A potato chip (North American English; often just chip) or crisp (British and Irish English) is a thin slice of
potato
The potato is a starchy food, a tuber of the plant ''Solanum tuberosum'' and is a root vegetable native to the Americas. The plant is a perennial in the nightshade family Solanaceae.
Wild potato species can be found from the southern Unit ...
that has been either
deep fried
Deep frying (also referred to as deep fat frying) is a cooking method in which food is submerged in hot fat, traditionally lard but today most commonly oil, as opposed to the shallow oil used in conventional frying done in a frying pan. Normal ...
,
baked
Baking is a method of preparing food that uses dry heat, typically in an oven, but can also be done in hot ashes, or on hot stones. The most common baked item is bread but many other types of foods can be baked. Heat is gradually transferre ...
, or air fried until crunchy. They are commonly served as a
snack
A snack is a small portion of food generally eaten between meals. Snacks come in a variety of forms including packaged snack foods and other processed foods, as well as items made from fresh ingredients at home.
Traditionally, snacks are p ...
,
side dish
A side dish, sometimes referred to as a side order, side item, or simply a side, is a food item that accompanies the entrée or main course at a meal.appetizer
An hors d'oeuvre ( ; french: hors-d'œuvre ), appetiser or starter is a small dish served before a meal in European cuisine. Some hors d'oeuvres are served cold, others hot. Hors d'oeuvres may be served at the dinner table as a part of the ...
. The basic chips are cooked and salted; additional varieties are manufactured using various flavorings and ingredients including
herbs
In general use, herbs are a widely distributed and widespread group of plants, excluding vegetables and other plants consumed for macronutrients, with savory or aromatic properties that are used for flavoring and garnishing food, for medicinal ...
,
spice
A spice is a seed, fruit, root, bark, or other plant substance primarily used for flavoring or coloring food. Spices are distinguished from herbs, which are the leaves, flowers, or stems of plants used for flavoring or as a garnish. Spices a ...
s,
cheese
Cheese is a dairy product produced in wide ranges of flavors, textures, and forms by coagulation of the milk protein casein. It comprises proteins and fat from milk, usually the milk of cows, buffalo, goats, or sheep. During production, ...
s, other natural flavors,
artificial flavors
A flavoring (or flavouring), also known as flavor (or flavour) or flavorant, is a food additive used to improve the taste or smell of food. It changes the perceptual impression of food as determined primarily by the chemoreceptors of the gust ...
, and
additives
Additive may refer to:
Mathematics
* Additive function, a function in number theory
* Additive map, a function that preserves the addition operation
* Additive set-functionn see Sigma additivity
* Additive category, a preadditive category with fi ...
.
Potato chips form a large part of the
snack food
A snack is a small portion of food generally Eating, eaten between meals. Snacks come in a variety of forms including packaged snack foods and other processed foods, as well as items made from fresh ingredients at home.
Traditionally, snack ...
and convenience food market in Western countries. The global potato chip market generated total revenue of US$16.49 billion in 2005. This accounted for 35.5% of the total savory snacks market in that year ($46.1 billion).
History
The earliest known recipe for something similar to today's potato chips is in
William Kitchiner
William Kitchiner M.D. (1775–1827) was an English optician, amateur musician and cook. A celebrity chef, he was a household name during the 19th century, and his 1817 cookbook, '' The Cook's Oracle'', was a bestseller in the United Kingdom and ...
's book '' The Cook's Oracle'' published in 1817, which was a bestseller in the United Kingdom and the United States. The 1822 edition's recipe for "Potatoes fried in Slices or Shavings" reads "peel large potatoes... cut them in shavings round and round, as you would peel a lemon; dry them well in a clean cloth, and fry them in lard or dripping". An 1825 British book about French cookery calls them "Pommes de Terre frites" (second recipe) and calls for thin slices of potato fried in "clarified butter or goose dripping", drained and sprinkled with salt. Early recipes for potato chips in the US are found in
Mary Randolph
Mary Randolph (August 9, 1762 – January 23, 1828) was a Southern American cook and author, known for writing ''The Virginia House-Wife; Or, Methodical Cook'' (1824), one of the most influential housekeeping and cook books of the 19th century. ...
's ''Virginia House-Wife'' (1824) and in N.K.M. Lee's ''Cook's Own Book'' (1832), both of which explicitly cite Kitchiner.
A legend associates the creation of potato chips with
Saratoga Springs, New York
Saratoga Springs is a city in Saratoga County, New York, United States. The population was 28,491 at the 2020 census. The name reflects the presence of mineral springs in the area, which has made Saratoga a popular resort destination for over 2 ...
, decades later than the first recorded recipe. By the late nineteenth century, a popular version of the story attributed the dish to
George Crum
George Speck (also known as George Crum;Hugh Bradley, ''Such Was Saratoga'', New York: 1940 July 15, 1824 – July 22, 1914) was an American chef. He was known for his role in popularizing potato chips in Upstate New York and was later mythologiz ...
, a cook at Moon's Lake House who was trying to appease an unhappy customer on August 24, 1853. The customer kept sending back his French-fried potatoes, complaining that they were too thick, too "soggy", or not salted enough. Frustrated, Crum sliced several potatoes extremely thin, fried them to a crisp, and seasoned them with extra salt. To his surprise, the customer loved them. They soon came to be called "Saratoga Chips", a name that persisted into the mid-twentieth century. A version of this story was popularized in a 1973 national advertising campaign by St. Regis Paper Company which manufactured packaging for chips, claiming that Crum's customer was
Cornelius Vanderbilt
Cornelius Vanderbilt (May 27, 1794 – January 4, 1877), nicknamed "the Commodore", was an American business magnate who built his wealth in railroads and shipping. After working with his father's business, Vanderbilt worked his way into lead ...
. Crum was already renowned as a chef at the time, and he owned a lakeside restaurant by 1860 which he called Crum's House. The "Saratoga Chips" brand name still exists today.
Production
In the 20th century, potato chips spread beyond chef-cooked restaurant fare and began to be mass-produced for home consumption. The
Dayton, Ohio
Dayton () is the sixth-largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Montgomery County. A small part of the city extends into Greene County. The 2020 U.S. census estimate put the city population at 137,644, while Greater Day ...
-based
Mikesell's
Mikesell's Potato Chip Company is a Dayton, Ohio-based producer of potato chips and other snack foods. It bills itself as the "oldest continuous operating potato chip company in the United States." New Hampshire-based Granite State Potato Chip Factory, founded in 1905 and in operation until 2007, was one of America's first potato chip manufacturers.
Flavoring
In an idea originated by the Smiths Potato Crisps Company Ltd, formed in 1920, Frank Smith packaged a twist of salt with his chips in greaseproof paper bags, which were sold around London. The potato chip remained otherwise unseasoned until an important scientific development in the 1950s. After English biochemists
Archer Martin
Archer John Porter Martin (1 March 1910 – 28 July 2002) was a British chemist who shared the 1952 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for the invention of partition chromatography with Richard Synge.
Early life
Martin's father was a GP. Martin was e ...
and
Richard Synge
Richard Laurence Millington Synge FRS FRSE FRIC FRSC MRIA (Liverpool, 28 October 1914 – Norwich, 18 August 1994) was a British biochemist, and shared the 1952 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for the invention of partition chromatography with Arch ...
received a Nobel Prize for inventing
partition chromatography Partition chromatography theory and practice was introduced through the work and publications of Archer Martin and Richard Laurence Millington Synge during the 1940s. They would later receive the 1952 Nobel Prize in Chemistry "for their invention ...
in 1952, food scientists began to develop flavors via a
gas chromatograph
Gas chromatography (GC) is a common type of chromatography used in analytical chemistry for separating and analyzing compounds that can be vaporized without decomposition. Typical uses of GC include testing the purity of a particular substance, ...
. After some trial and error, in 1954, Joe "Spud" Murphy, the owner of the Irish crisps company Tayto, and his employee Seamus Burke, produced the world's first seasoned chips: Cheese & Onion. Companies worldwide sought to buy the rights to Tayto's technique.Walkers of Leicester, England produced Cheese & Onion the same year.
Golden Wonder
Golden Wonder is a British company that manufactures snack foods, most notably crisps. These include Ringos, Golden Wonder and Transform-A-Snack. Since 2006, it has been a wholly owned subsidiary of the Northern Irish company Tayto, after bei ...
(Smith’s main competitor at the time) would also produce Cheese & Onion, and Smith’s countered with Salt & Vinegar (tested first by their north-east England subsidiary Tudor) which launched nationally in 1967, starting a two-decade-long flavour war.
The first flavored chips in the United States, barbecue flavor, were being manufactured and sold by 1954. In 1958,
Herr's
Herr's is an American brand of potato chips and other snack foods produced and marketed by eponymous private American company Herr Foods Inc. based in Nottingham, Pennsylvania. While their products are sold primarily throughout the Eastern United ...
was the first company to introduce barbecue-flavored potato chips in
Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...
.
Packaging
Chips sold in markets were usually sold in tins or scooped out of storefront glass bins and delivered by horse and wagon. Early potato chip bags were
wax paper
Waxed paper (also wax paper, waxpaper, or paraffin paper) is paper that has been made moisture-proof and grease-proof through the application of wax.
The practice of oiling parchment or paper in order to make it semi-translucent or moisture-pro ...
with the ends ironed or stapled together. At first, potato chips were packaged in barrels or tins, which left chips at the bottom stale and crumbled.
In the 1920s,
Laura Scudder
Laura Clough Scudder (July 19, 1881 – March 13, 1959) was an entrepreneur in Monterey Park, California, who made and sold potato chips and pioneered their packaging in sealed bags to extend freshness.
Biography
Born in 1881, in Philadelphi ...
, an entrepreneur in
Monterey Park, California
Monterey Park is a city located in the western San Gabriel Valley region of Los Angeles County, California, United States, approximately from the Downtown Los Angeles civic center. The city's motto is "Pride in the past, Faith in the future". Mo ...
, started having her workers take home sheets of wax paper to iron into the form of bags, which were filled with chips at her factory the next day. This pioneering method reduced crumbling and kept the chips fresh and crisp longer. This innovation, along with the invention of
cellophane
Cellophane is a thin, transparent sheet made of regenerated cellulose. Its low permeability to air, oils, greases, bacteria, and liquid water makes it useful for food packaging. Cellophane is highly permeable to water vapour, but may be coated w ...
, allowed potato chips to become a mass-market product. Today, chips are packaged in plastic bags, with nitrogen gas blown in prior to sealing to lengthen shelf life, and provide protection against crushing.
Kettle-cooked chips
Chips were long made in a batch process, where the potato slices are rinsed with cold water to release starch, fried at a low temperature of , and continuously raked to prevent them from sticking together.
Industrial advances resulted in a shift to production by a
continuous process
Continuous production is a flow production method used to manufacture, produce, or process materials without interruption. Continuous production is called a continuous process or a continuous flow process because the materials, either dry bulk ...
, running the chips through a vat of hot oil and drying them in a conveyor process.
Some small producers continued to use a batch process, notably in
Maui
The island of Maui (; Hawaiian: ) is the second-largest of the islands of the state of Hawaii at 727.2 square miles (1,883 km2) and is the 17th largest island in the United States. Maui is the largest of Maui County's four islands, which ...
. In 1980, inspired by the Maui Chip, an entrepreneur started
Cape Cod Potato Chips
Cape Cod Potato Chips is an American snack food company best known for their brand of kettle-cooked potato chips. The company is headquartered in Hyannis, Massachusetts, on Cape Cod. Cape Cod Potato Chips is a brand owned by Campbell Soup Compan ...
to produce thicker, batch-cooked "Hawaiian style" potato chips, which came to be known as kettle-style (US) or hand-cooked (UK) chips and became a premium, "gourmet" item. Kettle chips are thicker and the surface starch is not rinsed off, resulting in a style of chip called "hard-bite".
Nomenclature
Little consistency exists in the
English-speaking world
Speakers of English are also known as Anglophones, and the countries where English is natively spoken by the majority of the population are termed the '' Anglosphere''. Over two billion people speak English , making English the largest languag ...
for the name of this food. North American English uses "chips", though Canadians may also call French fries, especially thick ones, "chips" as well. "Crisps" may be used for thin fried slices made from potato paste. An example of this type of snack is Pringles, which chooses to market their product as "potato crisps" even in the United States.
In the United Kingdom and Ireland, "crisps" are potato chips which are eaten at room temperature, whilst "chips" are similar to
french fries
French fries (North American English), chips (British English), finger chips ( Indian English), french-fried potatoes, or simply fries, are '' batonnet'' or ''allumette''-cut deep-fried potatoes of disputed origin from Belgium and France. Th ...
(as in "
fish and chips
Fish and chips is a popular hot dish consisting of fried fish in crispy batter, served with chips. The dish originated in England, where these two components had been introduced from separate immigrant cultures; it is not known who created t ...
") and are served hot. In Australia, some parts of South Africa, New Zealand, India, and the
West Indies
The West Indies is a subregion of North America, surrounded by the North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea that includes 13 independent island countries and 18 dependencies and other territories in three major archipelagos: the Greater A ...
, especially in Barbados, both forms of potato product are simply known as "chips", as are the larger "home-style" variety. In the north of New Zealand, they are sometimes affectionately known as "chippies"; however, they are marketed as "chips" throughout the country. In Australia and New Zealand, a distinction is sometimes made between "hot chips" (fried potatoes) and "chips" or "potato chips". In Bangladesh, they are generally known as "chip" or "chips", and much less frequently as "crisps" (pronounced "kirisp") and locally, ''alu bhaja'' (for their similarity to the fried potato dish, ''
bhajji
Pakora () is a spiced fritter originating from the Indian subcontinent. They are sold by street vendors and served in restaurants in South Asia and UK. It consists of items, often vegetables such as potatoes and onions, coated in seasoned g ...
'').
In German-speaking countries (Austria, Germany: "''Kartoffelchips''", often shortened to "Chips"; Switzerland: "''Pommes Chips''") and in countries of the
former Yugoslavia
The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, commonly referred to as SFR Yugoslavia or simply as Yugoslavia, was a country in Central and Southeast Europe. It emerged in 1945, following World War II, and lasted until 1992, with the breakup of Yu ...
, fried thin potato slices are known as "chips" (locally pronounced very similarly to the English pronunciation), with a clear distinction from French fries. In Brazil, "home-style" potato chips are known as ("Portuguese potatoes") if their sides are relatively smooth and ("Prussian potatoes") if their sides show a wafer biscuit-like pattern, whilst American-like industrial uniform potato chips made from a fried potato purée-based dough are known as "batata chips" ("potato chips"), or just .
Health concerns
Most potato chips contain high levels of
sodium
Sodium is a chemical element with the symbol Na (from Latin ''natrium'') and atomic number 11. It is a soft, silvery-white, highly reactive metal. Sodium is an alkali metal, being in group 1 of the periodic table. Its only stable iso ...
, from
salt
Salt is a mineral composed primarily of sodium chloride (NaCl), a chemical compound belonging to the larger class of salts; salt in the form of a natural crystalline mineral is known as rock salt or halite. Salt is present in vast quantitie ...
. This has been linked to health issues such as high
blood pressure
Blood pressure (BP) is the pressure of circulating blood against the walls of blood vessels. Most of this pressure results from the heart pumping blood through the circulatory system. When used without qualification, the term "blood pressure" r ...
. However, researchers at
Queen Mary University of London
, mottoeng = With united powers
, established = 1785 – The London Hospital Medical College1843 – St Bartholomew's Hospital Medical College1882 – Westfield College1887 – East London College/Queen Mary College
, type = Public researc ...
in 2004 have noted that a small "bag of ready-salted crisps" contains less salt than a serving of many breakfast cereals, including "every brand of
cornflakes
Corn flakes, or cornflakes, are a breakfast cereal made from toasting flakes of corn (maize). The cereal, originally made with wheat, was created by Will Kellogg in 1894 for patients at the Battle Creek Sanitarium where he worked with his broth ...
on sale in the UK."
Some potato chip companies have responded to the long-standing concerns by investing in research and development to modify existing recipes and create health-conscious products.
PepsiCo
PepsiCo, Inc. is an American multinational food, snack, and beverage corporation headquartered in Harrison, New York, in the hamlet of Purchase. PepsiCo's business encompasses all aspects of the food and beverage market. It oversees the manuf ...
research shows that about 80% of salt on chips is not sensed by the tongue before being swallowed.
Frito-Lay
Frito-Lay is an American subsidiary of PepsiCo that manufactures, markets, and sells corn chips, potato chips, and other snack foods. The primary snack food brands produced under the Frito-Lay name include Fritos corn chips, Cheetos cheese-flavor ...
spent $414 million in 2009 on product development, including development of salt crystals that would reduce the salt content of
Lay's
Lay's is a brand of potato chips, as well as the name of the company that founded the chip brand in the United States. The brand is also referred to as Frito-Lay because both Lay's and Fritos are brands sold by the Frito-Lay company, which ha ...
potato chips without adversely affecting flavor.
Unsalted chips are available, e.g. the longstanding British brand Salt 'n' Shake, whose chips are not seasoned, but instead include a small salt
sachet
A sachet is a small scented cloth bag filled with herbs, potpourri, or aromatic ingredients.Oster, p. 54 A sachet is also a small porous bag or packet containing a material intended to interact with its atmosphere; for example, desiccants ar ...
in the bag for seasoning to taste. Many other popular brands in the United States, such as
Frito-Lay
Frito-Lay is an American subsidiary of PepsiCo that manufactures, markets, and sells corn chips, potato chips, and other snack foods. The primary snack food brands produced under the Frito-Lay name include Fritos corn chips, Cheetos cheese-flavor ...
, also offer such a product.
One
health scare
A health scare can be broadly defined as a social phenomenon whereby the public at large comes to fear some threat to health, based on suppositions which are nearly always not well-founded.
In 2009 an ABC News article listed "The Top 10 Health Sc ...
related to potato chips focused on
acrylamide
Acrylamide (or acrylic amide) is an organic compound with the chemical formula CH2=CHC(O)NH2. It is a white odorless solid, soluble in water and several organic solvents. From the chemistry perspective, acrylamide is a vinyl-substituted primary ...
, which is produced when potatoes are fried or baked at high temperatures. This discovery in 2002 led to international health concerns. Subsequent research has however found that it is not likely that the acrylamides in burnt or well-cooked food cause cancer in humans;
Cancer Research UK
Cancer Research UK (CRUK) is the world's largest independent cancer research organization. It is registered as a charity in the United Kingdom and Isle of Man, and was formed on 4 February 2002 by the merger of The Cancer Research Campaign and t ...
categorizes the idea that burnt food causes cancer as a "myth".
In August 2008,
California Attorney General
The attorney general of California is the state attorney general of the Government of California. The officer's duty is to ensure that "the laws of the state are uniformly and adequately enforced" (Constitution of California, Article V, Section ...
Jerry Brown
Edmund Gerald Brown Jr. (born April 7, 1938) is an American lawyer, author, and politician who served as the 34th and 39th governor of California from 1975 to 1983 and 2011 to 2019. A member of the Democratic Party, he was elected Secretary of S ...
announced a settlement with
Frito-Lay
Frito-Lay is an American subsidiary of PepsiCo that manufactures, markets, and sells corn chips, potato chips, and other snack foods. The primary snack food brands produced under the Frito-Lay name include Fritos corn chips, Cheetos cheese-flavor ...
Cape Cod Potato Chips
Cape Cod Potato Chips is an American snack food company best known for their brand of kettle-cooked potato chips. The company is headquartered in Hyannis, Massachusetts, on Cape Cod. Cape Cod Potato Chips is a brand owned by Campbell Soup Compan ...
, for violating the state's Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act. The state had alleged in 2005 that potato chips from these companies failed to document that they contained high levels of acrylamide, which is listed by California since the 1990s as a
carcinogen
A carcinogen is any substance, radionuclide, or radiation that promotes carcinogenesis (the formation of cancer). This may be due to the ability to damage the genome or to the disruption of cellular metabolic processes. Several radioactive substan ...
. These companies paid fines and agreed to reduce acrylamide levels to be under 275 parts per billion. Many potato chip manufacturers attempt to remove burned and thus potentially acrylamide-rich chips before the packaging process. Large scanners are used to eliminate chips worst affected by heat.
Regional varieties
Similar foods
Another type of potato chip, notably the Pringles and
Lay's Stax
Lay's Stax is a potato chip snack food produced by Frito-Lay, a subsidiary of PepsiCo."Pringles vs Stax" (Septem ...
brands, is made by
extruding
Extrusion is a process used to create objects of a fixed cross-sectional profile by pushing material through a die of the desired cross-section. Its two main advantages over other manufacturing processes are its ability to create very complex ...
or pressing a dough made from dehydrated potato flour into the desired shape before frying. This makes chips that are uniform in size and shape, which allows them to be stacked and packaged in rigid cardboard or plastic canisters. Pringles are officially branded as "potato crisps" in the US. Pringles may be termed "potato chips" in Britain, to distinguish them from traditional "crisps".
Munchos
Munchos are a potato chip snack food manufactured from dehydrated potatoes by Frito-Lay.
Munchos are somewhat similar to Lay's Stax and Pringles, which are also made from dried potatoes. Some reviews say that the chip differs in its "light and ...
, another brand that uses the term "potato crisps", has deep air pockets in its chips that give it a curved shape, though the chips themselves resemble regular bagged chips.
An additional variant of potato chips exists in the form of "potato sticks", also called "shoestring potatoes". These are made as extremely thin (2 to 3 mm) versions of the popular French fry but are fried in the manner of regular salted potato chips. A
hickory
Hickory is a common name for trees composing the genus ''Carya'', which includes around 18 species. Five or six species are native to China, Indochina, and India (Assam), as many as twelve are native to the United States, four are found in Mexi ...
-smoke-flavored version is popular in Canada, going by the
vending machine
A vending machine is an automated machine that provides items such as snacks, beverages, cigarettes, and lottery tickets to consumers after cash, a credit card, or other forms of payment are inserted into the machine or otherwise made. The fir ...
name "Hickory Sticks". Potato sticks are typically packaged in rigid containers, although some manufacturers use flexible pouches, similar to potato chip bags. Potato sticks were originally packed in hermetically sealed steel cans. In the 1960s, manufacturers switched to the less expensive composite canister (similar to the Pringles container).
Reckitt Benckiser
Reckitt Benckiser Group plc, trading as Reckitt, is a British multinational consumer goods company headquartered in Slough, England. It is a producer of health, hygiene and nutrition products. The company was formed in March 1999 by the merg ...
was a market leader in this category under the Durkee Potato Stix and
French's
French's is an American brand of prepared mustard, condiments, fried onions, and other food items that was created by Robert Timothy French. French's "Cream Salad Brand" mustard debuted to the world at the 1904 St. Louis World's Fair. By 1921, F ...
Potato Sticks names but exited the business in 2008. In 2014, French's reentered the market. A larger variant (about 1 cm thick) made with dehydrated potatoes is marketed as
Andy Capp
''Andy Capp'' is a British comic strip created by cartoonist Reg Smythe, seen in the ''Daily Mirror'' and the ''Sunday Mirror'' newspapers since 5 August 1957. Originally a single-panel cartoon, it was later expanded to four panels.
The s ...
's Pub Fries, using the theme of a long-running British
comic strip
A comic strip is a sequence of drawings, often cartoons, arranged in interrelated panels to display brief humor or form a narrative, often serialized, with text in balloons and captions. Traditionally, throughout the 20th and into the 21st ...
, which are baked and sold in a variety of flavors. Walkers make a similar product (using the Smiths brand) called "Chipsticks" which are sold in ready-salted and salt and vinegar flavors.
Some companies have also marketed
baked
Baking is a method of preparing food that uses dry heat, typically in an oven, but can also be done in hot ashes, or on hot stones. The most common baked item is bread but many other types of foods can be baked. Heat is gradually transferre ...
potato chips as an alternative with lower fat content. Additionally, some varieties of fat-free chips have been made using artificial, and indigestible, fat substitutes. These became well known in the media when an ingredient many contained,
Olestra
Olestra (also known by its brand name Olean) is a fat substitute that adds no calories to products. It has been used in the preparation of otherwise high-fat foods thereby lowering or eliminating their fat content. The Food and Drug Administrati ...
, was linked in some individuals to abdominal discomfort and loose stools.
Many other products might be called "crisps" in Britain, but would not be classed as "potato chips" because they are not made with potato or are not chipped (for example,
Wotsits
Wotsits is a British brand of cheese flavoured corn puffs sold first by Golden Wonder and now by Walkers Crisps. The most common form is the "Really Cheesy" flavour of corn puffs. Other shapes and flavours have also been sold, including limited ...
,
Quavers
Quavers are a deep-fried potato-based British snack food. Launched in the UK in 1968, they were originally made by Smith's. Since 1997 they have been produced by Walkers. The name comes from the musical note, quaver.
History
Quavers were lau ...
Hula Hoops
Hula Hoops are a snack food made out of potatoes and corn in the shape of short, hollow cylinders. Created by KP Snacks in the United Kingdom in 1973, they are sold in the UK and the Republic of Ireland, New Zealand and South Africa. Hula Hoops ...
, and
Monster Munch
Monster Munch are a British baked corn snack created by Smiths in 1977 and manufactured by Walkers. They are aimed at children and widely consumed in the United Kingdom. Flavours include Roast Beef, Pickled Onion and Flamin' Hot.
On the issue ...
).
Sweet potato
The sweet potato or sweetpotato (''Ipomoea batatas'') is a dicotyledonous plant that belongs to the Convolvulus, bindweed or morning glory family (biology), family, Convolvulaceae. Its large, starchy, sweet-tasting tuberous roots are used as a r ...
chips are eaten in Korea, New Zealand, and Japan; parsnip,
beetroot
The beetroot is the taproot portion of a beet plant, usually known in North America as beets while the vegetable is referred to as beetroot in British English, and also known as the table beet, garden beet, red beet, dinner beet or golden beet ...
, and carrot crisps are available in the United Kingdom. India is famous for a large number of localized 'chips shops', selling not only potato chips, but also other varieties such as plantain chips, tapioca chips, yam chips, and even carrot chips. Plantain chips, also known as chifles or
tostones
Tostones (, from the Spanish verb ''tostar'' which means "to toast") are twice-fried plantain slices commonly found in Latin American cuisine and Caribbean cuisine. Most commonly known as ''tostones'', Puerto Rico, Jamaica, Nicaragua, Cuba, Flor ...
, are also sold in the Western Hemisphere from Canada to Chile. In the Philippines, banana chips can be found sold at local stores. In Kenya, chips are made from
arrowroot
Arrowroot is a starch obtained from the rhizomes (rootstock) of several tropical plants, traditionally ''Maranta arundinacea'', but also Florida arrowroot from ''Zamia integrifolia'', and tapioca from cassava (''Manihot esculenta''), which is oft ...
and
cassava
''Manihot esculenta'', common name, commonly called cassava (), manioc, or yuca (among numerous regional names), is a woody shrub of the spurge family, Euphorbiaceae, native to South America. Although a perennial plant, cassava is extensively ...
. In the United Kingdom, Sweden, Finland, and Australia, a new variety of Pringles made from rice has been released and marketed as lower in fat than its potato counterparts.
See also
*
Chips and dip
Chips and dip is a dish consisting of chips (crisps) served with dips. Chips used include potato chips, tortilla chips, corn chips, bean chips, vegetable chips, pita chips, plantain chips and others. Crackers are also sometimes used, as are ...
*
List of deep fried foods
This is a list of deep fried foods and dishes. Deep frying is a cooking method in which food is submerged in hot fat, such as cooking oil. This is normally performed with a deep fryer or chip pan, and industrially, a pressure fryer or vacuum frye ...
*
List of potato dishes
The potato is a starchy, tuberous crop. It is the world's fourth-largest food crop, following rice, wheat and corn. The annual diet of an average global citizen in the first decade of the 21st century included about of potato. The potato was fir ...
*
Papadum
A papad is an Indian deep fried dough of black gram bean flour, either fried or cooked with dry heat (flipped over an open flame) until crunchy. Other flours made from lentils, chickpeas, rice, tapioca, millet or potato are also used. ''Papad' ...
*
Vegetable chips
Vegetable chips (also referred to as veggie chips) are chips (crisps) that are prepared using vegetables other than potatoes. Vegetable chips may be fried, deep-fried, dehydrated, dried or baked. Many different root vegetables or leaf vegetab ...
References
Further reading
* Banham, Rayner (1977) "The Crisp at the Crossroads", in P. Barker (ed) ''Arts in Society''. London: Fontana.
* : Origins of potato chips.
*