Rating: ©©©©-1/4 chips (lip-smacking)
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REVIEW: Pop’d Kerns – Barbeque
Rating: ©©©© chips (lip-smacking)
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“The Perfect Crunch”
“A corn crunch like no other!”
“Not your grandpappy’s same old crunchy corn snack!”
Alright, you caught us, that last one was of our own creation; but you get the picture. Pop’d Kerns, formerly Gladcorn, wants us all to know that their product is not only different than other corn snacks on the market, but actually has “the perfect crunch”. A crunchy corn hybrid snack resting somewhere between a fluffy, fully-popped kernel of popcorn, and an extra tough and crunchy corn kernel snack, like Corn Nuts. The best way that we can describe Pop’d Kerns’ full bodied texture would be delicately crunchy, and toothsome.
Pop’d Kerns embody corn essence, and exude corn flavor, as much as any other corn snack out there. They evoke the sheer rustic corn aspect of great, ground corn tortillas, only packed up into tiny crunchy popped kernels. The Kerns are aptly coated with a textbook version of barbeque seasoning. A tangy, sweet, smoky and slightly spicy combination of flavors that compliments the corn more than it covers it up.
So, for those of you looking for a corn snack with a little more crunchy body than popcorn, but that won’t chip a tooth, than Pop’d Kerns may just be the snack for you!
As always, these are our thoughts, we would love to hear what you think. Agree or disagree, let us know.
Kerns provided to Chip Review by Pop’d Kerns for review
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REVIEW: Popchips – Parmesan & Black Truffle Oil Risotto Chips
Rating: ©©©©-1/4 chips (lip-smacking)
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What do we have here? Oooh, fancy chips! Popchips have decided to try and elevate their typical popped chips, and give them an upscale makeover! Luckily for all of us, Popchips deliver on an entirely new taste experience!
Probably the most recognizably unique aspect of these chips are not their black truffle oil and parmesan flavor, but the risotto chips themselves. For any of you out there who happen to be (unluckily) unfamiliar with the amazing, classic Italian rice dish known as RISOTTO, you should immediately stop what you are doing, do a quick Google search for “the best risotto in insert your neighborhood here“, throw on your hat and coat, and drive there immediately. Thank yous can be sent to the attention of Dustin at Chip Review!
Risotto is the rice dish equivalent of the most comforting, rustically, homemade pasta dish you can imagine. Popchips risotto chips encompass a lot of those same delicious attributes. They have a light, smooth, and delicate crunch. They are definitely “softer” than Popchips traditional popped potato chips. Their texture becomes almost creamy as your mouth breaks down the chips. Amazingly enough, the chips are actually made using the classic risotto rice called Aborio. Who knew that this was even possible?!?
The bright white risotto chips are heavily coated with a scattering of green specs, and a liberal dosage of white parmesan cheese dust. We tasted garlic and onion in the background. The chips encompassed many of those same flavor layers that you get from risotto. But most noticeably was the unmistakable scent and flavor of the black truffle oil. A uniquely funky, earthy and fragrant ingredient that is considered one of the world’s most opulent foods! Once again, luckily for all of us, it appears as though Popchips have gone the extra mile and opted for the more authentic, and natural, (and for this reason we must assume expensive) route, and used an olive oil that has actually been infused with real black truffles. This would be as opposed to the far more commonly (over)used truffle flavored oil.
“For some reason, back in the ’90s, truffle oil became an acceptable—even desirable—ingredient for chefs to use. Coming in at a fraction of the cost of real truffles (which vary year to year, but generally run in the thousands-of-dollars-per-ounce range), it seemed like an easy way to add some truffle aroma to an otherwise boring dish. Problem is, truffle oil isn’t even made from truffles. It’s made from an organic compound called 2,4-Dithiapentane—derived either naturally or from a petroleum base—mixed together with olive oil.” Serious Eats
BRAVO Popchips! Well done! The fragrant black truffle oil and the rich and salty parmesan cheese create a flavor storm in our mouths. The chips are complex, yet simple. Homey, yet sophisticated. This was a HUGE CostCo size bag, and we devoured the entire thing in no time flat! The more we ate, the better they tasted! We would consider these definitely some of Popchips finest!
As always, these are our thoughts, we would love to hear what you think. Agree or disagree, let us know.
Discovered at CostCo; Oak Brook, Illinois
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REVIEW: Popchips – Salted Caramel Corn Chips
Rating: ©©©-1/2 chips (notable)
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Chalk up another chip addition to the holiday frazzle dazzle snack extravaganza!! The rich red packaging, and the sparkling snow flakes screams happy holidays! We love this time of year! Chip companies seem like they just can’t help themselves during the holiday seasoning, and start releasing flavors that (even they know) probably won’t work, but that means more new things for us to try!
Popchips latest flavor addition seems to fall somewhere in the middle between fantastic and slightly off-putting. The popped corn chips are slightly reminiscent of Popchips newer(ish) Kettle Corn Chips, but in the end slightly different! The salted caramel seasoning is pretty taste at first. Every Chip Reviewer could agree that the Popchips tasted eerily similar to traditional caramel corn, at least for the initial first few seconds. Sweet, buttery, “burnt” sugar with a hint of salt ignites thoughts of caramel corn, but the “fake” buttery richness is short-lived, and dissipates quickly.
As much as the chips’ flavor reminds us of caramel corn, their texture holds no real comparison. Caramel corn encompasses that always deliciously, shiny, glass-crackly, caramelized sugar casing, and well, these Popchips are just dusted with a tasty, buttery, caramel seasoning with only a sprinkling of salt – and we do mean sprinkling. The popped chips are certainly not as heavily salted as we wish they were!!
For those few of you out there who possibly still have not yet tasted one of Popchips popped corn chips, we would describe them as a hybrid blend of popcorn & chips, pressed and cut into triangles, using a similar technique as a lot of tortilla chips. The chips are light and crunchy, with a rustic texture. If you still can’t picture what we’re trying to say, think: popcorn, smashed, glued together and then cut into triangles.
Similar to the way we have felt towards many other kettle corn flavored popcorn chips out there, these caramel corn chips are tasty, but just don’t really do anything to elevate the original in any way. If given the choice between freshly popped, caramel corn and these Popchips version, we’re picking the real stuff for sure!
As always, these are our thoughts, we would love to hear what you think. Agree or disagree, let us know.
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REVIEW: Gourmet Basics – Hatch Chile Pop Rings
Rating: ©©-1/4 chips (tolerable)
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Apparently, you can pretty much pop anything these days. Soon the money we spend, the homes we live in, and the cars we drive, will somehow magically be popped. In fact we’ve decided that the saying is no longer “drop it like it’s hot“, instead it has morphed into “POP it like it’s hot!”
Maybe we need to start paying a bit more attention to chips, and other snacks, prior to just popping them into our mouths. We thought we were trying a new variation of some hatch chile flavored onion ring snacks, but evidently we were tasting a hatch and cheddar flavored, new created addition, to the popped snack family! And, just like the vast majority of those other popped snacks, Gourmet Basics Pop Rings are really just a healthier, less desirable, imitation of the their originals!
The popped rings were dusted with a nice blend of seasonings, that encompassed both a salty, cheddar cheese flavor, and a quick, bite of spicy hatch chile! Somehow there were no green chile specs visual anywhere on the rings, but the heat certainly grew with the more rings we popped through. As we looked closer at the packaging we noticed that no where on the front of the bag did Gourmet Basics refer to their Pop Rings as onion flavored, and we’re not sure if it was due to this, or the simple fact that the rings simply did not encompass very much onion flavor, but we just couldn’t find much onion anywhere in the bag.
Where these rings really rub us wrong is with their popped texture. The rings are devoid of any crunchy mouth character. They are too light, too crispy, no depth, no richness, no textural essence. They do not melt on your tongue, in fact, they do not react to the moisture on your tongue at all. Your mouth, and teeth, must do all of the crunchy hard work to pop through this bag!
As always, these are our thoughts, we would love to hear what you think. Agree or disagree, let us know.
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RATING: Angie’s – Holidrizzle White Chocolatier Peppermint Kettle Corn
Rating: ©©©-3/4 chips (notable)
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RATING: Popchips – Chili Lime Potato Chips
Rating: ©©©-3/4 chips (notable)
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