This Golden Bag Is Filled with the Best Potato Chips I Have Ever Tried
Recently, I went through a moment of profound food malaise. I shut the door to our pantry with a decisive bang, turned to my long-suffering husband, and announced, “I don’t think I like potato chips anymore.”
He didn’t gasp, as I expected, but instead, began offering solutions: “What about kettle chips? Or that Cajun crawfish flavor you couldn’t stop talking about? The giant Costco bag you made us buy just a few days ago?”
Sadly, I shook my head. There was nothing to be done. I’d tired of the grease, the familiar flavors (one does not spend 30-something years sampling the aisles without some ennui, I guess), the molar-sticking. I resigned myself to the fact that my snack repertoire would now remain chip-less.
Then, on an auspicious and sunny day, as I browsed my local Korean market, I came across a little golden bag that I hadn’t yet tried: Haitai Honey Butter Potato Chips. I bought them — as my Hail Mary to chips. Then, as I waited in creeping traffic on the way home, I reached into the bag. I took a bite. And when I tell you that the angels began singing a song of summer and starch, I am definitely exaggerating, but also a little serious in my claim that these chips are a revelation to my potato-starved soul.
Honey butter has been a favorite flavor ever since I was a hostess at my hometown’s Outback Steakhouse, sneaking bites of brown bread slathered with the secret, off-menu condiment (you can definitely ask for honey butter from your Outback server!). But in chip form? I hadn’t considered the possibility.
Buy: Haitai Honey Butter Potato Chips, $2.29 for 2.12 ounces at Instacart
These chips remind me of kettle corn, in that they are 85% sweet, with just a small aftertaste of salt. They’re fried in palm oil, so there’s a slight coconut-y taste that I find extremely compelling. And underneath all that is a richness that only butter can add. Each chip is perfectly sliced — not too thin and not too thick — and has a nice, light texture. No slick of oil after you eat a handful. It’s carnival food, the kind you catch in your mouth while strolling past neon lights and the thwack of beanbags against plywood.
Sitting in the driveway at home, I texted no less than three people about the honey butter potato chips. (I might have even taken a selfie with them.)
Okay, I’m about to change your life.
Can I send you a bag?
Praise be: I’m no longer in a potato chip rut.
The last text was to my husband. He sent, anticlimactically, a thumbs-up emoji. I went back and bought three more bags for future snacking, and have plans for a long, happy future with my new favorite chip. Until the next existential snack crisis.
Do you have a rut-ending snack you recently bought? Tell us in the comments below.