Walkers "Bring Me Back!" Barbecue

This is the final flavour from the Walkers "Bring Me Back!" campaign that the reluctant taste testers and I have tried.

Not liking barbecue flavour much I wasn't expecting to like this packet of crisps. But they aren't too bad. A little bit barbecue flavoured, with (I thought) a sort of tomatoey herby back taste. Despite there being no tomatoes in the list of ingredients and any possible herbiness disguised in the list as "flavourings".

I always find it a bit suspect when the ingredients list includes the words ...seasoning contains flavourings... One does rather wonder what Walkers don't want to tell us.

So the taste isn't bad, the crunch is as good as always, the crisps quite a dark golden colour, but the aroma! Do yourself a favour and don't sniff this packet of crisps before tucking in. It's just a smell of smoke and really not very alluring.

And once again the packaging is brown. Even browner than the "Bring Me Back!" Beef & Onion packaging. Is it just me or does brown packaging seem more likely to appeal to a man than a woman?

I wonder. Has any survey been carried out to see how the colour of a crisp packet might affect the way a man or woman chooses (or indeed likes) that flavour? If not I know someone who has carried out research on gender choices in pillowcase design and might be able to assist. I like plain white for myself.

Zweifel Snacketti Onion Rings

Here's another crispy snack from the Snacketti brand of Swiss crisp giant Zweifel. Onion rings. Which is apparently Swiss for, er, onion rings. 

So what do we have here? Yes, onion rings. Which do taste very oniony. A very good taste.

This crispy snack is made of potato starch and wheat flour and puffed up into great big bubbly rings with a lovely light crunch. 

The reluctant taste testers really loved this crispy snack and we ate at least three quarters of this great big 75g bag with no difficulty at all. The onion rings are mostly air with a great big hole in the middle so you get quite a lot for your 75g. The Chef likes them too so we have an all round vote of approval.

This is a plain and simple flavour and plainly we liked it a lot. Very moreish. Not much more to say.

Walkers "Bring Me Back!" Beef & Onion

Another "Bring Me Back" flavour from Walkers. And I don't like the look of it. Beef & Onion. Sounds a bit too meaty for me, not the sort of flavour I usually like. The packet's a bit dark brown too.

However, tech taste tester recommends them.

And how right he is. How wrong can you be? And you know I often am. Wrong, that it.

What a tasty crisp! Not especially meaty but very tasty, herby too (although the list of ingredients simply says seasoning and flavourings). As so often, slightly oddly suitable for vegetarians. But it's a much lighter taste than I was expecting. And really very good.

The reluctant taste testers all agreed this is a pretty good crisp and we could have eaten a good many more of them than you get in a 25g bag.

I think I even heard a cry of "where can I buy these?". You can't do better than that.

I would certainly vote for these crisps.

And since we are talking about a Walkers crisp, here's a link to this amazing Walkers tin I found on Etsy.

M&S Winter Berries & Prosecco Hand Cooked Crisps

Merry Christmas crisp fans!

What? Christmas already? Surely not. We're not even halfway through October.

I know. But it seems that in larger branches of M&S they've been selling these crisps since the end of September, so the marketing guys apparently think that now is a pretty good time to start selling special crisps for Christmas. The senior taste tester stumbled across this packet of crisps this week, and although it doesn't say so anywhere on the golden packet, I would be astonished if this were not intended to be a festive flavour.

In full the name of this crisp seems to be Marks & Spencer The Collection Fizz & Sparkle Winter Berries & Prosecco Hand Cooked Crisps with edible gold stars and a touch of fizz. Amazing, eh? And something of a mouthful.

Made using specially selected British potatoes, sliced with their skins on and hand cooked in small batches to give a delicious and crispy snack. So far so normal for an aspirational crisp. But what about the fizz and sparkle? Hard to believe I know, but this fancy product really does feature tiny edible golden stars strewn across the crisps. Very sparkly indeed. They really are pretty. If slightly improbable.

And the fizz? Yes.... Not such a success I feel. You don't want the first sensation to be a weird fizziness do you? I mean, I would have thought you'd want taste testers to notice the flavour first. They really reminded me of nothing so much as those sweets from my childhood: Refreshers. Do you remember Refreshers? They used to fizz on your tongue. And so do these crisps.

I can only suppose that the fizz is designed to remind you of Prosecco. And yes, there really is genuine Prosecco in the recipe. However, I don't think dehydrated Prosecco produces a fizz; for that you have to rely on Sodium Bicarbonate..... And not to be picky - oh alright then, let's be picky; why break the habit of a lifetime? - the winter berries are raspberries and blackcurrants. Not very wintry at all. More like summer fruits perhaps?

Nice crisps in the crunch department and they do look hand cooked. Lots of flavour dust; perhaps a little too much. And when I took a handful out of the packet for noble friend to try (she missed the main testing), my hand was covered in slightly oily flavour dust and (quite attractively) little golden stars. Which get everywhere.

These are seriously weird crisps. What with the weird fizz, the fabulous (but weird) golden stars, and the quite weird sweetness of the fruit. And a taste of apples too despite no apples in the recipe.

The reluctant taste testers and I, and the Chef too, all feel that crisps shouldn't be sweet. So we didn't like them much. It is certainly a novel flavour for a crisp: but perhaps a little too novel for us.

As always, feel free to disagree.

Nando's Peri-Peri Grooves Spicey Chicken & Smokey BBQ

The senior taste tester brought in two crisp packets. He tells me that he tried both flavours and he liked them quite a lot.

I've never been to Nando's and indeed I had paid so little attention that I didn't realise these South African chicken restaurants (with a Portuguese/Mozambican theme - or should that be the other way around?) were so ubiquitous. There seem to be branches all over the place, at least in London. So why haven't I been? Possibly because professor friend with children used to complain dreadfully how often she was compelled to take hers (apparently they regularly clamoured for Nando's chicken so loudly she gave in just for the sake of peace) so I sort of got the impression that you needed a child to eat at Nando's - although I'm sure that's not really the case. Or could it just be that I'm not mad for spicy food? Seeing that almost everything on the menu appears to be flavoured with peri-peri it is, perhaps, a restaurant chain not aimed at my tastes.

Anyway, history graduate taste tester tells me that I can buy Nando's sauces and stuff in some supermarkets. So the Chef and I could give the taste a try in the privacy of our own home if we feel like it.

However, enough of this. Senior taste tester recommends these crisps. I'm not sure I fancy the Smokey BBQ (you know I don't usually like BBQ flavour) but the Spicy Chicken might be interesting.

Some of the taste testers have suggested I shouldn't post crisps if I haven't tried them myself. But I say why not? The senior taste tester has tried and approved these crisps. There is no more to say. No doubt if I happen try try either of these flavours in the future, I will post an update.

M&S Monterey Jack & Chutney Pitta Chips

Marks & Spencer seem determined to run with pitta chips which I'm not mad for. The texture is all wrong and much too crunchy. And I get the feeling that the taste is all on the shiny top of the chip, and not on the rough bottom.

And why they have chosen Monterey Jack as the cheese part of the flavour is a total mystery. As far as I know this is a cheese from the United States. And not normally marketed in Europe. Or not in the cheese sections of my local shops.

Crunchy baked bites made from authentic pitta bread with roasted onion pieces says the packet. And on the back it says Monterey Jack cheese and apple chutney flavour pitta chips with roasted onion pieces. Mind you, the packet also says Motel. Let's hope these pitta chips don't taste of motels.

But there's no apple on the list of ingredients (or chutney either), and I'm not sure where the dried roasted onion (1%) comes in. Maybe that's what the odd brown spots on some of the chips are? It's all a bit of a mystery.

As for the Calcium Carbonate in the list of ingredients... CaCO3 is limestone, limescale, chalk, and a major ingredient of paint and antacid tablets. So why is it included in this crispy snack recipe? Seriously, don't look to me for an answer because I have no clue. I think it's probably a preservative but it does seem odd. Don't read about the effects of too much CaCO3 because you might be alarmed, but I doubt this packet of pitta chips will cause you to suffer health problems.

The taste I like. Very tasty. The cheesy, oniony, cinnamony taste is pretty good. But the texture is way too hard until the packet has been open at least 24 hours. And leaving your food lying around for 24 hours probably isn't ideal. So basically I'd lick the taste off, and throw the chips away.

Not the best review in the world. I don't think the reluctant taste testers are mad for pitta chips either.

Walkers "I'm Back!" Marmite

Well now, one of the crisp flavours in the "Bring Me Back!" multipack bags is this one. Which seems to have been brought back already.

I wonder if Walkers are bringing back Marmite flavour crisps for good, or whether this "I'm Back!" bag is to encourage voting on the other flavours - and buying of more packets of crisps?

I liked this crisp very much. I thought the Marmite taste was pretty good (they are actually made with Marmite) and I like the nice dark marmitey colour of the crisps. A success.

Even the non-Marmite eaters amongst the reluctant taste testers were prepared to try. The history graduate taste tester said maybe he was paving the way to trying the real thing. But dutch taste tester said she thought that noble friend was right when she described the taste as Oxo cube. Hmmn...

Of the "Bring Me Back!" flavours I've tried so far this is the one I would vote for. But it seems that Walkers have already brought it back. I guess we'll see how long it lasts.

Last week it was wonderfully sunny. Here's the lovely shadow of our white climbing rose on the dining room wall.

Lay’s Saveur Cheeseburger

You might guess that it was trying a packet of cheeseburger flavoured crisps that set me off writing a blog. You'd be wrong of course but it would be a good guess. No, I started to write this blog because I met the writer of News from Nowhere at a wedding celebration (no actual wedding but plenty of celebration) and he encouraged me to write about trees; which is what I really wanted to do.

But somehow a packet of Lay's Max Craquantes Saveur Cheeseburger grabbed my attention and on a nasty rainy day in Switzerland I wrote my first post. They were great crisps. They were crinkle cut. And very cheeseburgery.

You might say that cheeseburger flavoured crisps changed the course of my life. It's always the little things isn't it? Because the Chef, and the reluctant taste testers and I try loads of different crispy snacks, and I write about them, and you lot out there in India and Brasil, Australia and Malta, Poland and even St Helena read what we think. Amazing eh?

Anyway, I knew that Lay's produced a flat crisp version of the cheeseburger flavour and I'd been wanting to try it for ages. So naturally when I saw a packet I snatched it up.

Erm... what shall I say? Well, the reluctant taste testers liked these crisps quite a lot and ate two bowlsful. I... I was disappointed. I thought the flavour was almost all about the gherkin and the mustard and really not much about the cheeseburger.

If this flavour had been called something else I'd probably have said, yes, this is an OK flavour. Not a bad crisp at all. But Lay's called it cheeseburger. And I don't think it is. Or not any cheeseburger I ever ate. And I do love cheeseburgers.

Extra disappointing is that this flavour is endorsed by Belgian burger chain Quick, which is big in France. I've never seen a Quick (at least I don't think I have) so I've never tried one of their burgers. But do their cheeseburgers really taste like this?

Walkers "Bring Me Back!" Toasted Cheese

So... what does toasted cheese taste of then? Do you know, I haven't had a toasted cheese sandwich, or indeed cheese on toast for ages. Even so I am fairly certain that toasted cheese doesn't taste of Quavers.

This is so weird. This little packet of crisps - proper potato crisps - tastes of nothing so much as Walkers Cheese Quavers. Quavers is a wonderful cheesy snack apparently made of nothing but bubbles and air. And what works with bubbles and air as a cheesy flavour doesn't seem to work with a potato crisp.

I'm not sure the reluctant taste testers were too struck with this flavour. Although of course the whole packet did get eaten. However I would not vote to bring back this flavour.

A good rich golden colour, nice crunch, and plenty of cheesy flavour dust. So not nasty. And I think they might be quite popular. But not for me.

Walkers "Bring Me Back!" Cheese & Chive

Another of this autumn's selection of "Bring Me Back!" flavours from Walkers.

I don't remember this flavour at all but tech taste tester (that's as in technology) says it was always one of his favourites and he's pleased to find it again.

Basically of course, this is a cheese & onion flavoured crisp under another name. Admittedly made with chives (and parsley) and not onion. But chives and onions are both members of the allium family and their uses are similar.

A nice finely cut crisp, perhaps a little pale in colour, but with a good wack of flavour. And it is a pretty good flavour.

Yes, I thought these were quite nice. And the reluctant taste testers finished off this little 25g packet pretty quickly. I don't think I would vote for them to come back though.

It's a little bit disappointing that the little guy throwing his rubbish away responsibly is a generic design that I've seen before on packets of Walkers Pops, and indeed on the Vote for  flavour competition Walkers ran in 2014.