Héro" so often but basically what we have here is a superhero of a crispy snack.

A crispy circle (a zero) of puffed maize snack. With a nice cheesy taste. Not fancy but tasty. The reluctant taste testers and I liked these zero-shaped crispy snacks. And Dutch taste tester and I enjoyed the play on language.

And this superhero snack feature four superheros. We have Commandant Z'Héro, Miss Z'Héro, Kid Z'Héro (Maître du Taï-Cheese) and Speed Z'Héro. Oof! That was exhausting. All these superheros and their accents.

I'm not convinced these are particularly efficient superheros. If you look at the packaging these crispy superheros seem to be suffering some unfortunate accidents. Luckily on the back of the packet they seem to be a little more successful.

Vico Crazy Craq Spicy Lovers

This squirly crispy snack from France isn't quite what I was expecting.

I thought it was probably a maize based snack but instead it's a maize and peanut based snack. If I had read the packet I would have known that of course. The crunch is heavier than it would be without the peanut. And the odd sounding "spicy lovers" flavour (at least I suppose that's the name of the flavour) is only a gentle chilli flavour. Nothing too adventurous.

But the combination of peanut and chilli, plus onion and tomato and the ever popular "spices", is really extremely tasty. The reluctant taste testers and I liked these spirals a great deal. In fact I liked them much more than I was expecting and ate rather a lot.

Yum! I'd buy these again I think. I may have to. There was nothing left in the bag to take home to the Chef and he was a bit miffed.

Tesco Cheese Balls

This is the most ginormous packet of crispy snacks known to  mankind. Or at least the mankind that shops in the UK.

As an experiment I scanned the packet in two halves to see what I could do without benefit of fancy photoshopping or whatnot. Pity about the white strip between the scans but you do get a sensation of how large this packet is.

300g of little crispy cheese balls. As I had to put 6 of these on my kitchen scales to register any weight at all (1g or possibly 2g; the scales could not make its - their? - mind up) that will give you a fair idea of how many you get in one packet. Far too many for even the most enthusiastic taste testers to eat at one sitting.

Not a bad crunch (light as expected), not too much virulent orange flavour dust, and an OK taste. Not terrifically cheesy. We weren't mad for the little balls but a large bowlful did get eaten.

Extremely sceptical taste taster said she thought they tasted of sick. No they don't I protested. Yes, said the Tall taste tester, they do. But I notice that did not inhibit him from eating rather a lot of them. Weird.

Oh and Senior taste tester sniped at me again because this product (a concoction of puffed maize) is not a potato crisp. No it's not. It's a maize puff thingummy and we've tried stuff like this before. Plus it's my blog! And if my choices are a bit arbitrary, so be it.

Not at all sure what the bunny rabbit with the crown has to do with cheesy crispy snacks.

Kims Ostepops Original

History Graduate taste tester went to Denmark & Sweden for the weekend, as you do, and brought home this totally amazing packet of cheesy corn puffs.

Når du er sulten for sjov... says the packet: hungry for the fun of it (translates the website).

Little curly bright orange maize snacks with a superb cheesy taste. Extravagantly cheesy. The reluctant taste testers and I were not prepared for just how fabulous this crispy snack was going to be.

Made by Danish firm Kims along the lines of the good old British staple the cheesy Wotsit these corn puffs look pretty much like what we choose to think of as "the original" corn puff. But they don't cover your fingers in bright orange flavour dust that takes days to fade.

Of course, in other parts of the world one might say they are much like Cheetos. But as I haven't had too much exposure to Cheetos I will continue with the Wotsits theme.

And they taste better than Wotsits! Better even, I venture to suggest, than M&S Full on Flavour Cheese Tasters which are pretty good.

Amazing. And wow! And we all liked these a lot. Delicious.
This is intended to be a rave review. I hope you can tell.

I think we are all going to have to visit Denmark to pick up more crispy snacks from Kims.

I'm not wild about the packaging design though.

HiperDino Food Conos de Maiz Sabor Queso/Bacon

Noble friend went to the Canary Islands for a little winter sunshine and brought back this packet of crisps. Which was very nice of her.

These crisps seem to have been produced and packed in Spain for Dinosol Supermercados which is a supermarket in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria. So local crisps. Excellent.

For some strange reason you don't get bugle-shaped crispy snacks in the UK. I really don't know why not. I've seen them in Italy, here we have a Spanish version, and I know they are popular in The Netherlands. If I am wrong about bugles in the UK please let me know.

The Dutch taste tester liked this crispy snack, and the extremely sceptical taste tester loved them. Between us we ate the whole 80g packet in no time at all.

I must say I was a bit dubious. Cheese and bacon can be a sinister combination. But in fact this is a lovely light flavour, very pleasant. There's a good lot of flavour dust (not too much) and a nice crunch. I'm not sure that I was aware of the interesting texture/pattern as shown on the packet. But after all, that has nothing to do with the taste.

All in all a pretty good crispy snack.

Co-op JaMaDu Croustades de Maïs

This is a terribly exciting initiative from the Swiss Co-op to provide healthy crispy snacks for children.

"Kids Expert Jury" it says on the front of the packet. And on the back it tells me that it is important that children eat a balanced diet and take part in regular physical activity which they enjoy (I love that bit: when I was a child you had to do sports whether you liked them or not. And mostly I didn't).

Anyway, with this in mind the Swiss Co-op launched the JaMaDu programme. And we are told that all JaMaDu products have been tested and recommended by children, parents, and experts.

Great idea. Most unfortunately the reluctant taste testers join me in thinking that this crispy snack tastes of nothing at all.

Which is pretty grim. Except that the tall taste tester thought this crispy snack tasted kind of fishy (he said "cod") which is sort of worse than tasting of nothing very much.

Most of us thought this caterpillar-shaped crispy snack tasted of nothing very much. The managerial taste tester (who doesn't usually comment) contributed this interesting fact: crispy snacks for small children don't taste of anything. And who better to comment? Managerial taste tester has a 2 year old son. And should be an expert.

Well, it was worth a try. And the idea of producing a crispy snack with 40% less fat seems pretty good. I guess the advice should be to introduce your child to healthy low-fat no-saltiness before they have any chance to try and appreciate what I think of as a normal yummy salty crispy snack.

Not sure why the Co-op chose a lemur to illustrate this snack. Especially a red ruffed lemur. It looks like an absolutely charming animal but why it should be promoting a crispy maize snack I do not know.

Smiths Frazzles Crispy Bacon

Wow these are salty!

I love salt, I really do, but this maize-based crispy snack is the saltiest thing I have tried for a long long time.

What we have here is a crispy crunchy corn snack made to look like strips of streaky bacon. Except that the ones in the packet look a lot less like streaky bacon than the ones on the packet: there's a lot less pinky brown stripiness in real life (which in real life is beetroot red in places not pinky brown at all). But they do feature a pretty good bacon-style crinkle.

The packet tells me Frazzles have been around since 1975. And I don't imagine they have changed very much; they do have a 1970s feel about them. The bag is only 43g which has got to be a good thing. Even a massive fan of should not be eating very many of these at a time. Don't run away with the idea that I dislike them. But I wouldn't want a packet every day. Or every week really.

The Smiths brand is of course owned by Walkers (so the packet features a little guy throwing his rubbish away responsibly). Walkers are owned by Frito-Lay, who are in turn owned by PepsiCo Inc. There are a number of bacon-alike crispy snacks out there but I'm lead to believe that Frazzles are the original.

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.

Vico Dixi

At least, I think this crispy snack is called Vico Dixi. Either, or both, is/are a French brand from euro snack giant Intersnack and both are listed as brands on Intersnack.fr. And Vico seems to be the second (second to what I have not discovered) brand in the French snacking market.

Whatever... here we have a fluffy little ball of maize and peanut (un boule de maïs soufflé croustillante) flavoured with tomato. Each little ball is about the size of my thumbnail if that big, so not very large, and they are rather more-ish. Quite light, a little dry in the mouth but not off-puttingly so, really rather peanutty, and with a delicious tomato taste. And a rich tomato colour. The packet says the taste is un gout tomate intense et irristibles; and that's about right.

The packet also says that Vico is the king of aperitif  - by which I suppose it means the king of snacks to go with your gin and tonic, or glass of sherry. Or in my case today, a glass of white Swiss wine. Johannisberg since you asked.

Made without preservatives or colouring, and I imagine from the list of ingredients that they are suitable for vegetarians although the packaging does not say so. No palm oil. And made in France.

Avoid at all costs if you are allergic to peanuts: otherwise give them a try. Probably available at a supermarché near you if you happen to be in France (I only saw them at one motorway service station).

The newspapers say it has been the most horrible summer in Switzerland since 1965. My family went to Holland that year for our summer holiday and I can just remember it being freezing cold and very wet. Ever eaten an ice-cream on a freezing cold dark day in a howling gale? You would remember it too. It was lovely here on Thursday and Friday - lizards in the garden enjoying the sun - but today (Sunday) it is grey and wet and dark. So we have a wood fire even though it isn't as cold as it looks, a polar on the TV and a selection of interesting snacks to try. And we thought these little crispy balls were rather good.

Essential Waitrose Cheese Puffs

Another variation on the ever popular cheesy puff; much delicious extruded maize goodness. Yes, I know, these kinds of snacks are 100% pretence food but I find them irresistible.

Actually, I bought these by mistake for a friend. I say by mistake because I failed to notice that these stunningly good crispy snacks are made with wheat flour (who knows why) and I should have bought the M&S version (also sublime, in fact possibly even better) which is not made with wheat. And disappointed friend cannot eat wheat so I ate them myself.

Really good!

I recently reviewed the original (in this country anyway) cheese puff; the cheesy wotsit. Not terribly impressed as you can read for yourself if you wish. And until now my favourite cheesy puff was the M&S Full on Flavour version. But I think the essential Waitrose version is a pretty good contender.

Nice light crunch - as it should be, good bubbly texture, lots of tasty flavour dust but not to the extent of turning your fingers orange. And a lovely cheesy taste with a slight citrusy note which lifts the taste. As I said: really good.

I don't know if these are baked or fried as the packaging doesn't tell me. Whatever Mr Waitrose or his suppliers are doing it's definitely the right thing.

Suitable for vegetarians. No artificial colours or flavourings.
The packaging is nothing exciting but this is the essential range from Waitrose.

Pai d'Oro Anellini Gusto Pizza

I can't remember now if we got these crispy maize rings in a supermarket in Stresa or Baveno, but I suppose it doesn't matter much as they're both on Lake Maggiore in Northern Italy.  But I have to admit that I'm pretty disappointed with my first foray into Italian crisps. Especially as Pai seem to be sponsors of the Italian football team so you might hope their products would be tasty.

Well, you might hope because what we have here is "lo snack delizioso e stuzzicante". Yes….

This is quite a big bag considering it only has 35g of crispy maize snacks in it. But I suppose they are ring-shaped so you get a great big hole in the middle which takes up space but doesn't weigh anything. So top marks for the ring shape.

And the gusto pizza? No pizza I ever ate tasted like this, and the smell isn't pizzary either. Quite nice orangey colour to the rings but not a lot of flavour dust. They are quite (again with the quite) nice but not massively exciting. Like many maize-based crispy snacks the rings are a bit dry, but not terribly dry. I mean, these are OK but I wouldn't bother getting another packet. And if my pizza tasted as dull as this I wouldn't buy that sort of pizza again either. Sorry Pai.

Of course, my issues with the slightly pale taste could be that I am not an Italian. We will never know.

Obviously Pai say all sorts of grandiose things about their products, both on the packaging and on the not very impressive website (weirdly you have to download a sort of attachment to get any information) and they seem particularly proud of the fact that this snack is baked not fried. At least, speaking (or perhaps reading) not a lot of Italian, I am extrapolating from the many other packets of crispy snacks I have read so I expect that is what this means: "Infatti, graze alla cottura al forno e ideale per un break leggier e ricco di gusto".  Yes, these crisps are oven baked (technical term there) and are ideal for a tasty snack... I translate badly!

Don't forget to rispetta l'ambiente and throw the packet away responsibly.

Smiths Chipsticks Salt'n'Vinegar Flavour

Hmn... Chipsticks eh? Well, the local newsagent run by the amazingly cheerful man has been refurbished recently but the builders didn't install the new step for several months. But there it was, on Thursday, and suitable for wheelchair users too, so I went in to celebrate and came out with these.

What a lot of salt and vinegar flavour crispy snacks you can buy. And "did you know that Chipsticks have been around since 1971 and these crispy crunchy sticks, full of your favourite Salt & Vinegar flavour, are as delicious now as they have always been!" or so the packaging tells me.

These are reconstituted potato and maize sticks. I suppose they are extruded out of a stonking big machine and then fried to create pretend chips. And they're not bad.

Quite a soft crunch. A sort of vaguely fluffy texture although that's the wrong word. Similar texture to Monster Much but not quite so crunchy. A little bit dry in the mouth but not too bad. And, hurrah!, they come in a 37g packet; I get so fed up with all these crisps that only seem to come in gigantic "sharing" bags.

The salt and vinegar flavour is subtler than I was expecting. Opening the packet and having a good hard stare at the Chipsticks I thought maybe they'd taste rather harsh as some salt and vinegar snacks can do. But no. A lovely soft flavour. I enjoyed these and would have finished the packet only I had another crisp to taste test - yes I know, the trials of being a food writer! Isn't it sad?

Packaging quite traditional; nothing fancy. Suitable for vegetarians.

If I see Chipsticks in another flavour I will certainly give them a try.

Golden Wonder Transform-a-Snack Cheese & Onion

I recently reviewed the fabulous Transform-a-Snacks in Spicy flavour. You can read about them and see photos of the excitingly transformed snacks here.

I enjoyed the Spicy Transform-a-Snacks so much I went into the local newsagent run by the amazingly cheerful man (which has recently been smartly refurbished) and bought these. Continuing my quest to transform my tastebuds. And in case you didn't realise, this crispy snack is a kit for creating a crispy vehicle.

The amazingly cheerful man said it was interesting that these crispy snacks appeal to all ages. Which he then amended to 18 year olds as well as children. How diplomatic of him!

This is an interesting take on cheese and onion. It's quite subtle and not too oniony.  And in fact, I felt that the onion tasted wonderfully caramelised so you get a hint of toffee. So it's actually quite a grown up taste on a snack aimed at (probably) small boys. Not very cheesy either, but then there doesn't seem to be any cheese in the list of ingredients. What there is, is turmeric. Unusual.

Not bad at all though. I enjoyed these.