Chips Chips Chips

So how is the world of chips (crisps) doing today? From the IFT Expo, IFTSA Mixer and Dominick's, I managed to scanvenge a whole stomachful of new flavours and types of chips and now I have to admit that yes, apparently I do collect interesting chip wrappers (I've been in denial about this for the past 3 years).

1. Munchos Flamin' Hot Chips

 
These are radioactive in terms of color and taste. After a few dozen of them, my fingertips were tainted pinkish-red. The chips are really thin and spicy (possibly the spiciest I've ever had, but that doesn't mean much because I don't go on a quest for spicy chips) and lack pretty much any other flavor.


I had a trade sample! Unfortunately, I now have lost the wrapper :( I wonder what I'm going to do with the current wrappers and Pringles/Stax canisters in my collection, which currently includes cucumber, lemon tea, blueberry, steak and fries, dill pickle, and seafood.

2. Ruffles Max Flame Grilled Steak Chips

These taste slightly burnt and steaky, as expected and offer an addictive fragrance. ♪The wondrous smell of them linnnngers on me now...I hope you know, I hope you knowwww that steak chips are tasty and limited edition...It's personal-sized, for myself and I, we've got some pigging out to do...♪



3. Doritos Dinamita

What a novel shape - rolled tortilla straws! Unfortunately, I did not have any cocktails, gazpacho, bruschetta, or chowders to sip with them. These were mildly spicy and offered a punch of green pepper (although the package claims that it is red pepper, all I feel are bursts of green bell pepper). These are so entertaining to eat!


4. Seneca Apple Chips

I feel negatively towards this product because an entire scrumptious apple is likely less than 100 Calories and fat free, while this meagre package of 5 g fat prompts the (cliche) joke "Who put some chips in my container of air?"

Sure, it's tasty, but it lacks any sort of caramel flavour. And sure, maybe this snack can prompt kids to eat more "fruit" (does this even count as a serving of (fresh) fruit, though?) but I dislike the marketing techniques and the fact that there is packaging. Fried apple in a packet. Other products on this line include fried pear in a packet.

An apple is just less convenient, right?

5. Peppadew Sweet & Spicy Potato Chips

These are sour. Like, pickle sour. But, after frantic chewing, the potato starch itself is sweet. They're also pretty spicy and umami. Absolutely delicious!

6. Limon Cheetos
Well, these are lime flavoured but I had been under the impression that "limon" is "lemon". I forgot to take pictures of it. The Cheetos smell like barbecued or rotisserie chicken. You know how Cheetos are bright orange? Well, these are bright red. They taste sour (like lime) and spicy, but are NOT cheesy.

Montreal Day One!

My brother and I went to Montreal from the 11th to 16th of August, by bus. We managed to squeeze in nearly all of the important events in four days (the 11th and 16th were spent travelling), and to me, the most important events included FOOD - markets, grocery stores, restaurants, cafes, etc. Unfortunately, it didn't go as well as anticipated, as we didn't make it to a few places. Ah well. As Montreal is such a clean, entertaining place, I expect to go back in the future. As I don't feel like detailing the non-food entertainment, here goes the details about all I ate (in 4 consecutive blog posts), in non-paragraph form with final prices! This summer I've also pretty much been eating animals, and this continued in Montreal. I will perhaps revert back to a "mostly-vegetarian" when the semester starts again and I feel more in control of my life.

We spent a lot of money on food, and tacking on 15% tax + 15% tip made meals much pricier than I am used to. However, we're travelling and trying foods, and that's what matters. Point of life is to eat, right?

Day 1: 12th

Lays Fries & Gravy Potato Chips 1.71$

• These were pretty good!
• 

Café Depot ~8$

• In my question for une boulangerie at 8-9am on a sleepy Montreal Sunday, we ended up here. Unfortunately, this was a chain store (like Starbucks) and nothing was particularly appealing. If I were travelling alone, I would've walked around more searching for a neat local place, but I think my brother was hungry.
• My brother got an iced mocha coffee thing that tasted like green bean ice lolly to me. It wasn't that sweet, and I enjoyed it (but I enjoy most mocha things, so that doesn't mean much). I think I ended up with 1/5 of it because it was too much for him. The ice chunks were too coarsely crushed; We had a round of ice the size of a quarter.
• 
• We shared a slice of blueberry cheesecake that was merely ok. I realised that my standards for restaurant foods have slowly increased since I started learning to cook, particularly regarding desserts. I now look at a lot more food with disdain because I can make a whole batch of [insert dessert] for the same price of a made-weeks-ago-frozen-and-reheated dessert at a restaurant. This isn't true for macarons or baked Alaska yet, though.

Frites Alors! ~40$

• Well! Our second attempt to order in French was foiled again! Everyone can tell that we are not fluent (to zoom forward in time, though, there were two instances in which I spoke all French - badly - buying Metro tickets, and buying maple syrup at the Atwater Market). The waitress was really nice but forgot to give us our second sauce (but gave it to us when we asked her where it was).
• 
• Ever since I read the Wikipedia article about poutine, I've wanted to try it. Unfortunately, cheese curds are difficult to find in the Northeast, and now, I had the chance! I could eat poutine for all meals in Montreal! So, of course, I got the smoked cheese poutine. My brother saw that there was cheval tartare, which is horse tartare, which is horse pieces mashed up with spices and served raw. As we've both only tried raw fish before (sashimi), we immediately decided to order that. Finally, for some reason, my brother thought that it was necessary to order a third dish (sure, we were hungry, but not famished?), so we got fried calamari with amazing Frites Alors! sauce.
• 
• The smoked cheese poutine was a disaster. I didn't like it (although perhaps you would enjoy it). The fries had initially been cooked perfectly, but the cheese curds (or was it the gravy?) were so salty! Over time, the fries became extremely soggy and I felt like I was eating roasted, soggy, semi-mashed potato strips instead of fries, which defeats the purpose of using all that fatty cooking oil. Apart from the excessive peppercorns that added a lingering spiciness, it wasn't flavourful; all the volatile compounds in the gravy were masked by the salt. In retrospect, I probably should've just tried the original poutine.
• 
• The fried calamari was perfect, and the Frites Alors! sauce was drinkable (although a bit spicy). It is always a plus when a sauce is drinkable.
• 
• The raw horse mince (cheval tartare) was...interesting. I tried it by itself, and with bread. It was sour (there were chunks of pickle in it), oily (fatty tasting?), and kind of bland and tacky/gluey. Apart from that bizarre oiliness, there was no discernible flavour. I would not want to try it again.

McDonalds

• Free Wifi.

Moi & Toi Café ~25$

• I wasn't hungry at all (too much food from Frites Alors!) so I didn't even want to eat dinner. However, my brother wanted to have a meal, so we went, and I got Crème brûlée because I've never had it before. It was fine.
• 
• 
• My brother got ratatouille with fried goat cheese (ostensibly) and it came in a cuboid with a square of something that tasted like a mild cheese cracker. I don't remember ratatouille as something densely packed, but, sure, it was fine.
• 
• The meal came with three pieces of baguette.
• The service was quite nice.

Super C ~17$

• I enjoyed visiting this supermarket. I like checking out different cultures' supermarkets because they stock interesting items, whether in pairs, or on sale, or even merely the size of the items. For example, there was a whole cheese section (no cheese counter though), with picnic sized artisan and fancy cheeses, while the generic cheddars and stuff were in a different section of the store. There were small tins of tomato sauce (150g?) as opposed to the big tins at our stores. The baguettes were skinny, the beer was easily accessible, and there were a whole bunch of fruits and vegetables that I had never tried before.
• We got 5 Mars bars, one Dairy Milk Hazelnut bar, one Crunchie bar, 3 Kinder Surprises, 125 g Camembert cheese, one small baguette, and some juice.
• 
• We tried the Camembert and baguette that night (even though I wasn't hungry, and I didn't really have an appetite either), and it was quite good. The rind was pretty tasteless and a bit chalky, while the cheese was soft, mild, and creamy.

Nacho Cheese Tortilla Chips!

I don't remember when I first tried Nacho Cheese (or, "Nacho Cheesier") Doritos. However, I do recall loving it more than any other chip in this Universe (well, this was before I started relying on microchips). I might've tried them in Australia, but my definitive memories of them start only in Hong Kong. Some of these memories include:

1. Some day in ParknShop, I was allowed to buy small packets of chips. I think the 28g Nacho Cheesier ones were about 3 HKD (or 8 HKD for 3 packs).

2. My mum bought us a big packet of Nacho Cheese Doritos for my brother's birthday. He had his friends over that day, too.

3. For my 10th or 11th birthday, I was allowed to buy a big packet of chips. I was psyched! So many choices, and I could only pick one...so I ended up getting BBQ Ruffles, though I did stare at the Doritos forlornly.

4. There are many moments in HK in which I yearned for Nacho Cheese Doritos. They are painfully sad moments.

But then we moved to the US, where Doritos are inexpensive, come in even larger packets, and have a zillion more flavours. I got older, and my parents didn't restrict what I ate (especially after coming to college). Though, apart from the little bundle of nostalgia associated with it, I don't really eat them THAT often. I stopped eating Doritos a few years ago because of the partially hydrogenated oils in them. However, I crawled back to them as college stress muddled up my rules, free food tempted me, and tears made me careless. Fried in comfort, dipped in guilt flakes...and the remote control of my life.

How could I ever love a product that has partially hydrogenated oils? PHOs repulse me. If i see it on a food label, I immediately lose every desire to eat it - yes, even Herr's jalapeno kettle-cooked potato chips. A perfect analogy is seeing an attractive person, and, on the way to asking him/her out, he/she starts smoking a cigar(ette). Yet you must love him/her. He/she's your idol - understanding, reliable, but abusive.

Until now, Doritos were my sole exception to my PHO rule. I have, fortunately, found a beautiful replacement to Nacho Cheese Doritos. One that requires work, genuine desire and a willingness to travel further than ever before! So what is this new night in shining amour?

*fireworks and fanfare*

Trader Joe's Nacho Cheese Tortilla Chips!

*shining streamers and glitter shoot into the night*

They are perfect. They taste like Doritos, and there are no PHOs. What else do I want? SOME MORE PLEASE! [Haha, cheesy joke!] They are also $1.99 for 284 g, which is acceptable.

Bell Pepper & Tofu Sandwiches

 Red and orange bell peppers, marinated spicy tofu, barbecue chips, on multigrain whole wheat toast.

Lemon Tea/Blueberry/Cucumber Potato Crisps

Here's something that people who blog about food probably haven't encountered before, and something one can only obtain via connections. No, not some review from a 5-star restaurant (with over 9000 reservations and counting). Not truffle-and-caviar-and-saffron-and-OhMyGoshDon'tForgetTheGoldLeaf-pasta. I'm talking about interestingly-flavoured potato crisps/chips! My uncle bought these for me and they got transported to the U.S by my dad when he went to China. I kind of want to go to China (haven't been in 5 years), or at least, Hong Kong, mainly for the food. Actually, I'm not really sure that I'd feel that comfortable going to China, and I suppose going to London would be cooler since I've never been. Anyway, here are 5 different flavours, spelled with American English, made by the Lay's company, and sold only in China (as far as I know).

1. Little Tomato Flavor

2. Tomato Flavor

3. Lemon Tea Flavor

4. Breezy Blueberry Flavor

5. Green Cucumber Flavor

 The "Cool & Refreshing" flavours (all of them, except for "Tomato Flavor") definitely have some menthol in it, even though the ingredients don't say that.

 Little Tomato Flavor... was slightly tomato-y and sweet. A lot of menthol, so it's slightly overwhelming.

Tomato Flavor tasted more like tomato, was slightly savory (a bit sweet), and had a toasted taste. Much more preferable than the Little Tomato Flavor because it's less sweet and lacks menthol.

 The Lemon Tea canister didn't smell like tea (or anything, really), and had a faint tea/bittery taste. It was sweet, and while chewing, tasted a bit like a light lemon candy that I've had at some point in the past, but I can't figure out what it is. There's a tiny hint of menthol, which is alright.

 The Breezy Blueberry canister smelled slightly sweet, but after licking off the flavouring, the chip was definitely plain potato -- so in theory, I could make vanilla potato crisps if I sprinkled vanilla sugar onto plain potato crisps. This flavouring was salty and sweet (you could see the grains), and tasted like VERY artificial blueberry flavour (the kind in low-quality/unhealthy/electric-blue-coloured blueberry yoghurt, cereal, and granola bars). The menthol is way too overpowering. I don't particularly like this combination.

My favourite flavour was Green Cucumber! The canister SMELLED JUST LIKE CUCUMBER. My first reaction to licking the seasoning was, "Wow, nori." (did you know that I LOVE nori?) The cucumber taste is a little less pronounced, as is the menthol. It's savoury, delicious, and after chewing many crisps, this whole product started tasting a little bit like butter cookies (Not sure why, or whether it's just this flavour).

Also, note that the canisters are much smaller than American stack chip containers...each crisp was about 5 x 7 cm (well, most of them were crushed due to travelling).

Other seasonings on corn or potato chips that I'd want to try (that may/may not exist) include:

1. Pudding

2. Peanut Butter

3. Avocado

4. Marshmallow

5. Noodle

6. Spaghetti Sauce

7. Whole-Wheat Bread

House BBQ!

Note: I realised that this year, all the cookies during NSO were soft and moist. Last year, they were all hard. Anyway.

Every year, my dorm house has a welcome (back) BBQ followed by baked goods and karaoke. Last year, I missed parts of it because I was taking a Chem placement test and... I'm not really sure what I was doing. This year, however, I participated much more and the double cheese veggie burger was delicious! TJ came late so she had a veggie burger in a hot dog bun (which I lovingly prepared for her. Haha).

I also played volleyball with the frosh. This year's new guys [at my dorm house] are hotter than the new guys at my dorm house last year. Haha...Karaoke was fun, actually, even though I embarrassed myself beyond the edge of the world. It was spectacularly entertaining, and I met a lot of cool people, including a guy from Australia. So, I feel much closer to my college house now. :)

Lime Lays Potato Chips

One of the intriguing things that I asked my uncle to buy for me in China was lime flavoured potato chips. I don't understand why Lays doesn't sell these in the U.S.

They tasted like the "Hint of Lime" Tostitos, except that instead of a corn chip, we have a starchy potato chip. It's slightly sweet, has a neat clean lime taste that I would associate with really sweet limeade (but NOT anything creamy like key lime pie). I definitely prefer this flavour over the Original/salt flavoured potato chip (why are those so popular?! If there's a market for salt flavoured chips in the U.S., why isn't there a market for lime flavoured chips?!??!?)

My brother agreed with the package; he said, with a modicum of sarcasm, that they were "Cool & Refreshing". I would like to consume this flavour frequently. I suppose this is the upside to microwaving potato chips (I'll get to that tomorrow).

Cute translation, by the way. "Lays" got translated into 乐事 (le4shi4) which means "joyful things/events" in Chinese. My parents briefly called me 乐乐 when I was a baby. Obviously, it's not a suitable name for me.

Food Reviews

Doing food reviews because I didn't cook today.

Review 1. FOOD SHOULD TASTE GOOD All Natural Chips SWEET POTATO TORTILLA CHIPS (it's a cracker too) MADE WITH Sweet Potato

With a really "well-duh!" company name, Food Should Taste Good actually disappoints me. Although I do love tortilla chips, and although this brand's chips are definitely delicious, and even these sweet potato ones are delicious, I am disappointed for two reasons.

1. I'm not really sure I like the way they advertise. It's a bit pompous and the "CERTIFIED GLUTEN FREE" and "CERTIFIED VEGAN" irk me because it implies that these diets are "healthier" or something. Plus, these chips are evidently less healthy than broccoli, but broccoli doesn't have these labels because they take $$$ to buy.

2. The chips are tasty. They taste like tortilla chips. However, they do not taste even remotely like sweet potato. Go figure.

Review 2. QUAKER OATMEAL SQUARES HINT OF BROWN SUGAR

Quaker sent me "free" (okay, not free for them...and it cost 5 minutes of my time for me) cereal. Whoo! I'm not sure why there had to be so much packaging for a mere 120 Calories, and I think that the red box probably hindered Quaker's advertising scheme (I mean, the postman/woman is more likely to figure out what s/he's sending with the smaller box, due to the heart-healthy claims and such on the blue box). Well. Free cereal.

These remind me of wheat Chex cereal, except that they're thicker and sweeter. They taste nothing like oatmeal!! Nothing! There's nothing whatsoever "hearty" about this cereal (ha. ha.) except for the anatomically incorrect heart on the box. There's no warmth, no snuggling, no mother-chiding-at-me to this boxed cereal that doesn't resemble oatmeal. In addition, although oats are great for you and all, sugar is not (yeah, I'm talking about the brown sugar), especially in a refined cereal.

I mean, you start off with oats. You end up with bubbly airy sugar coated crunchy stuff that digests mad fast.

Oats > Oats without bran/germ/other fibre-y stuff > Flattened quick oat pieces > Mashed up quick oat pieces > Mashed up quick oat pieces with sugar > Poof! Stuff your kids will actually eat!! (In my case, stuff my sister* will actually eat.)

I guess I have some issues with advertising and labelling, and not with the food itself. Perhaps I'm just a little angry these days.

*My sister has decided that Frosted Flakes (NOT generic brand sugar-coated cornflakes - Frosted Flakes ONLY) and Lucky Charms are the only cereals that she will eat. She has also abstained from any carbohydrate that is whole-wheat, looks slightly wheaty, and/or lacks sugar. Therefore, she now only consumes the above-mentioned cereal, noodles, white bread, and white rice for her, er, "complex" carbs. She won't listen to me. So... none of that stuff is going to ever be in the house, if I ever have kids (although I don't think I will).

Baked Polenta!!!!!

I decided to bake my last tube of polenta.

Oh! How I lament not baking slices of polenta in my past!

It was absolutely delicious! Crispy (not really crunchy) outer poofy skin, soft and gooey center...

I'm still pondering how that happens, actually. What causes a poofy skin to form on a uniform corn mixture? Why is the surface of the polenta all crispy, enrobing a poof of air and soft, creamy (but still hot) polenta filling? It's like gruyeres. Cheese puffs.

In terms of physics, I know that when the temperature increases, volume increases. Therefore, when you stick polenta in the oven, the pockets of air within the polenta, which get closed off by the crispy surface of the polenta, expand. The expansion causes the poofiness. However, I don't understand what causes the surface of the polenta to stick to form a crisp. I initially thought, hm, gluten. But, gluten isn't present in polenta, is it? In corn? so what causes the surfaces to stick? Water? Water soluble proteins forming a matrix? The Maillard reaction? Of course, the outside is exposed to a higher temperature, meaning that it has a higher chance of burning. I suppose this means that there is less moisture on the surface of the polenta. Because the temperature is so high (425 deg. F), there isn't enough time for the water within the polenta to diffuse down its concentration gradient to distribute itself to the surface of the polenta. With a low temperature, the polenta would cook more evenly. With high temperatures, the outside is crispy, and the inside is moist (not as cooked). I could be wrong, but this is what I've gathered from science. I suppose it would be cooler to be a food scientist rather than a molecular biologist.

It's very delicious... Next time I ought to make thinner slices (though, these were already hard to slice). 425 F for 15 minutes on one side, 15 minutes on the other. Bottom rack. It's like a chip... but not really. No oil, either. Just slice polenta from a tube (I know, I should make polenta from scratch.) Delicious!

European Republic

European Republic. A shop tucked away at the corner of Strawberry St. and Chestnut St. Intersection of food! I got there at 11am, but they weren't open until 11:30, so I walked around town a bit. I entered promptly at 11:35, and there was already a guy ordering. From then until around noon, around 7 or 8 customers had purchased some sort of wrap and/or fries.

The only reason I wanted to check out this spot was that I had a small amount of hope that there would be cheese curds and gravy flavoured dip for my fries. A.k.a. poutine. A.k.a. something I've been wanting to try since I found the snack on Wikipedia! In retrospect, it doesn't make sense that a store called European Republic would sell something Quebecois. I went anyway, because I wanted fries. Oh delicious potato fries. Chips.

Unfortunately, no poutine on the menu. Ah well, at least they had fries! I liked the way the guy at the counter spoke. I ordered the large fries so that I could get two dips, but out of 22 choices, I really didn't know what I wanted! So, I stood there awkwardly, mentally crossing out dips that I was certain that I didn't want - olives, lemon dill, honey dijon, jalapeno cheddar - all the flavours you can get at a grocery store or another restaurant.

I asked what the European sauce was, and he said that it was mayonnaise. European ketchup was apparently mayonnaise, ketchup, and onions. Well! I decided that I'd have to try European ketchup then! I also was debating between the Jamaican curry and the avocado dip. The guy at the counter said that once my fries were out, he'd let me sample them. That was really nice, because I'm really indecisive.

The fries took about 10 minutes to make; I'm guessing they make these from scratch. There were tiny grains of salt lightly sprinkled on my serving (Okay, I believe this is probably 4 or 5 "servings" of carbs and fat. So delicious!). For $4.05 (including tax), I was very satisfied. I was afraid that I'd have some dip left over, so I severely over-dipped during the first half of my serving. I was out of dip near the end :(.

The fries: Thickly cut, extremely potatoey, and slightly soggy, these remind me of "diner fries". They're delicious, of course, but maybe I am conditioned to enjoy thinner crispier fries. They were very hot, and stayed warm in the paper wrapper. I don't think I love them to the point that I'd go out of my way to come back here.

The European Ketchup: I've had mayonnaise and ketchup together before, and I've been indifferent to it. With a hint of finely chopped/blended onions, however, the whole dip becomes much better! I really enjoyed this slightly sweet, slightly tangy dip.

The Jamaican Curry: A splendid green colour, with visible spices, this vegetarian dip was simply amazing! The creaminess helped ameliorate the spicy flavour, but it did get a tad too spicy (after chugging half the sauce in a few super-coated fries). I would eat this dip with everything! The best!

The Avocado Dip: I sampled a big blob of this one, and it was really mild and creamy. I mainly tasted mayonnaise, and didn't taste or smell any avocado at all. Therefore, I didn't decide to pick this dip.

Overall, it was a mouth-watering, satisfying meal. I'm not sure why I would come back though, because there are so many other places that sell equally delicious fries, and there are a zillion restaurants that I've yet to try in Philadelphia.

Something I'm confused about, though, is how the wraps relate to Europe.

European Republic

213 Chestnut St.