Natural Potato Chips Taste Test

Kettle Chip Box photo
"The Winner" photo by roboppy via flickr

While we usually visit Grist to check in on the latest news on topics like GMOs or federal farm policy analysis we couldn't resist reading Tom Philpott's unscientific taste test of 10 "health-food-store" potato chips. (Actually eight chips made from potatoes, one from plantain, and one from cassava, but why quibble?)

Even the most hardened locavore has their snack-food vice and we salute Philpott for taking this challenge and sharing his weakness for the mighty chip. He even manages to fit in a bit of food system education with his observation that organic potato chips are rare due to a lack of large scale organic potato farms to meet the demands of the potato chip processor.

On to the results:

Perhaps fittingly the only organic chip of the bunch, Kettle Chip's Chipotle Chili Barbecue offering, rated highest with the team of testers assembled from the staff at Philpott's Maverick Farms. Philpott himself found the flavour a "bit busy", and seemed to prefer the non-traditional cassava and plantain chips. The least favorite chip was Solea's Olive Oil Chips which the panel said "sucked". Ouch!

One nice feature included in the round-up is the mention of weird ingredients. While many, surprisingly, had none, some bags contained mildly alarming ingredients like silicon dioxide and corn syrup solids. Strange ingredients aside and the inherent contradiction in the concept of green potato chips, we'll take a natural potato chip over no potato chips any day.

::via Grist

More on Potato Chips
75 Grams: The Carbon Footprint of One Bag of Potato Crisps
Luxury Potato Chips by Tyrrells