Snack #204- Jack ‘n Jill Vcut Potato Chips Spicy Barbecue Flavor

Jack ‘n Jill Vcut Potato Chips Spicy Barbecue Flavor

These are the final spicy snack I found on my trip to Mongolia.  The flavor is called ‘spicy barbecue’ but they don’t really taste like any BBQ sauce I’ve ever had.  The flavor is pretty mild and the flavor of the oil that the chips were fried in comes through pretty strong.  They are slightly sweet and have a little bit of heat but the light flavoring actually works pretty well for them.  They also have the benefit of being well cut and fried chips that are nicely crunchy.  So although they don’t really have much barbecue or spicy flavor going on they are pretty tasty and make a good snack.

Rating on the Spice-O-Meter: 2/10

Bottom Line: Lightly sweet and spicy ‘BBQ’-style chips.

Snack #203- Ass Kickin’ Chipotle Premium Microwave Popcorn

Ass Kickin’ Chipotle Premium Microwave Popcorn

I found this spicy microwave popcorn in the Canyon Village Marketplace at the Grand Canyon South Rim and brought it back to the East Coast to pop in my microwave.  It popped thoroughly and evenly but it smelled like burning chemicals while it was cooking.  The first flavor that hits your mouth with this popcorn is a weird sweetness that tasted somewhat like kettle corn but more artificial.  The ingredients include sucralose which is Splenda and Splenda is gross so that is probably where the weird sweet taste came from.  Behind the sweet flavors there is a pretty big kick of heat but it doesn’t taste as much like chipotle as it should- mostly it just tastes like generic ‘spice’ flavor.  The bag smelled a lot like chipotle before we popped it but that flavor got lost somewhere in the artificial flavors.  The heat builds quickly in the mouth and after eating a handful of the popcorn my mouth was feeling the burn.  The heat also subsides quickly though so you would be able to eat the whole bag while watching a movie or something.

Rating on the Spice-O-Meter: 5/10

Bottom Line: Fake sweet kettle corn with a fairly spicy kick.

Heat Sweets

Also at the Grub Street Food fair where I picked up the McClure's Spicy Pickle chips was something much spicier.  The lovely ladies at Heat Sweets make jams, jellys, and fruit leathers spiked with jalapeño and habanero peppers.  We tried a few samples and they were really delicious!  A nice heat without overpowering the fruit flavors.  Check them out here: www.heatsweets.com

Snack #202 - McClure's Spicy Pickle Potato Chips

At an amazing street fair in the Lower East Side last weekend, I picked up a bag of spicy pickle flavored chips.  McClure's is a small-batch pickle maker based out of Brooklyn and Detroit, and if you haven't tried their pickles yet, you should! Especially their spicy pickle relish - it's insane! Unfortunately, their chips were not.  The chips were a nice crinkle cut that managed to not get all crunched up in the bag.  The chips could have been crunchier, but that wasn't my biggest problem.  My real problem was that these were pickle chips, but they were definitely not spicy pickle chips.  The minute I opened the bag, the smell of dill came wafting out.  The chips tasted very dill-y too, but that was it, there was no other flavor besides dill and maybe some garlic.  But no spice to speak of.  It was like they accidentally put the regular pickle-flavored chips in the spicy chip bag.

Rating on the Spice-O-Meter: 0/10

Bottom line: stick to the spicy pickle relish

Snack #201 - Inka Chile Picante Plantain Chips

These fried plaintain chips were just ok.  Unfortunately, plantain chips tend not to be very crunchy, which is sort of a dealbreaker for me when it comes to chips.  These were actually some of the crunchier ones I've ever had though. They tasted of onion and garlic, like they'd been dipped in the mojo sauce at a Cuban restaurant.  And if I really strained I could taste some chili powder, but not heat, just a smokey flavor.

Rating on the Spice-O-Meter: 0/10

Bottom line: A not so spicy, sort of crunchy chip

Snack # 200 - Unique Jalapeño Splits Pretzels

Our 200th spicy snack!! And to celebrate: a jalapeño-infused pretzel.  These pretzels didn't just have spicy dust sprayed on them like most spicy snacks, there was actually ground jalapeño in the flour, and you could really tell!  The first few bites just tasted like regular pretzels - good pretzels though.  After a few more bites, some garlic started to come through.  And then, the heat.  It was a very weird tingle that started on the outside of our tongues and moved inward.  The heat definitely built up from there, but never overpowered the pretzel flavor.

Rating on the Spice-O-Meter: 5/10

Bottom line: a truly jalapeño pretzel

Snack #199- Jack ‘n Jill Vcut Potato Chips Sweet Chili Flavor

Jack ‘n Jill Vcut Potato Chips Sweet Chili Flavor

These snacks taste just like really sweet ketchup.  They are light and flaky and have the texture of a great ruffle potato chip but the flavor is lacking.  When you swallow you can taste the chili heat in your throat but it never hits your mouth during chewing.  They taste like the flavor should be tomato but the ingredients don’t have any tomato listed.  The sweetness of the tomato and the delay of the chili heat in the throat doesn’t help these Filipino snacks.

Rating on the Spice-O-Meter: 4/10

Bottom Line: Tomato flavored chips with a chili aftertaste.