Oh man! You all know I love chips so I never buy them because they are deadly. When chips show up in one my exciting President’s Choice Insider’s Report care packages, they are the first product I try!
In this summer’s box of goodies I found PC Kettle Cooked Potato Chips – Smoked Sea Salt & Cracked Black Pepper. I must admit I first thought, oh man, that doesn’t sound that interesting. It sounds so basic. Almost, dare I say… plain. I am not a fan of plain.
I was thrilled to discover that as I was eating these thick rippled and more-than-a-little oily chips that they were quite flavourful. The black pepper kind of kicks you in the head a bit and there was a complexity to them I was not suspecting. We devoured the chips, licking our oily fingertips, the sound of crunching gone from the air… and no one was more surprised than I was that I found them quite tasty and delicious.
Foodie Issues
I do have a bit of a complaint though. Here is the list of ingredients:
Potatoes, vegetable oil (canola and/or corn and/or sunflower), seasoning (maltodextrin, black pepper, garlic powder, onion powder, monosodium glutamate, sea salt, natural flavour, yeast extract, silicon dioxide), sea salt.
Umm… I do not see “smoked sea salt” on the list. Sea salt is listed twice but… What the heck?
The presence of garlic powder and the onion powder explains why the chips were more complex than the name. Also, not super thrilled to see MSG listed there as a seasoning.
Foodie Conclusion
As much as I loved the big crunch factor thanks to them being batch-fried in large kettles, that the chips were more flavourful than I was anticipating and are only $2.49 for a bag, I can only give them four wooden spoons. There is so much good here but I see no evidence of “smoked” sea salt in the ingredients which makes me wonder about the integrity of the name. Also, MSG is a big no no for me since Reg is very sensitive to it.
That said, I enjoyed these chips and would eat a whole bag if sent to me again. I just really do not like feeling like the name was misleading and the addition of MSG is a bummer. Close but not quite perfect!
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