🔗 Share this article Look Past The World of Gourmet Cheese: French Potato Chips Are Utterly Decadent. Over the holidays, I found myself in France, a place that seemed on its best behaviour. Elegant, shimmering illuminations, village market booths stacked with remarkably pristine fruits and veggies, and enough cheeses to coat every mile of the Chunnel with arterial plaque. Heaping dishes of lustrous seafood resting on ice seen through steamy café panes. As I watched a extended but civil line of well-dressed citizens picking up their craft Christmas cakes, I mused, with some guilt, that my place of origin, York, that transforms into a contemporary interpretation of a tableau of excess during the festive season with vape pens in festive pie flavours and pre-mixed cocktails, might benefit from several tips. The Sophisticated Front But every bit of “art de vivre” affectation is merely a refined front – France falls victim equally to its most primal cravings as the rest of us. Simply step inside any grocery store and you’ll see. The snack food corridor stands as a monument to decadence, stacked with flavours including blue cheese, chickpea fritter, Flemish stew and *beurre salé* profiles. Who in their right mind tries chips that taste of butter? It’s like a product found at those infamous US state fairs where they submerge butter patties in hot oil. An entertainer has asserted they’re the best crisps she has ever sampled, though she has clearly succumbed to an instance of regional conditioning – after all, her childhood was in that very region. A Global Lawlessness I know the crisp flavouring industry internationally is as lawless and unregulated as Silicon Valley. Nobody seems willing to allow the humble spud to shine on its own, embellished as it should be by a simple, respectful sprinkle of sodium. We have a dubious legacy when it comes to snack tastes across Britain, particularly during the festive period. Recently, it should be remembered, introduced gingerbread Doritos and special-release pastry-and-meat potato snacks. Furthermore, who can erase the memory of that time a major retailer thought “prosecco and winter berry” made for a good idea in a salty crisp? But I thought better from the nation of culinary masters. Where does it end? *Pâté*-flavoured snacks? Cream puff crisps? Gauloises? I must cease, lest I provide inspiration.