Snack Review: Smartfood Popcorn Clusters

I love popcorn for breakfast. Every morning, I always take those 100 calorie bags of kettle popcorn with me to work, because they are low in calories and they take a while to eat. However, for the past few weeks I took Frito-Lay Smartfood popcorn clusters with me to work and not only were they tasty, they seemed to satisfy my hunger every morning.

These delicious clusters contain something different in each flavor. Each flavor was coated in caramel, but not so much that it stuck to your teeth. The popcorn had a fresh crisp texture to it and I had to stop myself from pouring the whole bag down my mouth. There were three flavors that I tried: Chocolate Cookie Caramel Pecan, Honey Multigrain and Cranberry Almond.

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Snack Review: Deep River Asian Sweet & Spicy Chips

 

Deep River chips and snacks have been the “Snack of the Day” on the Rachael Ray Show, and magicianPenn Gillette called them a “damn good chip,” ranking their Rosemary and Olive Oil Chip third on his list of Top 10 Best Potato Chips.

With such endorsements, I thought I’d give Deep River a try. Besides, I’m a fool for quality kettle chips; I just can’t get enough. When I dug into the bag of their Asian Sweet & Spicy chips, I admit I was skeptical. Would these chips taste like cheap and greasy Chinese takeout? What do Rachel Ray and Penn Gillette know anyway? Apparently, they know a lot.

Oh Grasshopper. These were fresh and delicious.

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Snack Review: Chocolate Chip Cookie Showdown

The recent issue of Consumer Reports rates chocolate chip cookies. I was - intrigued? offended? dubious? - to find that two brands outranked my favorite Chips Ahoy.

I mean, “favorite” isn’t even the word. In my mind they are the standard, the traditional, THE American cookie. What’s more, they are outranked in these ratings by Keebler.

Here’s the truth, people: As far as I know I’ve NEVER eaten a Keebler cookie. I’ve certainly never chosen to buy them myself. I don’t want cookies baked by creepy little elves in a dirty forest. And yet, Keebler were ranked “very good” and Chips Ahoy only “good.”

Well, this was a challenge. And - what if they were actually better? So of course I had to try them.

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Snack Review: Kettle Brand Chips

The enlightened snack purveyors at Snackaisle.com sent us a huge box of assorted treats. It was a wonderful thing they did, but it transformed the Snackerrific Review Lab into a feeding frenzy of snack sharks. Chip dust everywhere, dry-roasted edamame husks on the desks, Lara Bar wrappers strewn all about - oh, it was ugly.

Based in New Hampshire, Snackaisle is an online source for tons of all-natural, low-fat, low-sodium, gluten-free snacks, too many to mention now. We’ll be reviewing many of them here over the next few weeks.

Kettle Brand Baked Salt & Fresh Ground Pepper Chips
It was only a 4 oz. bag, but the contents disappeared (during the aforementioned feeding frenzy) in about 10 seconds. I snagged enough chips for myself to know that they’re simply the tastiest potato chips I’ve eaten in years. It was all I could do to keep from licking the inside of the bag.

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Snack Review: Stretch Island Fruit Co. Raspberry Fruit Leather

We reviewed Stretch Island Fruit Leather a while back on these pages, but I thought it might be worth a second look.

Oh, and I have a confession: I was a fruit leather virgin before last night.

Sure, I’d messed around with fruit rolls before, but the closest I’d ever gotten to fruit leather were the myths and legends about the stuff from a friend who grew up with hippie parents. Truth is, I’d never actually indulged. Boy was I missing out.

It’s so simple: take fresh fruit, remove the seeds and stems (this review is sounding more and more suspect by the minute), puree it, pour it out onto a tray, let it dry naturally or run it through a dehydrator, cut it into cellphone-sized slabs, and wrap it up for future enjoyment!

Fruit leather has been rolling out of Stretch Island Fruit Co. since 1976 when Ron and Mary Sagerson moved to Stretch Island, WA, and began making the fruity treats in their laundry room. (Thankfully, for everyone involved, they’ve long since moved the operation to much larger digs.)

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