July 2023 – The Saboscrivner

King Cajun Crawfish

It has been over five years since I’ve eaten at King Cajun Crawfish (https://kingcajuncrawfish.com/), the Vietnamese-Cajun restaurant in Orlando’s Mills 50 district, one of our best and most diverse neighborhoods for dining. I have always loved it, being a fan of New Orleans and its culture and culinary traditions, so I don’t know what took me so long to return. At least I’ve been there more recently than I’ve been back to the Big Easy itself (not since 2001, sadly).

You may already be familiar with the Cajun and Creole dishes of Louisiana, but I will be didactic and point out that Cajun food is rustic and rural, a spicy stewpot of French-Acadians who left Nova Scotia and settled in the bayous of Louisiana along with Southern influences, while Creole food is more continental “city food” from New Orleans, influenced by Caribbean and European flavors, especially French.

Vietnamese-Cajun is a unique offshoot — a fusion of a fusion — and we are lucky to have several Viet-Cajun restaurants here in Orlando. I believe King Cajun was the first, so it has always been my favorite. Food & Wine offers a nice history of the fusion cuisine, which started with Vietnamese refugees who worked in the seafood industry in Gulf Coast Texas and Louisiana.

I recently invited a beloved professional mentor and friend out to lunch, something we’ve been meaning to do for almost 15 years but never gotten around to. She is a sophisticated and brilliant woman who hails from New Orleans, so I figured King Cajun would be a good choice. I see it as pretty authentic, but I was glad she said the same, without any prompting.

King Cajun Crawfish specializes in seafood boils, messy pots of excess featuring crawfish, shrimp, and crab in savory, spicy broths with potatoes, corn, and Andouille sausage. However, those are so messy, you really have to dress down for a meal like that, or you’ll ruin your clothes. Just an FYI: a meal like that might not be the best choice for a date, unless you’re planning to disrobe later, in case it could end up being an inspired choice. My colleague and I played it safer, selecting with other menu items less likely to splatter, splash, and stain, but for future reference, those seafood boils are delicious, especially if you go with the house specialty “ShaBang sauce” (a blend of their traditional, lemon pepper, garlic butter, and “Rajun’ Cajun” seasonings).

My mentor started out with hush puppies, seasoned dough balls fried to crispy, golden perfection, yet savory and soft inside. These were terrific dipped into some thick, tangy remoulade sauce, and the leftovers heated up perfectly in my toaster oven later that night.

She also ordered a cup of jambalaya, which is a rice dish in a thick, tomatoey sauce with Andouille sausage, chicken, shrimp, onion, and celery. We both liked the little we tried, and I brought the rest home for my wife, who overcame her skepticism and absolutely loved it.

I got seafood gumbo for us to share, which my wife and I both always enjoyed at King Cajun in the past, and this was no exception. My mentor and I requested it at medium heat, because there was hot sauce on the table to punch it up if it was too mild. I could have taken it hotter and been fine, but it was great as is, with plenty of plump shrimp, sausage, chicken, rice, okra, and the “trinity” of Cajun and Creole cooking: onion, celery, and green bell peppers, all cooked in a flavorful roux (stirring flour into butter or some other fat to thicken sauces). Needless to say, we did not roux this day! Gumbo is more like a soup or stew than jambalaya, just in case you have confused them in the past. Both have similar ingredients, but gumbo always has more of a broth, with white rice on the bottom of the cup or bowl.

The hot, fresh French bread at King Cajun is awesome — perfectly crusty on the outside and fluffy, soft, and warm inside. A small loaf, more than enough for two people to share, is only $2. You must get it, whether you order the seafood boil or something else saucy, like gumbo, jambalaya, or crawfish étouffée (for next time). The po’boy sandwiches come on the same bread, but when you order the loaf, it is scored to pull apart easily.

This was the fried oyster platter (my choice), which I thought was only supposed to come with six fried oysters, but it came with far more than six. They were also fried perfectly in a cornmeal batter. I think I prefer raw or charbroiled oysters most of the time, but these were delightful. You can also get them in a po’boy sandwich, but we already had French bread, and I felt like getting some sides.All the fried platters come with two sides. I chose potato salad and onion rings, so long-time Saboscrivner readers know this is also a RING THE ALARM! feature. The potato salad was cool and refreshing, tangy with a little yellow mustard the way Southern potato salads often are. The onion rings were breaded rather than battered, but they didn’t have those jagged crags that cut up the inside of your mouth, and the onions inside were at a reasonable temperature, not molten and scalding. I dipped the oysters and onion rings in the included cocktail sauce, but the remoulade (not pictured) was the best dipping sauce for both.

A side of cole slaw was crispy, cool, creamy, and refreshing, but not too heavy with mayo. Like the potato salad, it was nice to cut all the richness of the fried stuff we had been eating.

And for dessert, you can’t leave New Orleans or King Cajun Crawfish without an order of beignets (pronounced “bin-YAYS”), puffy triangles of fried dough covered with so much powdered sugar, it looks like they just left a bachelor party in Miami… or let’s face it, any party in Miami.
King Cajun Crawfish serves Café du Monde coffee, a New Orleans classic that is an ideal combination with these beignets (especially with condensed milk added), but we both passed. I’m not a coffee drinker, and even I’ll tell you that is some damn fine coffee with its flavoring from the chicory root. Then again, condensed milk makes everything better, and now I’m thinking about requesting some to drizzle over the beignets or dip them in it next time.

This was a long overdue lunch with one of the best people I know, and we could not have picked a better restaurant. It made me happy she liked it and considered it authentic (better than Tibby’s, she said!), and I wondered how and why it had been so long since my last visit to King Cajun Crawfish. Next time I return, I will have to go with a group and dress down to enjoy some boiled crawfish and shrimp in ShaBang sauce without ruining my work clothes. I don’t think that’s too shellfish of a request.

Zorba’s Greek Restaurant

Zorba’s Greek Restaurant (https://zorbasgreekfood.com/) is located at 115 East 1st Street, in the quaint, picturesque, historic section of Sanford, about half an hour north of downtown Orlando. 1st Street is lined with great restaurants (including the beloved Hollerbach’s German Restaurant, Christo’s diner, and the nearby St. Johns River Steak & Seafood), bars, breweries, and cute shops. There is an excellent ice cream parlor (Wondermade, one of my two favorites in Central Florida) and a very cool new food hall, Henry’s Depot, which I recently visited for the first time and will definitely write about in the future. There is a German grocery store (Magnolia Square Market, owned by the Hollerbach family), a shop that specializes in hot sauces and everything spicy (Spice is Nice, which I also plan to review), and a farmer’s market every Saturday. It’s one of the most underrated foodie areas around, so I am thrilled to review another restaurant in the neighborhood that quickly became one of my new favorites. In fact, after two visits, one for dining in and one for takeout, I might go out on a limb and call Zorba’s my favorite Greek restaurant in the Greater Orlando area.

Funny enough, my wife and I ended up there completely accidentally, after first driving to Sanford intending to go to Hollerbach’s on a day it turned out to be closed. We had been passing Zorba’s for years, and since it is mere steps away, we went there instead, and were so glad we did. We were hungry, so we did our usual over-ordering thing, knowing we would have plenty of delicious leftovers to last us for days, which would heat up well at home.

We started out with eggplant garlic spread, which came with warm, soft, lightly grilled pita bread wedges for dipping and/or spreading. I am relieved to report the pita bread was really good, because I hate the Toufayan brand of pita they sell at Publix, near the deli section.

The eggplant garlic spread was savory and creamy, as the menu promised. It was my wife’s idea to order it, but I think it was so garlicky, I ended up liking it more than she did. But it was really awesome, and I would definitely recommend it as a nice starter.

She chose the octopus from the list of mezethakia, or Greek appetizers, to be her main course. We all have our favorite dishes we can never turn down when we see them on menus, and octopus is one of hers. You never know quite how restaurants are going to serve it, but Zorba’s served one large, marinated, char-grilled tentacle with tomatoes, kalamata olives, lemon, and some of the best feta cheese either of us have ever had. I’ve had so much rubbery, chewy octopus that I don’t seek it out anymore the way she does, but she insisted I try it, and it was outstanding — easily some of the best I’ve ever tried anywhere. Really meaty and flavorful, possibly from being tenderized by an acidic marinade that includes vinegar.

Since my wife doesn’t cook, I suggested she order something else that she could eat over the next day or two, once I was back at work. She chose papootsakia, which is really fun to say. The menu describes it as half an eggplant stuffed with seasoned ground beef topped with creamy Bechamel sauce and baked, but as you can see, it looks like they served her a double portion! This was another banger. We both tasted cinnamon in the ground beef, and I suspected they use the same recipe for the moussaka (casserole with ground beef, eggplant, potatoes, and Bechamel) and some other dishes. My wife named this one of the best things she has ever eaten in her life, and she doesn’t toss around superlatives as freely as your friendly neighborhood Saboscrivner!Needless to say, the papootsakia (hehe) lasted her a few days, and like so many saucy, savory dishes, it kept tasting better and better after every day in the fridge.

Just like octopus and eggplant are two of my wife’s “trigger dishes” that she always feels compelled to try anywhere, slow-braised and stewed meats in sauces are one of mine. I noticed Zorba’s offered a lamb shank and a pork shank, both braised and baked in a tomato sauce. I had a hard time deciding between the two, but our patient server suggested I try the lamb shank for my first visit, and so I did. This really is one of my favorite meals, period. I loved the braised lamb shanks at Cappadocia Turkish Cuisine (and listed them as one of my Top Five favorite things I ate in 2018 in Orlando Weekly), and now I’m pretty great at making them myself, using this recipe. Well, I’m happy to say that the lamb shank from Zorba’s is as good as any of the other versions I’ve tried or made, if not better. The tomato sauce is so rich, it really puts it over the top. The meat was fork-tender and so savory and flavorful.The rice pilaf was already soft and buttery, but I mixed all the tomato sauce I could into it, making it even better.

As if that wasn’t enough food, I ordered one of my favorite Greek dishes, pastitsio, which is kind of like Greek baked ziti or lasagna — a baked casserole with layers of seasoned ground beef (with more of that cinnamon) and long, uncut ziti noodles tossed in beaten egg whites and feta cheese after boiling to help the noodles stick together, topped with more creamy Bechamel that browns when baked. It is a delicious, hearty dish that is different enough from the Italian versions that you absolutely have to try it, if you never have had it before. And the pastitsio at Zorba’s is absolutely the best version I’ve ever had. They knocked it out of the park.

It’s so pleasing to the eye too, when the chef gets all the ziti noodles facing the same way, so it creates that honeycomb-like pattern when slices are cut out of it.

All the entrees came with a choice of a lovely Greek salad tossed in a housemade viniagrette dressing with more of that terrific feta (so much better than the kind I’ve been buying at Aldi), or a soup. The salad turned out to be a much more refreshing choice.

The soup was avgolemono, a hearty Greek chicken soup with orzo pasta and lemon. We wanted to try both the salad and the soup, but it’s just too blasted hot to enjoy most soups, here in the hottest summer recorded in human history.

The entrees all come with fresh-baked rolls studded with sesame seeds. It seems like an unnecessary inclusion, but these are really damn good rolls, especially when you have such delicious sauces and juices to mop up. Don’t leave them behind!

And my wife said we couldn’t leave without trying the baklava for dessert, so who was I to argue? It was good baklava, although I have never had bad baklava.

Here’s a look at it with the thin, crispy phyllo dough “roof” removed:

On my second visit to Zorba’s, this past weekend, I brought home the lamb chop lollipops for my wife. I asked for them rare, but they came out closer to medium. These are a lot thinner than the thick lamb loin chops I buy at Costco for roasting, so it was probably harder to rescue these while they were still rare. These were served over more rice pilaf and dressed salad greens.

Since I liked the lamb shank so much last time, this time I ordered the pork shank, which was an even bigger hunk of meat with the bones still in. Like the lamb shank, it was baked to fork-tender perfection in the same rich tomato sauce, over more rice pilaf. I didn’t even eat this until the day after I brought everything home, but I suspect it got even tastier in the fridge overnight. No matter which shank you choose, you can’t go wrong. Zorba’s prepared both perfectly.

I could not help ordering a regular gyro for us to share, just to see how Zorba’s stacks up to other gyros around Orlando. It was really good, with the garlicky, salty lamb slices still tender (some places throw them on the grill after carving them off the spit, drying them out), nice, thick, creamy, garlicky tzatziki sauce, and a properly grilled pita. If you’re in the mood for a gyro in Sanford, you absolutely can’t go wrong. BUT — and this is not a complaint about the quality at all — nobody in the Orlando area makes a better gyro than Mediterranean Deli on Fairbanks Avenue. If they do, I haven’t found it yet.

So that’s Zorba’s Greek Restaurant. If Sanford wasn’t such a schlep from home, we would become regulars for sure. As it is, I’ll still make the trek to bring it home when we’re in the mood, because it is that damn good. You can tell everything is homemade, fresh, and authentic. The service was great when we dined in, and it’s a nice little spot that would be fine for casual family dining, but nice enough to bring a date. There are so many great dining options in Sanford these days, but this is one that may not be as new or exciting or “sexy” as some of the other restaurants along 1st Street. Don’t sleep on it, though. It was one of our favorite discoveries of 2023, and it will probably become one of yours too.

SoDough Square

I recently visited SoDough Square (https://sodoughsquare.com/), a new pizzeria that opened in 2022, for the first time. It was so good, I returned a week later, with a friend and co-worker, and it was just as good on that second visit. The original location for SoDough Square is at 419 Michigan Street, Orlando, Florida, 32806, directly next door and sharing a dining room with one of owner Rob Bair’s other restaurants, Tin & Taco, which I reviewed in early 2019. There are a few Tin & Taco locations around Orlando, and just this past week, a second SoDough Square location opened at 223 Fairbanks Avenue, Winter Park, Florida, 32789, directly next door to another Tin & Taco. Go Rob!

SoDough Square is unique in Orlando because it serves Detroit-style pizza, a unique pizza style that I had never seen in Florida before. These are rectangular pizzas cooked in steel pans, then cut into four or eight slices, depending on whether you order a small or a large. The slices crisp up from cooking in the pans, and the toppings go all the way out to the edge, which I appreciate. Lots of upscale, pricey hipster pizzas seem to be half crust these days, and that just seems like wasted real estate to me. SoDough Square proofs its own dough (fermented for over 24 hours), makes its own tomato sauce, and shreds its own brick cheese blend, which forms a crispy, caramelized crust around the outer edges of the rectangular slices, called “frico.” This results in a thicc slice of pizza, similar to the Sicilian style I love so much, but not nearly as heavy, bready, and casserole-like as Chicago-style deep dish. I’m a convert. I love it! If you have read this far, you probably will too.

At SoDough Square, you place your order on one of two touchscreen monitors and then wait. I was bringing home the pizza to share with my wife, but while I was there, I enjoyed a Detroit coney dog ($5.99), topped with a savory, beanless chili sauce, chopped onions, and yellow mustard. I rarely order hot dogs when I’m out of the house, since I can usually buy a pack of high-quality dogs for the price of one or two from a restaurant, but I will make exceptions anytime I’m near my beloved Arbetter’s in Miami, a Skyline Chili location, and now for the coney dog at SoDough Square. I love trying anyone’s different versions of chili, and if it comes in chili dog form, all the better.
It’s a magnificent combination of flavors and textures. The all-beef dog has a great snappiness from its natural casing, the chili was excellent (far more of a crowd-pleaser than Skyline’s polarizing Cincinnati-style chili that I nevertheless like), and you got a pleasant crunch from the onions. As much as I love mustard (which is a lot), I usually don’t partake in plain yellow mustard, but it brought a necessary acidic brightness to this perfect coney dog that a spicy brown or horseradishy deli mustard would not have been able to duplicate.

That soda pictured above is called Rock & Rye, from Detroit’s beloved Faygo brand, a favorite of Juggalos everywhere. I had no idea what it would taste like, but it reminded me of Big Red soda from Texas, if you’ve ever tried that one, or Barq’s Red Creme soda (a New Orleans classic that is impossible to find in Orlando). Vaguely like cream soda, maybe a bit like cotton candy or bubble gum. More about Faygo later, I promise.

Several of the specialty pizzas sounded good, but the one I’ve been hearing the most raves about and seeing the most tantalizing photos of was the Detroit Rob City ($15.99 for a small or $29.99 for a large), so I ordered a large to bring home. This absolute unit is topped with Detroit red sauce, SoDough’s brick cheese blend, whipped ricotta cheese, pinched sausage (I admit it, I laughed), Ezzo cup pepperoni, Mike’s hot honey, and fresh basil. WOW, what a combination. This was one of the best things I’ve eaten in quite a while. Everything comes together perfectly on this pizza!
The creaminess of the ricotta works so well cutting the saltiness of the sausage and pepperoni and the surprising spiciness of the hot honey. (As a semi-related aside, I bought a different hot honey at Aldi, one of their private label brands that is half the price of Mike’s, but it barely has any heat at all.) And I absolutely love fresh basil on any pizza, which works miracles when combined with the tomato sauce. This is food of the gods, folks.

I also couldn’t resist trying the T&T ($15.99 for a small or $28.99 for a large) for myself, but I knew my wife wouldn’t be into a pizza topped with shredded lettuce, diced tomatoes, sour cream, and crushed Doritos, so I just ordered a small. The tribute to Rob Bair’s Tin & Taco restaurants worked for me, and I was stone-cold sober when I enjoyed it back at home!

I also ordered a small garlic cheese bread for us to share ($8.99 for a small or $16.99 for a large), and it was awesome too. It is made from the same pizza dough, but topped with garlic parmesan sauce, the same brick cheese blend, grated cheese, and fresh basil, with a small dipping cup of the house-made red sauce on the side. Don’t sleep on this when you go! My wife liked it even more than the pizza, which I expected, since she doesn’t like tomato-based sauces as much as I do.

On my second visit with my friend and colleague, who loves pizza as much as I do and hot dogs even more than I do, I ordered us two coney dogs so we could each have one, and we split a small Enforcer pizza ($14.99 for a small or $27.99 for a large), with the same Detroit red sauce and brick cheese blend, pinched sausage, Ezzo cup pepperoni, applewood smoked bacon, pecorino romano cheese, and fresh basil. Very similar to the Detroit Rob City, but personally, I would rather have the ricotta and hot honey than the bacon. Here is my last slice of the Enforcer:

I also got three different Faygo sodas they didn’t have on my first visit. I drank the pineapple orange with my meal, chugged most of the root beer on my way home because it was such a stupidly hot Friday afternoon, and saved the grape for my wife, who said it smelled and tasted like grape bubble gum. (I didn’t taste it, but I thought it smelled just like a grape-flavored candy from the ’80s called Bonkers.) My friend tried the Faygo diet cola, by the way.
I’ve had better sodas, and definitely better root beers, but I’m always happy and excited to taste anything new. All three of the Faygo flavors I tried were pretty artificial-tasting, even by soda standards. But they are $2.49 each, and I don’t think you can buy them anywhere else locally, so why not try something new and different?

My friend and I then walked to John and John’s – A Pizza Shop, conveniently located mere moments away, although the sweat was pouring off my shaved head by the time we walked in there. He had never tried John and John’s either, and I figured I would keep blowing his mind by introducing him to another favorite of mine — my choice for the best New York-style pizza in Orlando. Needless to say, he loved it too, especially the gyro-inspired Mediterranean Blue slice, named for the Greek restaurant that was the previous tenant of John and John’s space. After that, we parted ways, and I went back to SoDough Square to order another cheesy garlic bread to bring home for my wife, since I try to be a mensch.

I admit that the Michigan Avenue location of SoDough Square is a hike from home, so I was overjoyed when I heard about the second location opening on Fairbanks, near Rollins College in Winter Park. But I will warn you right now, stalwart Saboscrivnerinos — the new Winter Park location does not have the coney dogs, so just keep that in mind. That’s a shame, because I can’t envision going there and not getting one of those dogs as a pre-pizza appetizer. But no matter which location you visit, you are going to be treated to some of the best pizza in Orlando, from Detroit with love.

Have you been to SoDough yet? Which pizzas are your favorites, and are you in love with the coney dogs as much as I am? What is the deal with Faygo? Is it something you had to grow up with? Hopefully I haven’t incurred the wrath of the Juggalos over that, but it won’t be my first time, and I doubt it will be the last.

Tight Chips: Over Two Years of Potato Chips

In this new installment of Tight Chips, I will review some of the new flavors of potato chips I’ve enjoyed and discovered over the past two years, since my last chip review roundup. I pride myself on sticking to a budget and keeping my impulse buys and “retail therapy” in check, but one way to sucker me out of a few bucks is to come out with new and weird flavors of potato chips. I always feel obligated to try them, especially five years into this food blog, under the flimsy excuse of “JOURNALISM!” and even “SCIENCE!” I used to be like that with sodas too (especially as a non-drinker), but at least I’ve managed to cut back on those.

But it’s almost July 4th, a time when we celebrate our country’s independence (while hopefully realizing we still have a long way to go to improve things here) and get together with family and friends for cookouts and dangerous explosions, often eating lots of chips. Perhaps this blog entry can serve as a guide for those of you who offer your guests salty, crunchy snacks in between grilling out, drinking heavily, and blowing things up.

I’m going to start with some of my favorite potato chips I’ve ever tried: Zapp’s, out of Gramercy, Louisiana. Zapp’s specializes in thick, crunchy kettle-fried chips with strong, bold flavors. You can usually find them at Wawa, 7-Eleven, Publix, and Winn-Dixie stores, at least here in Orlando.

Zapp’s most popular flavors may be Voodoo and Voodoo Heat, which combine salty, savory, sweet, smoky, and tangy flavors, similar to the Canadian-inspired all-dressed chips I have reviewed before. I give the slight edge to Voodoo Heat, which, as you might guess, is spicier than the delicious but mild Voodoo flavor.

If you like it spicy, but also tangy and sweet, these are awesome.

I must admit preferring the thinner, crispier, Lay’s-style potato chip to Zapp’s crunchier, thicker chips, but Zapp’s has recently started offering its own “Thinz,” which are more like Lay’s, texture-wise, but with the superior Zapp’s flavors. Winn-Dixie carries larger bags of Zapp’s Thinz.

The Voodoo Thinz taste just as good as the thicker kettle chips:

Zapp’s Bourbon Street Smoky Sweet is kind of like a sweet barbecue flavor minus the tanginess of tomato, and they are also really good. I’ve only seen the Thinz version sold around here:

But you can’t go wrong:

Zapp’s Evil Eye is more of a tomato-forward flavor that I like, but not as much as the Voodoo:

But they don’t skimp on the seasoning:

Finally, Zapp’s Cajun Dill Gator-Tators are kind of like a mildly spicy dill pickle flavor, but not overly spicy, so don’t worry. They don’t taste like alligator at all, so don’t worry about that either.

They are one of the better pickle-flavored chips out there, but I will be covering a few more here.

The Voodoo flavor is such a breakthrough hit, other companies have similar versions. Southeastern Grocers, the parent company of Winn-Dixie, has a surprisingly excellent New Orleans Blend potato chip flavor that is thin and crispy like Lay’s and Zapp’s Thinz, and large bags are ridiculously cheap compared to the name brands. They also go hard on the seasoning and are excellent quality.

These are better than they have any right to be:

I only ever see the Dirty brand of potato chips in small bags near the Publix deli (not in the chip aisle). These are thicker kettle chips. My wife likes the plain ones from time to time (she doesn’t share my fascination with flavored chips), but one day I tried the Funky Fusion, and it is essentially the Dirty version of Zapp’s Voodoo flavor. Not nearly as good, though.

Not bad, but they’re no Zapp’s.

All this talk about July 4th cookouts and then the flavors of New Orleans might put someone in the mood for an icy cold, refreshing beer. If you want one, enjoy it responsibly, but I can caution you against bothering with Clancy’s Beer-flavored potato chips, which are occasionally available at Aldi supermarkets. Clancy’s is Aldi’s private label for chips and other salty snacks like pork rinds. Some are great (including Moscow Mule- and Bloody Mary-flavored chips I have reviewed before), but this wasn’t one of the great ones.

They were mostly bland, vaguely earthy-tasting, and incredibly salty, even by potato chip standards. I wouldn’t get them again.

I mentioned Clancy’s Bloody Mary and Moscow Mule-flavored chips, which I enjoyed in the past, but the smoked Kentucky bourbon flavor was another miss from this Aldi store brand.

They tasted a little smoky, but not in a good way, like smoked meat or barbecue sauce. Mostly they just tasted overwhelmingly salty. I used to enjoy Maker’s Mark bourbon, and there is no substitute for the real thing.

To close out the Aldi chip discussion but tie it back to the cookout theme, Clancy’s also came out with a grilled ribeye steak flavor, which I didn’t love either.

These had a subtle “burned on the grill” taste with more overwhelming saltiness and also a peppery flavor, but they sure didn’t taste like steak or any other meat. I think I just don’t care for the “Krinkle Cut” style of ridged chips that much, at least not from the Clancy’s brand. They always taste much saltier to me.

I bet you didn’t realize how classy potato chip flavors have become. Barbecue and beer are one thing, but bourbon and ribeye steak are new. Going beyond that, a Spanish company called Torres makes really upscale chips, including a sparkling wine flavor I recently found at Publix, and another snack company I love, Herr Foods, Inc., out of Nottingham, Pennsylvania, came out with Herr’s charcuterie board-flavored potato chips earlier this year! Forget cookouts, these are the perfect chips for a really fancy soiree or a date!

It’s uncanny how much the Torres chips actually tasted like sparkling wine — sweet, acidic, fruity, sour. It isn’t the most satisfying flavor combination overall, but they are definitely worth a try for those who share my fascination with novelty and weirdness.

And as my longtime readers know, I am a pretty serious aficionado of cured meats. I love that the Lunchables generation has turned charcuterie boards into a thing, but I would rather have my salami, prosciutto, soppressata, capicola, and other delicious deli meats on a sub or hoagie, topped with cheese, vegetables, and condiments, rather than arranged beautifully on a wooden board. But when you don’t have access to either, you probably want to try these new Herr’s chips. They definitely have a delicate, salty, porky flavor, but didn’t taste like any specific cured meat that I could pick out. I should note that I’ve only ever found this Herr’s flavor at Deli Desires, which is one of Orlando’s more underrated spots.These chips did not include any meat in the ingredients, so you’re welcome, vegetarians!

I love Herr’s chips, and being a Pennsylvania-based company, you can always find them at Wawa convenience stores, another Pennsylvania company. My most recent chip finds are these three “Flavors of Philly” Herr’s chips: tomato pie, roast pork sandwich, and Korean BBQ wings.

I tried the tomato pie chips first, inspired by Corropolese Italian Bakery & Deli in Philadelphia. Tomato pie is similar to Sicilian pizza, but the thick, rectangular slices have a sweet tomato sauce and are topped with Romano cheese, but no mozzarella. The closest I’ve found to it in Orlando is the tomato pie at Tornatore’s, which is more of an upstate New York version, but the scachatta at Alessi Bakery and La Segunda Bakery in Tampa is similar to tomato pie, sweet sauce and all, only they have finely ground beef in their sauces. These chips tasted like sweet tomato sauce with a dash of pungent cheese, so they nailed it as best they could.

The roast pork sandwich chips are specifically inspired by John’s Roast Pork, a Philadelphia legend I haven’t had a chance to try, although I did have two pretty amazing roast pork sandwiches when I was there last month. Be on the lookout for that review coming soon. Anyway, these chips were a lot more subtle, with garlic emerging as the main flavor (aside from salt). It’s a delicious sandwich when made well, especially when topped with sharp provolone and bitter broccoli rabe, but much more subtle than an Italian hoagie or a cheesesteak.

What I wasn’t expecting was that Herr’s Korean BBQ wings flavor, inspired by Mike’s BBQ restaurant in Philly, would be the best-tasting chips in this new trio. But I should have guessed, because Korean-style chicken wings kick ass, whether you order them from Hawkers, Domu, Kai Asian Street Fare, or bb.q Chicken.

And Herr’s just keeps on barreling forward with wild flavors. I admit I didn’t think much of these Loaded Tots chips, but it was an ambitious experiment:

There were some interesting flavors present, but I know I couldn’t pick out bacon and cheese and sour cream and chives!

Earlier this year, Herr’s sold new Sandwi-Chips with four “extra bold” flavors, exclusive to Wawa stores, marketed to be put into sandwiches. That’s something I’m going to do if I have a sandwich and chips together anyway, so I took it upon myself to sample all the new flavors, inspired by condiments and sandwich toppings.

Everyone knows I love mustard, to the point where I write a recurring mustard review feature called Cutting the Mustard, so I tried the Herr’s mustard Sandwi-Chips first.

Needless to say, these tasted bright and tangy and acidic, just like yellow mustard. If you’re making a ham, turkey, or roast beef sandwich or a burger, go to town with these. You won’t regret it.

The sweet onion Sandwi-Chips were almost too strongly oniony, compared to a more mellowed-out sour cream and onion flavor.

They were kind of a lot, as my students used to say.

Next up, I had to try the ketchup Sandwi-Chips, because I have always really liked Herr’s regular ketchup chips. That is a popular Canadian chip flavor, but not nearly as popular in the U.S. I’ve never been to Canada, but always wanted to, as I have a fondness for its culture and people, with their reputations for being polite. In fact, several people have thought I, your friendly neighborhood Saboscrivner, am Canadian, between my voice (your guess is as good as mine) and my unfailing politeness. I’ll take it as a compliment, eh?

Anyway, to make this a truly scientific experiment (well, not really), I had to compare and contrast Herr’s original ketchup chips, which I’ve had several times, with the new Sandwi-Chips.

They tasted very similar, and I’m honestly not even sure if I mixed up the photos or not. I’ve always appreciated that the regular ketchup chips are heavily seasoned, and they will definitely turn your fingertips RED. They are tomatoey, tangy, and sweet, and I like them a lot. Always have, always will.

I think the only difference I noticed was that the “extra bold” ketchup chips might have had even more seasoning on them, but I couldn’t discern any unique taste. But I liked both!

Finally (at least for these), Herr’s came out with a spicy pickle flavor of Sandwi-Chips, and they tasted very pickley, as one would expect and hope, but somewhat light on the spice.

They were fine. They would go particularly well on any sandwich or burger where you would normally add pickles, or even if you actually did add pickles.

As long as we’re talking about pickle-flavored chips, I should note that I used to hate pickles, until I embarked on a mission to learn to appreciate pickles by comparing, contrasting, and reviewing a bunch of different pickles.

The pickles that made me a fan were Grillo’s pickles, which I waxed rhapsodic about in that above review, “A Plethora of Pickles.” The Utz Quality Foods company, another snack company with Pennsylvania roots (Hanover, this time), actually created Grillo’s pickle chips, which a good friend shared with me after buying a ginormous bag at Costco.

These are maybe the best pickle chips I’ve ever tried, and I was grateful to not have to buy the whole pillowcase-sized bag of them.

I can’t say I’m the biggest fan of Frito-Lay’s extremely popular Flamin’ Hot flavor, regardless of its heartwarming and/or apocryphal origin story. What exactly does it taste like? HOT. It tastes like hot, and there might be a bit of lime, but maybe that’s all in my head. All the Flamin’ Hot chips (Cheetos, Ruffles, Lay’s, etc.) are fiery, angry red, and sometimes after the fact, other things are fiery, angry red too.

Even though I would have ignored this flavor in the past, when I saw Flamin’ Hot Dill Pickle Lay’s, I had to give them a try.

They weren’t gross like I expected. The sourness and the dill helped offset the intense Flamin’ Hot flavor (like nothing else in nature!), and I ended up thinking these would be good pickles to crush up on a burger or in a sandwich — maybe something that already had real pickles on it. They would be great with some kind of cool, creamy dip, too.

And while we’re still on the condiment-flavored chips, Trader Joe’s offered these Patio chips over the summer of 2021 (and possibly still, although I haven’t looked for them since).

The bag contained a blend of multiple chip flavors: sea salt and vinegar, delicious dill, homestyle ketchup (for all the people who make their own ketchup in a world where Heinz is easily available, cheap, and superior), and smokin’ sweet BBQ. I appreciated this ambitious experiment, but I don’t think any of the Trader Joe’s flavors stood out on their own, and crunching on multiple flavors in the same mouthful didn’t work as well as I would have guessed. If these have since been discontinued, I wouldn’t even be surprised.

As long as we’re talking about pickled things, the Kettle brand makes really tasty pepperoncini-flavored chips, which would be awesome crushed up on an Italian hoagie, a gyro, or a Greek salad, or anywhere else you might enjoy those pale green, mildly spicy pickled peppers.

Keep in mind these are also thicker, crunchier chips. I don’t buy the Kettle brand very much because they only come in large bags, but I’m glad I took a chance with this particular flavor. They really did taste like pepperoncini peppers!

So let’s switch gears now and talk about some more spicy chip flavors, after that flawless segue. Lay’s briefly offered an Adobadas flavor in 2022, featuring chile peppers, tomato, and lime.

They were okay. I only bought one small bag one time, and that was fine with me.

On my 2022 sojourn to the senses-shattering Buc-ee’s, a colossal convenience store that pretty much sums up the American experience and all of its excesses, I bought these “Hot” flavored chips:

And they delivered. They were hot, but not overwhelmingly so. Definitely not “Flamin’ Hot.” I would have preferred some nuance, though.

These Southeastern Grocers Sweet Hot Barbecue chips came from Winn-Dixie, so you know they were cheap. But were they good?

Actually, yeah. I love the sweet, tangy smokiness of barbecue chips, and these packed more heat than most. I still prefer the New Orleans Blend, Southeastern Grocers’ Voodoo knockoff flavor, though.

Have you tried hot honey as a condiment? Mike’s Hot Honey is the main brand, and it has a lot more heat than other companies’ versions. It is awesome on pizza, just FYI. And Utz makes a Mike’s Hot Honey potato chip flavor:

They are sweet and hot, so I guess I like my potato chips like I like my women.

Just in case anyone else cares about such things, Utz owns both Zapp’s and Dirty chips, in addition to its own brand.

Lay’s short-lived chile mango chips were also sweet and hot, but I didn’t care for the flavor combination as much:

This was a one-and-done flavor for me. I love mangos like crazy. I will eat mangos like they’re going out of style, and I’m a sucker for anything mango-flavored. I was excited to find these and disappointed I didn’t love them, but you don’t have to take my word for it!

On a lucky trip to Walgreens (admittedly a while back), I found not one, but two new flavors of Lay’s: Hot Sauce (specifically Frank’s Red Hot, the perfect sauce for classic buffalo wings), and Kettle Cooked Beer Cheese. I like Walgreens because they almost always get new chip flavors first, and unlike Publix, they sell them in small bags, which make me feel much less guilty about eating chips in the first place. What do you get, six or seven chips in these wee bags?

I like Frank’s Red Hot sauce in the first place because it balances the cayenne pepper-based heat with the acidic tang of vinegar, and I love anything vinegary. If you shy away from spicy food and order “mild” or plain wings, you probably won’t like these. But if you do like typical hot sauce flavors, you will be in for a real treat with these chips, especially if you have some good blue cheese dip or dressing to go with them.

The Beer Cheese Lay’s were a lot more subtly flavored. I’ve had real beer cheese before, and it is delicious. A friend in Kentucky assures me it’s a big deal up there, whereas it is a little harder to find around Florida. But these chips didn’t taste too strongly of anything. I rarely regret trying new chip flavors, but I wouldn’t bother getting these again. I haven’t seen them in a long time, so they may already be discontinued.

One more spicy flavor, and then we’re done, if you can believe it! I’m guessing Game Day Chili Lay’s might have been timed to come out around the NFL playoffs and the Superb Owl. I didn’t find them until early March (2021 or 2022?), and I was really surprised to find them at all. These were yet another Walgreens find. I love chili in all its forms, so I was excited to tear into this bag.

This flavor was also a little disappointing, especially given how much I love chili. It wasn’t overly tomatoey, and I didn’t pick up on cheese at all. It wasn’t very spicy either, and nothing about it tasted “meaty.” I’ve already gone on at great length about how I love tomatoey flavors in my chips, but this one was a letdown. At least I didn’t spring for a larger bag.

Well, that’s a pretty good rundown of the new potato chip flavors I’ve tried since 2021 — the good, the bad, and the weird. If you have tried any of these, I want to hear about it. Which ones have you enjoyed? Were any disappointing or gross? What are your favorite chip flavors and brands, especially if I haven’t covered them, and where can I get my hands on some? I might not be an influencer, but if anyone wants to send me chips to review, I would probably graciously accept them!

So enjoy your Fourth of July, stay safe, have something delicious to eat (ideally accompanied by people you like spending time around), and remember to stay hydrated in this insane summer heat, especially if you’re munching and crunching on salty chips.