Barbara’s – Baked White Cheddar Cheez Puffs

While I love to test my jaw strength with crunchy, harder snacks, I can full appreciate the lighter things in life like a good cheese puff or cotton candy. My brain is weird in that it tends to associate things that require chewing and energy to consume to be more satiating or filling, and things that just sort of melt in my mouth to not be as filling. Obviously this isn’t the case, but my brain is like any others – it believes what it wants. But my brain also has an insatiable curiosity for anything snack related so here we are.

Barbara’s is a relatively new and smaller company that started in the 70’s mostly selling cereals and later on snacks that are aimed at being healthier alternatives to some of the mass market stuff. I’ve mentioned before that I don’t tend to pay too much attention to the health stuff, but having tried some of their other products, their snacks hold their own in the taste and texture department, regardless of their ingredients.

For what it’s worth, these are made with real white cheddar cheese, and uses non-GMO corn. As I always say, these are just nice to haves, the real thing that matters to me is taste. Ok that’s not entirely true, but what I’m trying to say is that for all the cool back end stuff like quality ingredients etc., the most important thing is if these are tasty. If they aren’t, nothing else will convince me to buy these again which I feel is the best way to determine whether a snack is worth it or not.

These are pretty addictive. The texture can be a bit weird to some, since the normal, or classic cheese puff isn’t baked, but fried. The fried ones tend to be softer and melt in your mouth easier, where as these are a bit less melty and a bit more Styrofoam like. At first I thought they were slightly stale cheese puffs, but I then remembered that these are baked and that affects the texture. It’s not noticeable enough that it bothers me, as I find it leaves them feeling less “dry” then the fried ones. Now that I think about it, they kind of remind me of Corn Pops cereal in it’s texture.

The flavour of these is a more natural, but equally satisfying white cheddar. While most white cheddar seasonings taste very distinct and sharp, this one tastes more mild but also tangy which is quite refreshing. Part of what makes these addictive is they don’t feel heavy in either texture or flavour, so you can end up eating handful after handful, after handful, after handful…They also benefit from a lighter flavour and don’t leave too much of an aftertaste. These are what I consider the most dangerous type of snack – one that doesn’t satisfy you very quickly, but light enough that you can keep eating and eating before realizing you’ve finished the entire bag and are still craving more.

I would definitely do these again, but probably have to restrain myself from buying more than one bag at a time. If history is any indication, it’s not safe to have these near me once the bag is open and I’ve had a taste for it. Like a starving vampire that catches a whiff of a nearby hospital.