Wednesday, July 27, 2011

Sublime, meet Ridiculous

First, the sublime: Zapp's Voodoo Gumbo kettle-cooked potato chips. I bought these strictly because the name and label were irresistible. In fact, they are loaded with all sorts of awful ingredients (including my personal favorite, MSG) and tasted pretty much like any other "flavored" potato chips, which is to say vaguely sugary with paprika and salt. Thank god the Boy was home or I would have eaten the entire bag of crack I mean chips by myself, in one sitting.



Next, the ridiculous. I was at Safeway to acquire cheap club soda, so I decided to pick up sharp cheddar for quiche while I was there (more on the quiche later).

I discovered that most of Safeway's cheese is inedible. It is rubbery, and, when prodded with a finger, bounces happily back like a squeezed nerf ball. GROSS. So I headed to the "gourmet" cheese display. There I found a selection of exactly the same cheeses, dressed in their Sunday best. These cheeses are in fact Lucerne (Safeway's everyday brand) repackaged as Primo Taglia (Safeway's upscale brand, designed to look Italian - and marked up 200% or so). Unsurprisingly, these fakers still fail the nerf-poke test.

So, why not try a non-Safeway brand? Because at Safeway, eight ounces of Canadian cheddar will set you back $14. That's right kids, $28 a pound. USD. And it's either that or Safeway brands. So I left.



(PS - I went to the local and got organic cheddar from Marin County for $5 a pound, and it was awesome.)

2 comments:

  1. I got those Voodoo chips along with my vegan "tuna" melt at Gestalt a while back. I agree, they taste like any other chip (pretty darned good when you don't normally eat chips), and it was 100% the packaging that sold me on them. So funny that two savvy marketing chicks such as ourselves still fall for this stuff over making a healthier decision. Oh well, a little msg every now and again ain't gonna kill us! ;)

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  2. The dude at the market told me the only reason THEY bought them was for the packaging, too! They normally only stock local/organic/healthy stuff but he got sucked in buy the little voodoo dolls.

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