Friday 4 October 2013

Zweifel Original Provençal Crisps

Another superb crisp from Swiss company Zweifel.

Usually crisps have a golden roast potatey look or are more strongly coloured with paprika. I always imagine these are green which you might suppose would be an off-putting thought, but not a bit of it because that's how they taste. Only, they aren't green at all. Just ordinary potato crisp colour with lots of herby bits. It's all the herby green yumminess that gives the yummy herby Provençal taste.

In addition to the parsley, rosemary and thyme (sadly no sage so not quite song lyric ingredients), we have coriander and turmeric and a hearty wack of garlic so the taste packs quite a punch. It may sound a little strange but the taste is very real. Some crisps are, you know, yummy but fake tasting.

So, you know how some things somehow seem just right and you cannot hope to better them?

  • My lovely Russell & Bromley boots in black kid and black suede that fitted perfectly and I wore them until they fell apart.
  • My favourite purple cashmere cardi with the frills that's just the right thickness and I really really need to mend it before that falls apart too.
  • The Victoria's Secret bras I bought in the 1990s - red, purple and dark green. A great design: fabulous fit with lovely wide satin straps and no scratchy lace.
  • Or maybe the best ever Wiener schnitzel with frites followed by the most fabulous apricot ice cream with whipped cream: step forward Les Premiers Pas winner of my personal award for reliability and deliciousness in a restaurant. Except when they try to convince us to eat fennel; désolé, mais je déteste le fenouil.
  • Or what about going to see Star Wars (as we called it in those days) on 27 December 1977, the day after it opened in London, and again the very next day because it was simply the most amazing thing I had ever seen. It's called Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope these days of course (what kind of name is that?) and has been digitally "improved", but you can't take away that perfect moment when the Imperial spaceship cruised over the top of our heads for the very first time.
  • Even finding the perfect loo roll holder that doesn't fall of the wall all the time, doesn't tip downwards so the loo roll falls off, and doesn't require some sort of engineering qualification to change the roll.
All brilliant things that I'd buy again or do again if I could.

The loo roll holder sounds a bit mad I know, but when I was younger it was one of my special talents to pull them off the wall. Not on purpose! it was something that just happened to me. It was usually in a school friend's house so I had to own up to the parents I scarcely knew. And I pulled ours at home off the wall so often my mother refused to fit another. So anyway, when we were doing up the bathrooms here I made a big fuss about buying the right loo roll holders which would cope robustly with my cack-handedness.
Best ever loo roll holder from John Lewis
And hurrah! just for the moment you can still buy Zweifel Original Provençal flavour crisps. So take advantage of the opportunity to try some of the best crisps ever.

Just don't eat the whole packet all at once. You will be tempted.

Very very good and highly recommended. Available all over Switzerland, possibly in Germany and Italy too.

You can still eat at Les Premier Pas if you happen to be in the neighbourhood. Don't let them force you to eat the vegetable from outer space if you don't fancy it.
Best crisps I've ever tasted (so far)

4 comments :

  1. Hope you will get this. WHERE did you get the bag? Do they still make this flavor? I remember a CURRY flavored chip. Any recollection of curry? This is the only reference I have found to Zweifel chips and Switzerland. Thanks!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes! they still make this flavour. Yes, we bought a packet just the other day. Every Swiss Co-op I have visited sells them as does the little shop at Sion railway station. And I expect you can find them in other Swiss shops.
      I have tried lots of fancy Zweifel varieties but in the Original crisp range: Nature (salted), Paprika, Spicy Tomato and Moutarde. You can find reviews of all these on this blog.
      Thanks for the comment.

      Delete
  2. I was there in November but the packaging is much different. I remember the orange bags. I regularly mailed bags of the curry chips to a friend in Australia . . I will have to look the next time I am over there. I DID come home (Nashville) with LOTS of Migros chocolate bars (my favorites are Giandor and Frigor) and the lovely little very cheap kitchen knives, also from Migros. I lived a few years in Grindelwald when we ONLY had a Coop. Had to go to Interlaken for Migros which took nearly the entire day as it was at the opposite end of the town to where the train (covered on my ski pass) station was - Interlaken Ost. I miss living in Switzerland! Thanks for the reply!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The orange bags are for the Paprika flavour. Provencal is still bright green.
      I was at Interlaken Ost last week. We went to Mayeringen and took a paddlesteamer on the Brienzersee. Great fun. And some years back we had dinner at Grindelwald. I think the restaurant might have been called the Kreutz und Post?

      Delete