I like to think everyone has one or two fields that they are experts in. Now this isn’t practical, career based things. It’s things with little to no value beyond the realms of fun. I like the realm of fun.

I asked around twitter and a few things came up

• X Files
• Fabric Textures
• Spiderman Comics
• Making Tea
• Photoshop
• Buffy
• Making Popcorn
• Cheese and Onion Pasties
• Obscure Cutlery and Etiquette
• Eating a Whole Big Bag of Haribo Tangfastic in One Quick Sitting
• The Availability of Twirls in London (http://londontwirls.blogspot.com/)
• The Circumstances of My Sneezes (http://www.sneezecount.joyfeed.com/)
• Sugarcraft
• Playing Spy on TFC (Team Fortress Classic)

I was having a chat with Sam and the course of discussion turned to sampling free products for market research and it triggered a memory of the one time I was taste tested. Even though I’d forgotten it, I remember it like it was yesterday.

This was during my college years at plucky old Barton Peveril. Barton Peveril is in Eastleigh, a thorough toilet of a town near Southampton. We would often go to the town centre during our free periods to mooch about. There was nothing really there to do except eat and wait but it beat doing that at on campus.

Whilst plodding around we were approached asking us if we’d like to try a new kind of crisp. Being bored we of course agreed and were whisked to an open plan room full of people being interviewed with plates of crisps in front of them.

The crisps they were testing were Bugles. This was the early 00’s (remember them?) and they were about to launch. The wiki says they now sell over here but I rarely see them anymore and avoid them like the plague if I do, which is the point I’m meandering towards.

When I was interviewed I was asked to pick my favourite flavour, I picked Salt & Vinegar, my weapon of choice. Now the Bugle people hadn’t really considered what they were contending with, for you see

I am an expert on Salt & Vinegar crisps

I shall illustrate this with what went down and then elaborate on some further theories I have. They made 2 errors:

1. Putting their weight behind an inferior crisp
2. Taste testing it against two heavyweights of the s&v crisp world

With regards to point 1, I think we all know this by now but I shall declare

Bugles are rubbish

They’re far too wheaty. This means the crisps taste like nothing but wheat and any flavour they have been imbued with is absorbed by said wheat making them a weak effort. A vague whiff of salt & vinegar when I want the flavour to knock my block off.

I could probably handle the banality if the competition wasn’t so fierce. They let me try two bad boys, Quavers and Discos.

I couldn’t find a picture of Quavers as I think they maybe now lost to the pantheons of crisp history…crisptory. Though I think they maybe multipack only. This would be a shame as the Cheese Quavers are horrible.

Anyway, Salt & Vinegar Discos are still going strong and are bold, bloody powerful though also a little dry. That said they were more than enough to beat the pathetic Bugle.

Now they didn’t give the names of these crisps but I’m an expert, I could pick em off a mile away.

When asked for my opinion, I was blunt. I can’t remember exactly what I said, but I know it was scathing about the poor quality of the Bugles, I was quite enjoying telling them just how crap their crisps were and I left them with a lot to think about. The crisps didn’t change.

There’s only one thing that could be possibly going through your brain now

So Mr Smarty Pants, what is the best kind of Salt & Vinegar crisp?

I’ll tell you and less of your lip thank you very much. Novices among you might assume I’d pick something twatty like Kettle Chips. Bleurgh, no. The vinegar is far too sweet and the crisps themselves are too big. It shows a complete lack of understanding and an arrogance for which I have no time. Fuck off Kettle Chips and all your brethren of presumptuous garbage.

Now.

There are a few contenders but I know my favourite. Discos are quite good but as I said quite dry. Some people like dry crisps which I can fully understand, live and let live.

If you’re looking for a dry salt & vinegar crisp, you can’t say fairer than these.

Of course! Square crisps.

I swear by these when I’m feeling dry. Sharp, robust and full of flavour. They are a joy eaten out of the packet or made into a sandwich. I would usually get Squares in multipacks, eat all the Salt & Vinegar, trundle through the admirable Cheese & Onion and then trudge through the frankly boring Ready Salted.

Though they are not the best Salt & Vinegar potato crisp adventure that you can take your taste buds on. That honour is reserved for

Here it stands. The king of crisps. Chipsticks.

The maize and potato snack, made for us by the crisp gods to stave of lingering hunger with a brand of flavour second to no bastard. Layered with delicious oily, vinegary stuff, stands this monolith of snack food.

Dry crisps lack of oil means it lacks the full punch that only Chipsticks can bring.

Take yourself on a roller-coaster ride of flavour as you shove 5 in your mouth at once, getting grubby fingers before digging out the lumps of maize caught in the bridge of your mouth. Heaven.

So there you go, that’s my field of expertise as I see it. You might not agree, but hey, you’re wrong.

There’s only one thing left to ask, what’s your area of expertise?