PopCorners – White Cheddar

I can’t quite exactly explain why it’s taken me this long to review this. I’ve actually had these before, way back in the time tunnel when these first came out and I was still young, ambitious and had a fire in my heart. When I first had this, I fell in love and at some point fell out of love with it and forgot about it for over a decade. Some things should be left alone and shouldn’t be dug back up, but how bad could these possibly be? Let’s find out.

Opening the bag I am overcome with nostalgia on two fronts – the oh so familiar shape and appearance reminds me of a simpler, more optimistic time in my life. The second is that the smell reminds me of basically any white cheddar seasoning you would have on top of a popcorn. Whoever was the first person to come up with putting cheese on popcorn was smart, but the first person to turn cheese into a powder before dusting it on top of popcorn was the real genius.

The flavour is exactly as I remember and is the quintessential white cheddar seasoning. It’s got the distinct cheddar flavouring, and has that quality to it where it sort of clumps up in your mouth, but in a pleasant way. The chip itself has that popped corn flavour that is hard to describe but you know instantly if you’ve had popcorn. While I am not quite sure what makes white cheddar different from just normal cheddar other than colour, suffice to say the flavour is iconic and it’s exactly as you would expect.

The texture remains unchanged and does not disappoint. It is like the perfect balance between being light, airy, but also crunchy and crispy without being fried. I’d love to learn how these are manufactured, since the texture is the best of so many worlds that it’s hard to imagine being able to replicate this. They sort of remind me of rice cakes that had been compressed down to get rid of the air so it’s not as puffy, but as a trade off get crunchy while still maintaining a bit of airiness to them.

I feel like white cheddar is still my favourite flavour so far, and after all these years it seems that hasn’t changed. Now that I’ve revisited this romance, I may come back for more. By may, I mean try my best not to but ultimately cave to my deep, deep white cheddar addiction. Add on to that a unique and interesting texture and you have a crippling snack addiction.