Salty Snacks

[JAZ]

I like to mix the hot cheetos with regular cheetos, to get that cayenne / cheesy flavor.

Have you tried the Cheddar and Jalapeno Cheetos? I like them much better than the Flamin' Hot variety, which to me are just hot with no flavor.

[Katie Meadow]

Generally I don't buy many snack foods, salty or sweet. I do have a fondness for cheetos and Maui sweet onion potato chips, but for the most part I have to curb my salt intake so only eat them as a rare treat. If I want a salty snack I usually make stove-top popcorn, so I can avoid the oversalted processed stuff, and just add sea salt and maybe some grated pecorino to taste. At cocktail hour we go through the Trader Joe's unsalted blistered peanuts at a fair clip, which I also salt to taste.

However, my skinny daughter is home for a couple of weeks and she is bringing in a variety of weird packaged products. Among them are pretzel pillow thingies filled with peanut butter. I never would have bought them myself, but they're not half bad; salty but with a sweet kick.

Jaz, I see you are in Atlanta, which is where said daughter is heading for grad school at Emory SPH. I may hit you up soon for some recs for cheap ethnic food stops, if you have any favorites in east Atlanta/Decatur. She likes falafel, viet, thai, etc. and will be your typical frugal impoverished student. She also is fond of brew pubs and trivia nights.

[Toliver]

Have you tried the Cheddar and Jalapeno Cheetos? I like them much better than the Flamin' Hot variety, which to me are just hot with no flavor.

I believe there's also a Flaming Hot Cheetos with Limon (lime). But you're right...they still don't have much flavor to them...just heat.

I tried these new Fiery Fusion Crunchy Cheetos over the weekend. Here's a bag that I purchased but just couldn't bring myself to finish.

It was a bag full of meh-ness. They were soul-suckingly blah. In no way shape or form can I recommend them.

[threestars]

I love cheetos! Unfortunately, I only tasted a couple of flavors of it. Most of the time, cheese flavor.

[Panaderia Canadiense]

I'd like to put in a kind word for properly made Tostado (dry roasted corn kernels with tons of garlic and salt, yummo) and for Cevichocos, a dish of heavily salted lupini beans in an oniony-tomatoey-limey-salty sauce, hopefully with shredded carrots on top. Both are common roadside snacks here.

[LizD518]

Lately I have been trying to eat less carbs, so I've been munching on nuts when I need a crunchy snack. Love the Spicy Chili-Lime mixed nuts from trader Joes, but warning - don't eat them in low-light! What I thought was a sliver of almond with the skin still on it turned out to be a piece of dried chili pepper!

[threestars]

Lately I have been trying to eat less carbs, so I've been munching on nuts when I need a crunchy snack. Love the Spicy Chili-Lime mixed nuts from trader Joes, but warning - don't eat them in low-light! What I thought was a sliver of almond with the skin still on it turned out to be a piece of dried chili pepper!

I love dried chili peppers! I can eat that with the lights off..

[patti]

For me, World Market's chili lemon peanuts, but I have to stop buying them. Can't have chips anymore, so I thought I'd have a "few" nuts for a snack. HA! Tried their chili lime cashews, but surprisingly love the peanuts more.

Buttered, toasted rye with fleur de sel used to be one of my faves.

[patti]

Chili limon, not lemon!

[heidih]

I picked up these crunchy garbanzo beans at the 99 cent store. Not greasy, nice crunch, and a bit of heat and "limon" supplied by citric acid. Good value. Not as tasty as the ones I roast myself because my seasonings have a bit more depth, but that has not stopped my from opening the jar every time I pass through the kitchen.

[Toliver]

Lay's Sweet Southern Heat Barbecue potato chips

This is a picture of a bag that I consumed myself and then scanned.

Thumbs up!

They started with the normal barbecue flavor as a base and then added a little bit of mustard, a la South Carolina BBQ. Then they added some spicy heat. These chips do have a little kick to them.

Overall, I'd say these chips are a great addition to their lineup.

I recommend this new flavor.

edited for spelling

Edited February 8, 2012 by Toliver (log)

[sadistick]

Lately my salty snack of choice tends to be those rice crackers that have various flavours, like black sesame, etc.

If you want to do an interesting experiment, next time you open a bag of Doritos, light one on fire, see how long it burns for.....there is NOTHING natural/normal about that! I use them for one thing, and one thing alone - fire starter material for camping!

[Alcuin]

These are my favorite salty snack:

They went away from my Chinese grocery store, so I've stocked up. They are fried peanuts with copious amounts of big chunks of dried pepper (so much it scares some people) and very fresh Sichuan peppercorns (very piquant and mouth-numbing). They are highly addictive with beer.

[phatj]

Doritos Spicy Sweet Chili flavored tortilla chips

This is a new flavor being sold in my area. The Subway Sandwich chain is currently promoting this newest flavor in their shops with their combo meals.

The chips definitely have a kick to them so the "spicy" is dead-on. The chili flavor is nice, too.

But, true to their name, they are also sweet, which I just can't get past. I'm more of a savory person to begin with so perhaps I'm not the best judge of this new flavor. Maybe if there was more of a balance between the salty and the sweet, I'd like them better but I find them far too sweet for my tastes.

I had these a couple times via the vending machine at work. Very weird flavor for me - aside from the spiciness, they tasted to me like they were dusted with ramen noodle seasoning packets.

[Kouign Aman]

Because something burns, its not natural???

Wow, someone ought to let the grasses, trees, coal seams, and martyrs know that.

[sadistick]

Rather than offering sarcastic remarks, perhaps you should attempt what I suggested...you might then realize that for an object with such little mass to burn for so long (which you would garner if attempted) is not natural.

[Kouign Aman]

I've burned em, and corn chips, and popcorn and dried corn on the cob. They all burn for quite a long time, except the popcorn which flares and tries to float away to start larger fires elsewhere.

[Toliver]

Once upon a time there were these awesome, addictive potato chips called "Snyder's of Hanover Steak & Onion Potato Chips" (and the similarly named "Snyder of Berlin Extra Crunchy Kettle-Style Steak & Onion Potato Chips" which were a different company and different chip).

The "Snyder's of Hanover Steak & Onion Potato Chips" were amazing. They tasted like steak. Yes, steak. Not "sorta like steak" or "kinda like steak". They tasted like grilled-on-your-BBQ steak. There was an onion undertone but it was the steak flavor that made them highly addictive. Sure, they were quite salty, but I was willing to forgive them for elevating my high blood pressure because they tasted just like steak, dang it.

And then the day came when I couldn't find the chips in the stores any longer. Snyder's stopped manufacturing them and the chip faded into the mist of what-used-to be.

When I spied the Ruffles Smokehouse Style BBQ potato chips on a rack inside my local AM/PM, I had high hopes. This is a picture of a bag I consumed myself and then scanned.

I mean, look at the cover of the bag. Those are ribs. Meat! Could they be a successor to the Steak and Onion potato chips I used to enjoy?

At first they tasted like your run-of-the-mill BBQ potato chips. But then I did notice a slight smokey undertone. The verbage on the bag claimed they were spicey but that had to be hype as I couldn't discern a bit of spiciness in the chips. The verbage on the bag also claimed "lip smackin' dry rub style BBQ flavor". Really? These chips seemed to be all spin and no substance.

They didn't taste like the BBQ ribs pictured on the front of the bag. No meat chips!

The smokiness was far too subtle and they tasted too much like regular BBQ potato chips.

Alas, the search continues...

[Ashen]

If you can find someplace selling Herr's Brand potato chips , bug them to carry the Baby Back ribs, Kasas city prime or firemans BBQ Chicken flavours. The have a meaty taste for sure.

[Toliver]

Something new....

Dorito's Dinamita (the spanish name)

This is a bag I consumed and then scanned for this post.

They're basically Dorito's Spicy Nacho chips with a slight exception. It looks like they took round corn chips, not the usual triangular Dorito shape, and rolled them into tight cylinders. Hence, the "dynamite" name. You can sort of see some of the cylinders on the chip bag cover.

The bag description claims the chips have a jalapeño flavor but they really don't. They just have a nice Spicy Nacho spiciness that builds overtime. Not a big burn at all.

Because they are rolled, they are extra crispy/crunchy. While eating them I was sorry I didn't have some sort of dip to dip them in. I think they'ed be perfect for dipping. They feel more solid than a regular Dorito chip so I'm thinking they wouldn't break so easily when dipping them in dip.

Another plus is that even though the bag seems smaller than the usual Dorito's snack size bag, you do get a lot of these rolled chips in the bag.

Thumbs up for these new "chips".

[rod rock]

These are my favorite salty snack:

They went away from my Chinese grocery store, so I've stocked up. They are fried peanuts with copious amounts of big chunks of dried pepper (so much it scares some people) and very fresh Sichuan peppercorns (very piquant and mouth-numbing). They are highly addictive with beer.

Those are favorite for me too! Just i need a lot of water to drink after them

[Toliver]

Doritos "Jacked" - Smoky Chipotle BBQ

This is a picture of a large bag of the chips that I consumed and then scanned the bag (which barely fit the scanning bed!).

Something new. Supposedly the "Jacked" chips are bigger, bolder, thicker.

I did notice quite a number of large chips in the bag so they got that right. I didn't think they were that much thicker than a regular Dorito's Tortilla chip.

These chips are odd. There is a slight smokiness to them but nowhere near the smokiness of a chipotle pepper. Speaking of which, I didn't think they had a chipotle flavor at all. They were spicy which built up over time but not a chipotle spiciness.

They also had a sweet note to them which, again, I found odd and didn't enjoy (the ingredient list lists sugar, brown sugar, dextrose and sucralose).

The back of the bag has some hyperbole: "Bite into the bold flavor of succulent baby back ribs SMOTHERED [their caps] with sweet hickory smoked BBQ sauce. Then light up your senses with the taste of SPICY chipotle peppers for a WICKED afterburn."

I couldn't taste any sort of ribs, any sort of smoky BBQ-ness.

They get a thumbs down from me.

[MelissaH]

We tried the Bigger Bolder Thicker chipotle bbq doritos a couple of weeks ago. What got to us was the texture of the chips, which reminded us of the cardboardy nature of a baked chip. We don't think we'd bother with them again either.

MelissaH

[Kouign Aman]

Anchovy-stuffed olives.

Salty, tangy, slightly chewy, fishy goodness.

and now available not only at your local spendy specialty shop (Andre's Cuban market, Tropical Star, etc), but through Amazon.

[tonyrocks922]

peanuts are mine. there's a taiwanese food truck in nyc that sells peanuts mixed with dried anchovies. amazing.