This Grocery Store's Potato Chip Is Virtually Tasteless

Major supermarkets offer store-brand products that are a fraction of the price of their name-brand counterparts. While some stores manage to pull off worthwhile dupes, others fall short. Potato chips are just one snack that most grocery brands produce to varying degrees of success. We sampled 16 store-brand potato chips, ranking them on texture and flavor, and determined that Kroger's Crispy and Crunchy Ripples were anything but tasty. 

In every category, Kroger's Crispy and Crunchy Ripples fail. Starting with the ratio of potato to salt. Whether or not tasteless potatoes were used to make these potato chips is up for debate. But, even fresh and flavorful spuds would be no match for the excessive coating of salt that these chips contained. In addition to an intense saltiness, the abundance of oil used to fry these chips left an unpleasant greasiness on our fingers and a bad aftertaste in our mouths. 

While the chips certainly live up to their crispy and crunchy description, Kroger may have taken texture too far as the snack was actually painful to eat. The chips' hard texture and sharp edges destroyed the tops of our mouths and any stray shards tended to jut into our gums as we chewed. This was only made worse with the chip's excessive amount of salt, adding insult to injury.

Although Kroger's Crispy and Crunchy Ripples didn't pass our taste test, other chip varieties under the brand's name achieved higher rankings. For example, Kroger's Kettle Cooked Original Potato Chips weren't overly salty nor oily, and had the perfect level of crunchiness. But, the bubbly and crispy chips still lacked the flavor we hoped for. Kroger's Wavy Potato Chips were our favorite from the brand and, unlike the other two varieties, had a pronounced potato flavor that was enhanced with just the right amount of salt.  

Alternatively, you could seek out another brands available at Kroger for even tastier chips. Kroger's Crispy and Crunchy Ripples are a generic take on the ridged Ruffles, which are more than triple the price. However, Ruffles are worth the extra few bucks if you actually want a flavorful chip — we've even ranked 12 Ruffles chips flavors from worst to best for you. If you're willing to venture beyond Kroger, Walmart's Great Value Ripple Potato Chips won first place in our chip ranking, and is around 50 cents cheaper than Kroger's Ripples.

Should you find yourself with a tasteless bag of Kroger's Crispy and Crunchy Ripples, you can always repurpose them. Since they're super salty, you can use them as a crunchy seasoning to sprinkle over a creamy soup. In fact, you can infuse the chips with more potato flavor by using them as a garnish for any one of our 14 comforting potato soup recipes.