On Saturday, my soon-to-be wife dragged me to the store to do some grocery shopping with her. This came after a spirited debate in which we discussed her hypothesis that I don’t do nearly as much around the apartment as she does. She pointed to her meticulous cleaning, intensive dog grooming, sublime refrigerator and cabinet organization, and a handful of other activities that prevent me from diving headlong into the 31 year old boy-child squalor abyss. Really my only reply was that her True Blood episodes weren’t going to illegally download themselves. So off we went.
Generally, I do not enjoy the grocery store as I do the majority of my snackspotting at dollar, drug, convenience, and specialty stores. Nor do I enjoy the surly gum-snapping teenaged cashiers or the scale at the front, upon which I insist on weighing myself. And as a society I would like us all to agree that it’s time to officially retire Seal’s “Kiss from a Rose.”
But occasionally I will discover a product of note, and this was one of those times. Zapp’s Baby Back Ribs Potato Chips. These are a Winn-Dixie “Limited Edition Exclusive.” If you don’t know, Winn-Dixie is a chain of slightly skanky grocery stores found throughout the South. This Winn-Dixie is located right across the street, so what are you gonna do?
The first thing I noticed about these chips was the horrible, horrible bag design. If you’ve been reading the blog faithfully, you may be aware of my love of Zapp’s bags, especially the wondertastic Voodoo Gumbo bag. This bag could not look more generic. There are no stripes. Foiling is minimal. Fonts are lazy. It’s just bad. Shame on you Zapp’s. And shame on you Winn-Dixie for pulling them into the gutter with you.
That being said, I was still excited to devour the juicy sweet and smoky flavors of baby back ribs.
I am still waiting. The generic-ness of these chips is a great fit for the generic-ness of the bag. These taste like your run of the mill barbeque potato chips. They are a little sweet, a little paprika-y, and a lot disappointing. There is really nothing wrong with the flavor, but you’ve had it before, a million times over.
Faithful readers will also know about my crunch threshold: the point at which chips cease to be little discs of flavorful fun and start to be teeth-smashing monstrosities. These were the latter. They hurt my face. When my eyeball jelly starts to vibrate, I’ve had enough.
I’ve never been in love with any Zapp’s product. They’re always decent if unremarkable. But these are plain disappointing. It seems in the spirit of cross-promotional gimmickry, someone in the flavor labs got a little lazy. If you’re in a Winn-Dixie, just pass these by. You’re not going to miss anything. And walk on by that front-of-the-store scale too. No good will come of it.
Food Junk 
aw, disappointing. of chips, my favorite flavor is always BBQ or something like it. But it is sad when they taste just “ordinary”. boo!
Yet now I want chips. Or ribs. I’m so confused.
Damn you.
You flaunt your easy access to Zapp’s in my face through my monitor, simply to claim they are less than an orgasm in your mouth. How dare…eh, that last sentence didn’t mean to sound like that.
Damn man, Zapp’s are good. I miss being able to swing by the Circle K and grabbing a bag of Jalapeno Zapp’s or Crawtators. Although I can’t vouch for this particular flavor, I long for the thick as a brick curled up ultra-crunch of Zapp’s chips.
Winn-Dixie : Publix :: Wal-Mart : Target
Haha, good call
I would recommend avoiding all processed food stuff in favor of a plant based, whole foods diet. Your are wasting your time and health consuming foods such as these. I’d bet you’d feel a lot better and would be less angry if you avoided products like this too. Oh, the bag design is well thought out and classy. The Voodoo bag you mentioned is tacky. Sorry.