French Fry Diary 741: Lay's Wavy Hickory BBQ Potato Chips

This one was written a while ago, but the chips still rock, so there you go...

I had picked these chips up for this year's Super Bowl, not realizing I hadn't written about them before.  Our Super Bowl celebration this year, our first in Florida, was just the two of us, and late in the evening.  Yes, it was quite a game, even though we watched most of it in fast forward, only hitting play for the mostly mediocre commercials, and of course the truly stunning and amazing halftime show. Lady Gaga definitely won this year's Super Bowl. 

Speaking of bowls, I got the Lay's Wavy Hickory BBQ Flavored Potato Chips mainly because the Lay's Wavy are thick and perfectly ruffled for dipping.  The dip in question was slightly melted vanilla ice cream, 'cause that's just how I roll. 

Unlike other Lay's BBQ chips, the Hickory flavor isn't overseasoned, doesn't burn, or have a hot after taste.  These are sweet and tangy to which the ice cream gives an excellent contrast.  Now that I have written about them, I'll remember how much I like them and get them again.  These are darned good BBQ chips. 

French Fry Diary 673: Ichiban Buffet

Recently some old friends and The Bride and I got together at a new buffet where the old Old Country Buffet in Cherry Hill used to be - the Ichiban Buffet. In Japanese, 'ichiban' means 'number one' or 'first,' but I think in this case, I think they're just being hopeful, as this was less than satisfying.

I'm not a big fan of buffets to begin with. I dislike the idea of not knowing who has been touching my food, maybe multiple times, for who knows how long, perhaps getting it on their plate, then changing their mind and putting it back. It's just not sanitary, no matter how many employees and cooks are watching to make sure that kind of shenanigans doesn't happen.

This buffet was $16.00 per person, and they seemed to have a good variety, as well as (boo) Pepsi products. One big highlight was the 'donuts,' or more accurately the little chunks of fried and sugared dough, but I was disappointed at there being no soft ice cream, usually a buffet staple. I was a bit irritated by this seemingly professional place in all other effects having the ingredients of the trays written on signs below in Magic Marker. Tacky.

But of course, I wasn't there for the signage, or the donuts, or even the ice cream, I was there for, among other things, the French fries. They were only warm, probably baked frozen seasoned fries, seasoned to the point of being as dark golden brown as the sweet and sour chicken, whose sauce was great on the fries. The mashed potatoes only okay, and I didn't see any onion rings.

There was one puzzle I couldn't figure out. Why won't they trust us with knives? We can cut our own meat at the serving station, dish our own hard ice cream, but they won't trust us with knives at our seats unless we flag someone down and ask for one? Weird. I probably won't be coming back, the company was excellent though.

French Fry Diary 618: Richman's Ice Cream

Richman's in the Echelon Mall was my first real job. When I say real, I mean I was paid above the table and I actually needed a Social Security number for it. I was at the mall, saw the 'help wanted' sign, and asked for an application. I remember the kid at the counter, Dave was his name, first guy I ever met with a rat tail (yes, I'm dating myself), said manning the ice cream counter out front let you see all the girls walk by in the mall. This would be an awesome job!

I got it, and after buying a couple pairs of white pants, white shirts, pinning a badge on and topping it off with a paper hat, I was ready to go. The first day I spent scooping ice cream, weighing and putting it back in the bucket. I had to get the weight right before I could scoop for the public. For the next week, I rocked the front counter, meeting girls, and getting digits. As I suspected, awesome job.

Then counter training ended, and busboy/dishwasher training began. Star in the front to troll in the back overnight. This job was not fun. It seemed like I would never get back to the front, and as the holidays approached, I scored the primo job at the top of the mall food chain, at a record store.

That wasn't the first time at the Echelon Mall Richman's however. My cool big sister took me there once years before. In a lesson of learning the value of money, I had to earn enough to go to this 'grown up expensive restaurant.' I also learned things later while I was employed there. The government takes a lot out of your paycheck, and always carefully examine your food - you never know when a fly will die unnoticed in the rum raisin ice cream. I have never had that flavor, ever, since then.

I've told the story of the other thing I learned on an early episode of The GAR! Podcast, but I'll tell it again here. My first day on my dinner break, I ordered the Basketburger, and the waitress and multiple cooks kept calling back in the kitchen "Basketburger" and "Employee meal." I would later learn it meant to do it right, not mess with it, and if it fell on the floor, to throw it out. Yeah. Glad I was an employee.

Not a Richman's Basketburger, but you get the idea...

The Basketburger was a bigger than McDonald's burger on a sesame seed bun, a pickle, cole slaw, and crinkle cut fries. I didn't know then, and believe it or not, I never saw into the kitchen, but I'm pretty sure the fries were frozen and deep fried even though they didn't taste that way. They were pretty good and didn't taste greasy.

Working at Richman's was an educational job, fun at times, and the fries were pretty good too. Well worth it for the short time I was there.

French Fry Diary 600: Dairy Queen

Dairy Queen is one of the few big chains I haven't yet reviewed here at French Fry Diary, mainly because they have been so hard to find. The just ice cream versions of Dairy Queen are everywhere, but it's been darn hard to find one that serves hot food, a Brazier. There are a couple down in the southern South Jersey area, but you have to navigate the traffic hell that is Route 42 and the Black Horse Pike to get there, not an easy task.

Decades ago, when I was just a wee one, back in the late 1960s, early 1970s, there was a Dairy Queen walking distance from where I live now in Cherry Hill. There's a strip mall there now. At that Dairy Queen I remember, a picky eater even then, raising a fuss because I didn't want those things on my hamburger bun. After trying them however, and until even today, I like sesame seed buns better than regular seedless buns. Oddly, they don't seem to have sesame seeds on most of their burgers at Dairy Queen now.

After braving the traffic hell one day and actually finding the Dairy Queen, I got down to the business of reviewing them. The burger was good, and nothing beats real ice cream as a dessert compared to other fast food places that have dessert as an afterthought. Dairy Queen does ice cream, and it shows. Best fast food dessert, hands down and thumbs up. Sundaes are awesome, as are the shakes, and if your taste turns toward smoothies, DQ also owns Orange Julius and you can get that here as well.

Now on to the main event, I got two small orders of French fries and onion rings each, and they came in small cardboard boxes reminiscent of White Castle containers. The French fries were thick shoestrings with a slight batter covering for extra crisp, soft and very hot inside, a little greasy but not enough to be worrisome. These fries are substantial, excellent for shake dipping. These fries are good, but wow, they pale in comparison to the onion rings.

Dairy Queen onion rings are heavenly, medium sized slices of onion, with bread crumb batter just enough to make them crispy. With a hot succulent delicious whole onion inside, they have a lightly baked quality, and that's even though I know they're deep-fried. They don't taste deep-fried. Seriously, these are superior onion rings, too good for a fast food chain. Highly recommended.

French Fry Diary 512: Barcel Chips A la Diabla

I like spicy. I like barbecue. I like a bit of heat. Unless of course, it gets too hot. That's why I was afraid of these potato chips.

As is sometimes the case with potato chip products, it has a looong name. The full name of the item is Barcel Chips by Papas Toreadas A la Diabla Kettle Cooked Potato Chips. If subtitles count, and they do here because the words have so much power, they are 'Red Hot Pepper flavored.' Somehow I don't think they're talking about Anthony Kiedis or Flea. These are made in Mexico, where they know heat.

Despite the bag's visual and literal bravado however, chile is just one of several ingredients listed under flavoring. We'll see. Upon opening the bag, there was an aroma of heat, but nothing to knock anyone out. What struck me first was how dark the seasoning on the chips.

I let The Bride be my guinea pig and she took the first chip. I wasn't throwing in front of a bullet, mind you, she volunteered, and does have a higher tolerance for hear than I do. She didn't think they were that hot, but she did forbid me from giving any to my cat Spooky, so they had to have some kick. She compared the heat to chip dipped in heat rather than the heat actually being on the chip, if you know what I mean.

My turn. The Bride thought they might be too hot for me. They were very crunchy, and after the second chip, I thought maybe I was worrying about nothing. After the third however, the burning began. Again, by only eating one chip, The Bride proved her intellectual superiority over me. These are HOT.

These chips are very hot, so have something cold to drink nearby. That said, I think these would be great for dipping in ice cream or a milkshake. If you like heat, you will love Barcel's Chips A la Diabla.

French Fry Diary 385: Ruffles Ultimate Sweet & Smokin' BBQ

I love Ruffles, they make a great dipping chip. But then I saw this. Ruffles. Ultimate. Really? When I first saw those words on the shelf at my local Wawa, I was entranced. I had to know what Ruffles Ultimate was. And even better - Ruffles Ultimate with sweet and smokin' barbecue flavor, what a bonus.

So of course I snagged a bag. The packaging held some clue. Apparently Ultimate Ruffles are all about 'hardcore flavors' to crush a 'hardcore hunger.' Apparently the Ultimate style chips come in the regular Original and there's also a Kickin' Jalapeño Ranch flavor. I don't think I'll be trying those. These, however, promised on the bag that my hunger was about to get blown up by a spicy, sweet and smoky taste bomb. Boom. Well, then.

I have to say, once opening the bag and trying them, these are indeed no ordinary potato chips. Heck, these are no ordinary Ruffles. The ridges are huge, bigger than any I've seen on any other ridged potato chip. They are more like Herr's pink foil Ripples but much bigger, and cut much differently than regular Ruffles. These chips would be and are amazing as dipping chips, especially with my favorite, ice cream as the cold contrasts with the heat of the chip.

Yes, be warned, these are very hot chips. No playing around here, these are hot, but it's a good heat. Have something cold and refreshing nearby to wash these babies down with. The seasoning is very heavy, almost making the chips a bright solid orange, and they are indeed both sweet and smoky.

These Ruffles are very close to ultimate. Bravo. Much like Herr's with their Lattice Cut Potato Chips, Ruffles has found a way to make a better dipping chip. Thumbs up.

French Fry Diary 371: Ben & Jerry's Late Night Snack

For today's entry here at French Fry Diary, I have something very different - ice cream! Ben & Jerry have a new flavor inspired by "Late Night with Jimmy Fallon," called Late Night Snack.

Now I like Jimmy Fallon quite a bit, and I love The Roots, although I don't get to see the show as often as I like. I was delighted to find out that an ice cream flavor has been created to honor them, and especially one I could write about here. Late Night Snack is vanilla bean ice cream with a salty caramel swirl and fudge covered potato chip clusters.

It doesn't sound like my thing at all. I prefer fudge over caramel, and really don't like crunchy stuff in my ice cream (I am very anti-jimmy/sprinkle), but surprisingly I really liked this. Thumbs up for Late Night Snack, and props to the Ray-man for hopping me to it.

French Fry Diary 365: Hawaiian Luau BBQ Kettle Style Potato Chips

My friend Marni has a skill, well, besides those. She has this amazing ability to win contests, contests of any kind. Recently she won a contest on Facebook and the prize, wait for it, was potato chips. She won a selection of Hawaiian Kettle Style Potato Chips, from Hawaiian Snacks, some of which she shared with French Fry Diary.

Marni gave me a whole 8 oz. bag of the Luau BBQ Potato Chips, a beautiful orange bag with pictures of Hawaiian native people barbecuing on a sunshine paradise beach, framed in lotus flowers. The bag also promises the chips to be 'sweet & spicy' and 'crispy & crunchy.'

Inside were, as promised, very crunchy and crispy kettle chips, but not so much barbecue flavor. At least not at first. There's a slow burn going on in your mouth, have some cold beverage handy, cuz it lingers. Being good kettle chips, they're great for dipping, preferably ice cream for me, as it would add a good contrast with the hot vs. cold.

Marni also got the original version, and the Maui Onion. The Originals were pretty typical. Hawaiian Snacks also makes onion snacks, in the onion and bbq flavors. All in all I was impressed, and would like give them all a try as well. Good stuff, thank you, Marni!

French Fry Diary 346: Lay's Kettle Cooked Mesquite BBQ Flavored Potato Chips

I had just purchased ice cream at the local Wawa and was perusing the snack aisle looking for something to dip with it. Yeah, I know. I do that, get over it. I was wondering why, for like the hundredth time, they don't have BBQ Ruffles in my area, when I saw this bag of Lay's Kettle Cooked Mesquite BBQ Flavored Potato Chips and decided to go with them. There were a dozen other choices, but I wanted barbeque.

Now usually ridges are best for dipping, but kettle cooking makes a thick hard break easily chip that is also good for dipping. The only problem with this particular chip is, as you can see from the picture, kinda on the small side. Still they work, not as well as I would have liked, but they work.

For those looking for the health info, there's good news. These chips are free of MSG, transfats, or bizarrely enough, anything related to pigs. They are also a good source of Vitamin C, yeah, right, but I guess that shouldn't be a surprise based on their orange color.

The flavor is a good sweet barbeque flavor, but without a burn or an aftertaste. That's a win-win situation in my book. Not the best BBQ chips I have ever had but pretty darn good ones. And they were terrific dipped in the ice cream.

French Fry Diary 302: Herr's Honey BBQ Potato Chips

I always kinda dug the bag for Herr's Honey BBQ Flavored Potato Chips. The brick background conjures a backyard barbeque with a very gangsta-looking honeybee who looks as if he just sprayed the wall with graffiti that reads "Honey BBQ." Yeah, I'm easily amused.

These chips have everything that the regular Herr's Barbecue Potato Chips in the gold foil have with two important differences. The Honey BBQ chips have honey, and actually it seems to be the only addition in ingredients - and they have ripples, just like the, duh, Herr's Ripples Potato Chips in the pink foil.

The honey is thick but not sticky. If the Wise Honey BBQ Potato Chips have just the flavoring of honey, the Herr's variety taste like the honey was just poured on - and that's a good thing. Very sweet and very good, although, like the regular gold foils, they can be seasoned inconsistently. Just a little is just enough.

The ripples are wide, and like the regular pink foils, these are thick chips, which make them just perfect for dips. Anyone know why Herr's other chips have become so thin in recent years? Longtime readers of French Fry Diary will know I like dipping into ice cream and these are among the best for that.

These are darn good chips, and highly recommended. Mmmm... Chips...

Random Tater Pic of the Day #25

Today's image comes from the opening scenes of the third season premiere of HBO's "Hung." Featured is Sweet Potato Sensations in Detroit, which has a variety of sweet potato sensations like pies, cakes, cheesecakes, cobblers, cookies, yams, baked sweet potatoes, ice cream and even t-shirts.

French Fry Diary 283: Kim's Magic Pop

I'm not really sure exactly what you would call these other than big flat rice cake things, but Kim's Magic Pop snack cake things are interesting.

Here's the good news: they are all natural, fat free, low calorie, and low sodium. These snack cakes come from South Korea and this "natural potato flavor" is made from whole wheat, potato and rice.

The serving and eating suggestions say they can go with soups, salads, with cheese or right out of the bag as a fun snack. I tried one with ice cream, which was messy but good, and one with peanut butter that brought out a Ritz cracker vibe.

Kim's Magic Pop comes in twelve unique flavors, and is an interesting, tasty and healthy snack - check it out.

French Fry Diary 255: Utz Honey BBQ Potato Chips

When I worked at a 9-5 office job we had an Utz delivery guy come in once a week with free chips and sometimes new test flavors. Nice guy and good memories, and good times. I like Utz a lot, they have great products.

On a recent trip to see family in Maryland I saw some Utz stuff I had never seen before, at an ice cream parlor of all places. They had crab chips (we were in Maryland after all), Carolina BBQ chips, and my favorite flavor - Honey BBQ. Guess which one I brought home.

Utz BBQ chips come in two styles - regular and with ridges, you never know what you're going to get. When I opened this bag of Utz Honey BBQ Flavored Potato Chips I got regulars not ridges, which was fine. I like the mystery.

The bad news is that they weren't that great. They had the lingering aftertaste and touch of heartburn that some barbeque chips have, and also a weird grainy quality sort of like Jack and Jill chips. They weren't horrible, I would have them again, they just weren't preferable.