Popchips Sour Cream & Onion

Product name: Popchips Sour Cream & Onion
Purchase details: £0.99 for an 85g bag (tesco.com)
Calories: 95 per 23g serving (352 per bag)
Country of origin: Europe

This is the last of my big bags of Popchips (thank goodness their lovely people have sent me some smaller ones to keep me going!) and these Sour Cream & Onion chips were the same concept I described in my review of the Barbeque ones.

The green bag contained at least 3.5 servings of around 18 crisps which were described as ‘creamy onion dip plus crispy chip minus guilt trip’ – a nice way of looking at it! I was also quite surprised that the powerful scent actually had a teeny bit of this creaminess to it, in addition to the stronger oniony and herby elements.

The crisps were the usual shape but were two-tone, with parts of each chip being more golden in colour than others. They were also flecked with green, and had a noticeably powdery texture, which was to be expected since the ingredients contained onion, sour cream and garlic in powder form!

The first Popchip I tried tasted almost identical to the Original so I was a bit alarmed by the lack of additional flavour. This gradually built, though, and I was again surprised to be able to specifically identify an element of cream – something I’ve never noticed in sour cream and onion crisps before. When I reviewed Walkers Pops: Sour cream & onion, I described how I always associate the flavour with Pringles, but these Popchips actually tasted different. Each chip seemed to either focus on a garlicky or slightly sweeter flavour, and there was a fairly zingy onion aftertaste too.

Whilst the texture remained the same, I found the flavour to be more interesting than both the Original and Sea Salt & Vinegar versions, but they weren’t quite as good as the Barbeque.

I have one flavour left to try...I wonder how it will compare!

Appearance: 7.5/10
Aroma: 7.5/10
Taste: 8/10
Texture: 8/10
Overall score: 7.75/10

Popchips Sea Salt & Vinegar

Product name: Popchips Sea Salt & Vinegar
Purchase details: £0.99 for an 85g bag (tesco.com)
Calories: 94 per 23g serving (349 per bag)
Country of origin: Europe

It’s time for me to try another flavour of Popchips from my stash: Sea Salt & Vinegar.

These chips were the same concept again as the Barbeque and Original varieties but, this time, the packaging was a gorgeous shade of turquoise.

The bag contained 3.5+ servings of 18 chips which featured ‘the tangiest pairing of flavours since, well, ever!’ and these discs had a very strong, tingly vinegar scent that went right up the nose...I quite liked it in a weird kind of way!

Interestingly, the flavour wasn’t as strong as the scent had suggested. The base flavour was very much like Popchips Original, but much less salty, and this was well-balanced with the barley malt vinegar which had a cooling effect, lifted the flavour, but wasn’t overpowering and didn’t sting the lips. In relation to more traditional salt and vinegar crisps, these had a much starchier taste, as well as the same enjoyable texture as the other Popchips I’ve reviewed.

I found these Popchips Sea Salt & Vinegar to be another great part of the range and I can’t wait to tuck into the smaller bags that Popchips kindly sent me recently!

Appearance: 7.5/10
Aroma: 7/10
Taste: 7.5/10
Texture: 8/10
Overall score: 7.5/10

Popchips Original

Product name: Popchips Original
Purchase details: £0.99 for an 85g bag (tesco.com)
Calories: 95 per 23g serving (351 per bag)
Country of origin: Europe

Since it’s been nearly a year since my first and only review of Popchips, to date, I thought it was about time I cracked on with some of the other flavours! For this post, I will be going back to basics with the Original variety.

These Popchips came in a cool blue bag that had the same overall style as the Barbeque version. However, this was a bigger packet that was supposed to contain at least 3.5 servings of around 19 chips. I’m sorry, but I didn’t get the point of that – surely it would be better to make it serve either three or four rather than somewhere in the middle? (I had enough spare calories for the whole pack but that wasn’t the point!)

Issues of logic aside, I was really quite keen to get tucked into these. The discs looked the same as the Barbeque ones, too, but without the red powder. I also found my mouth watering, once more, at the smell of the crisps – it was surprisingly powerful despite essentially just smelling of salt and potato! There also seemed to be a slight oily element to this which may have been down to the sunflower oil they’d been popped in.

Unlike Walkers Pops: Original, these chips were simply flavoured with sea salt and contained no additional flavourings. For that reason, they were much more like your traditional ready salted crisps. However, the level of starchiness in their potato flavour reminded me of something even more specific: Walkers French Fries. Despite being plain, I didn’t find these Popchips tasted boring and, if anything, I sometimes found them a bit too salty on the back of my tongue.

The chips felt a tiny bit greasy between the fingers but, aside from that, their texture was the same great one that the Barbeque variety had.

One minor criticism was that the bag these Popchips came in was far too big for the contents but, thankfully, this was deceptive as there were a lot more crisps in there than it first appeared. Furthermore, despite being lighter than most normal crisps, these Popchips still felt like a real treat...one I’d happily buy again.

Appearance: 7.5/10
Aroma: 7.5/10
Taste: 7/10
Texture: 8/10
Overall score: 7.5/10

Popchips Barbeque

Product name: Popchips Barbeque
Purchase details: Boots
Calories: 96 per bag
Country of origin: UK 

Since winning a picnic prize from Higgidy at the start of the Summer, I’ve been looking for a packet of Popchips in order to use my voucher, and Boots finally came through for me recently. Whilst I was able to claim my bag for free, they were priced at £0.80 for a 23g bag.

If my memory serves me right, this is the first savoury review I’ve ever done. It’s not that I don’t like savoury snacks – I just prefer to have sweet things in the evenings. I do love crisps and similar products, though (I enjoy a packet of Space Raiders with my lunch most days and I love pre-dinner nibbles too!), so I was looking forward to trying Popchips for the first time.

Popchips, to my knowledge, are a unique concept in that, like crisps, they are made of potato rather than things like corn but, instead of being fried or baked, they are popped. The brand claims that this provides ‘all the flavour’ but ‘half the fat’ of ‘regular fried potato crisps’, and that consumers won’t notice that they’re a healthy option. In addition, they contain no artificial ingredients, and even the seasoning is natural. So far, so good!

I decided to try the Barbeque flavour since it’s one I don’t normally have and I thought it sounded more interesting than the original and sour cream & onion alternatives. They came in quite a large, good quality bag, although this didn’t feel full, and the packet stated that the average contents were 18 Popchips. The image of the Popchips looked quite appealing and, thankfully, the real things did too. I actually thought they looked a little bit like mini rice cakes as they had a slightly bubbly texture, presumably down to the ‘potato ingredients’ being flakes and starch rather than actual slices of potato. Each Popchip was round and concave and looked very neat. Whilst the red powder from the barbeque seasoning was not evenly distributed, I did think that it looked attractive.

The Popchips had a decent smell which was familiar from the barbeque crisps I’ve eaten in the past. Somewhat surprisingly, I found this made my mouth water and, thankfully, my tastebuds were not disappointed. Each lightweight Popchip delivered a sweet barbeque taste which was similar to spare ribs but with a slight kick afterwards. In fact, they had so much flavour that I’d be happy to serve them to guests – the packet was right to say they didn’t feel like diet food! Texturally, the Popchips were thicker than normal crisps and had a bumpy and crunchy texture.

I was really impressed by this packet of Popchips and would agree that they were ‘naturally delicious’ and they were also very moreish. Whilst the bag was not full to the top, I was also pleased that the packet felt like a good serving size.

Maybe I should have savoury treats in the evening more often!

Appearance: 7.5/10
Aroma: 8/10
Taste: 8.5/10
Texture: 8/10
Overall score: 8/10