lesser evil krinkle sticks

When I saw these on sale from my primary grocery source these days, Amazon.com groceries, I made an impulse buy. I was jonesin’ for some crunchy, salty snack food. Of course the frustrating part about satisfying cravings via internet shopping in Africa is that it takes three weeks for your poison to arrive. By the time my Lesser Evil Classic Seasalt Krinkle Sticks arrived, I’d forgotten that I’d wanted a crunchy, salty snack. (And because Amazon sells in bulk, I had something like twelve little packs to get through before allowing myself another crazy impulse buy.)

Now, if I had taken a bite and discovered they tasted just like Pringles, I would have instantly fallen back in crush with salty, crunchy snacks. But for a product that calls itself “Seasalt,” it wasn’t salty enough. I kind of liked the natural potato flavor though. The crunchiness… it was a satisfying first bite, but ended up getting chewy and stuck in my teeth.

As for the “Lesser Evil” gimmick… it’s still snack food, not health food. For some reason it’s not simple enough to have potatoes, salt, and oil on the ingredients list. Ingredients include: potato flakes, potato granules, potato starch, salt, annatto coloring, sunflower oil, maltodextrin, sea salt, garlic powder, onion powder, white powder. They claim to have 75% less fat than “regular” potato chips, they have 110 calories per serving, and they are cholesterol free and gluten free. I guess the lesser evil part comes in because all potato chips are bad for you, these just aren’t as bad.

And I’m a potato chip fiend. But I’d rather have less healthy chips that are just a tad tastier. And I do prefer chips to sticks.

I’m almost through my 12 packs. I aim to be finished with them by the time my next impulse purchase arrives.

Lesser Evil snacks are available directly from their website and from Amazon.com groceries. They are also sold at Target, Whole Foods, and Safeway. They have potato sticks and kettle corn varieties. (I don’t care for kettle corn, so I’m not going to try it.)