There’s been a debate for years about, ‘Are Lay’s International flavours are any good?’ – or ‘just some foreign culture’s idea of good?’ But an intrepid You Tuber has taken the plunge and tried some! The Hoffinator’s ranking reveals some true oddities…
The Hoffinator is snack-video king @diewastaken on Instagram. And he pulls no punches. Nor does shay away from challenges others would consider too far beyond the fringe…
Somebody had to do it
Trying all the International Lay’s flavours, that is. And the Hoffinator did it. So we don’t have to… And he’s been kind enough to report on his findings in the video embedded above.
He struggles to ‘be nice’ in his descriptions of some of the farther-out flavours. But I, personally, found some of his on-screen phrasings – and faces – reminded me of a kid tasting straight lemon juice for the first time.
You’ll laugh, you’ll cry…
But you’ll enjoy his in some cases detailed reviews of some really wild chip flavours. Specifically, he starts off with half a dozen Chinese Lays flavours. And his first observation is, “Why would anybody make a seafood-flavoured potato chip?” Gives you an idea of how much (or, rather, how little) he prepared for his international tasting stint.
One of his faves was Garlic Salt. “The golden rule of chips is, if you like it you keep going back for more,” The Hoff-snacker notes. “I’ve gone back for several more bits of this garlic one from China. This is the flavour to beat. I’m giving it an ‘A'”
The early lead…
But that was only minute 2:51 of an 11-minute-plus video. By 3:48, Wasabi was the new leader. At the 7:16 mark, Hoff’s reviews hit their low point: H gave Thai Seaweed an ‘F’. And offered to mail the rest of the bag to the first viewer to comment about it.
The next contender for top spot on Hoff’s international flavours list was ‘Italian Red Meat‘. The pack-age features a large photo of a bowl of what appears to be Bolognaise Sauce. But the label is in Chinese. Nevertheless, Hoff decided it must be Italian and plotted it in the Mediterranean on his Map of the World. ‘Italian Red Meat’, he decided was shaded by Wasabi, but only by the merest millimetre or so.
‘Mexican Chicken and Tomato’ flavoured chips got an ‘A’ from the Hoffinator, at 9:38. ‘Pretty darn good’, but not good enough to challenge wither Wasabi or Italian Red Meat for top spot. Turns out, this ‘Mexican’ flavour is actually from China, too…
‘Western’ exposures…
At the last minute (11:30), Hoff gave ‘Texas Grilled BBQ’ chips a top score, along with Wasabi and Italian Red Meat. But his overall estimate of the TG BBQ flavour was ‘spectacular’. And in the end, he crowned it the king of the International Lay’s chips he reviewed. Alas, Hoff thought they, too, were from the US, in spite of the fact that the main label text is in Chinese…
Canadian ‘Turkey Dinner Flavoured Chips’ rated a ‘solid B’ with the Hoff. He liked them. But I guess they weren’t spicy-hot enough for his seriously-skewed palate.
My take
I was disappointed that The Hoffinator had so little ‘proper’ food knowledge, and based his reviews of a small selection of Lay’s International Chips solely on his own flavour experiences and prefer-ences. His palate skews sharply to the spicy, as his acclaim for he Wasabi and Grilled BBQ flavours clearly dem-onstrates.
And his apparent unwillingness to read the fine print on certain chip bags, for clarification, put him in the embarrassing position of claiming several Asian-market Lay’s flavours came from places far re-moved from their Chinese home.
‘The rest of the story…’
But in closing, I’d like to remind you that, Lay’s produces almost 400 different chip flavours to suit national and regional cultural tastes. “Lay’s (and its sister international brands like Walkers in the UK and Sabritas in Mexico) tailors its portfolio heavily to local palates rather than using a one-size-fits-all approach,” according to Bokksu Market. This promotional magazine for the Japanese Market of the same name takes a much more thorough approach to reviewing Lay’s global flavour catalogue’.
We’re going to bring you a carefully curated digest of their findings, as soon as we can work our way through Bokksu’s 24-screen overview!
~ Maggie J.