Doritos Ultimate Garlic Parmesan

 

Product circa: July 2026

Part of Doritos' semiquincentennial recognition.  Because garlic and parmigiano cheese are so American?

Anyway, LMAO - these taste shockingly like Doritos Cool Ranch, with perhaps a bit more garlic, and maybe the sour cream is a bit more "aged" to be cheese-like.  But the DNA is still Cool Ranch, through and through.  How disappointing and hilarious.

Herr's Jalapeno Cream Cheese and Hickory Barbecue

 

Products circa: July 2026

Labeled "United" and "Liberty", these are semiquincentennial products, this time Philadelphia-coded as "Flavored 4 Philly".  I have no idea how these flavors relate to the city, but Herr's is known as a fantastic regional brand located not far from it.

Jalapeno Cream Cheese: Essentially a sour cream & onion flavor, with a greenery amped up a bit by green chile, and perhaps the sour cream powder goes a bit deeper in flavor so as to be "cheese".  The heat builds up just a bit after a couple bites.  Not bad, but I won't remember these.

Hickory Barbecue: It starts as your typical barbeque flavor, but it's clear that the hickory here as a much more deep and woody flavor than your average chip.  One of the best bbq chips I've had to date.

Herr's Kettle Cooked Mozzarella Sticks & Marinara

 

Product circa: 2025-2026

Despite having tomato powder in the ingredients list, it's largely undetectable.  That leaves the expected mélange of Italian seasoning, but somehow this mix nails the seasoning that's traditional in the batter of fried mozzarella, and the taste of these is reminiscent of the real thing.  In the end, however, it's unremarkable.

Doritos 3D Crunch Chili Cheese Nacho

Product circa: 2022

These are a "re-release" of the original Doritos 3D from 1998.  I indubitably remember the originals from 1998, and these are completely different.

The originals were indeed tortilla chips that were somehow inflated during the cooking process, and the texture was sublime.

This version is more of a corn snack than a tortilla chip - think the texture of Bugles.  With that said, these are tasty.  The texture in the mouth is very pleasant, and the cheese flavor is good.  There isn't a heavy hand with the "chili" seasoning. 

 

Lay's Cheetos (potato chips)

Product circa: 2021 and intermittently after

These indeed have the same seasoning on them as Cheetos snacks.  Unfortunately, the seasoning isn’t nearly as good on potato chips.  It’s that simple.

 

Lay's Cheesy Buffalo Dip, Loaded Nachos, and Hot Sauce Potato Chips

 

Products circa: autumn 2025

 

As NFL season 2025-2026 is upon us, Lay's released these 3 new varieties.

 

Cheesy Buffalo Dip - A fairly simple experience.  Ultimately, the chile flavor isn't very detectable, and the heat is quite modest, and so these end up tasting like cheesy chips with a significant zing of acid.  I wouldn't reach for these again.

 

Loaded Nachos - A hodge podge of typical seasonings all thrown together.  The cheese is well tempered by a mix of savory flavors like onion, garlic, cumin, and coriander.  It tastes like a muted taco meat seasoning.  There is also jalapeno and bell pepper powder here, which I always enjoy.  There's a bit of heat that will trail at the end, as well.  But overall, all the flavors are quite muted.

 

Hot Sauce - A very well done simulacrum of hot sauce.  Heavy on vinegar, heavy on chile, which occasionally tastes like Tabasco, though I doubt they used fermented chiles in this.  I swear they used a bit of cheese powder to make these taste a bit creamy, but it's not in the ingredients list.

Pringles Cheeseburger

Product circa: 2016 and intermittently after

One of the shining examples on how junk food is made to taste like complex cuisine, and cheeseburgers are often the subject of these successes.  Individually, your tongue with detect distinct flavors of charred beef, cheese, onion, mustard, and pickle.  Add to this a very salty delivery, and it's one of the best potato chips (if you can call it that) that I've ever tasted. 

Lay's Cheddar Jalapeno

 

Product circa: 2020 (and later?)

Note: This is a Presumptive Ephemeral Nom

Evidently this product was a joint with John Legend?

I gotta be honest, I think most Lays varieties with cheese fall flat.  This one is no different.  You’ve got your normal cheese seasoning, and this has some added heat, along with a vaguely vegetal flavor that I’ve tasted before as trying to simulate jalapeno.  But when you squint your eyes, it’s just cheese potato chips, and forgettable.

Funyuns Spicy Queso

 

Product circa: 2023

Disappointing, overall.  There is cheese powder added to these, and they are notably spicy.  There are flecks of herbs on the "chips", but I cannot taste them.  In fact, these are pretty low on flavor.  It's almost like these are under-seasoned and could use more salt, though I'm sure the sodium of this product is already sky-high.

Doritos Late Night Loaded Taco

 

Product circa: 2025

I'm fairly certain that this product was released many years ago, but I can't recall if I tried it back then.

A fairly complicated mix of many different flavors.  There is no meat in the ingredients, but there is cumin, coriander, onion, and garlic, which do a pretty decent job at simulating the flavor of the type of seasoned ground beef you'd find in tacos.  There is tomato powder in this, but I don't taste it.  I do, however, get a bit of the regular cheese powder thrown in here as well.  Very good!

Doritos Late Night Sizzlin' Cheeseburger

 

Note: This is a Presumptive Ephemeral Nom

Product circa: 2025

Though I never posted it on this site, some 15+ years ago I recall having this same product.  It was a revelation.  Each component of a cheeseburger could be parsed from the taste of the product: beef, cheese, tomato, onion, mustard, pickle, and even lettuce.

While I commend that this product actually has beef in the ingredients list, this still doesn't quite measure up to the older version.  At first bite, the beef, cheese, and pickle immediate produce the cheeseburger "vibe".  Aside from the additional onion, and perhaps mustard, that's where this product stops.  It's still delicious, though.

Pringles Philly Cheesesteak

Note: This is an Presumptive Ephemeral Nom.

Product circa: autumn 2024

No beef flavoring here, like usual, and instead it is mimicked by yeast powder.  The central flavoring on these chips is a sharp American cheese, which is impressively pungent.  This is followed up by onion, and that's about all for this simple experience.  The outstanding American cheese, however, makes these quite interesting.

Herr's Philly Cheesesteak Potato Chips

 

Product circa: autumn 2024 (for football season?)

My skepticism of this product was corroborated by the ingredients list.  As expected, these have no meat flavoring in them whatsoever.  In fact, at this point, most sandwich-flavored snacks can safely be assumed to be sandwich toppings-flavored ones.

At first taste, these seem to be mostly a copy of the "sour cream & cheddar" genre of chip.  If you concentrate, however, you can get some added onion powder.  And eventually I realized that the cheese flavoring on these is exceptional, with a deep, aged, and vibrant flavor.  They're also noticeably oilier and saltier than normal.

These are perhaps the best cheese-flavored chips I've ever had, but they taste nothing like a cheesesteak.

Doritos Ultimate Cheddar

 

This limited time item is easy to miss, as its flavor doesn't necessarily seem very unusual.

First taste is intensely savory, the ingredients list revealing both tomato, onion, and garlic powder.  The cheese then takes over, but it's not intense.  Once again, the ingredients list tells that cheddar, monterey jack, and swiss cheese powders are involved here, though I don't think you're going to pick any of them out.  Honestly, the cheese flavor here is way too subtle, and left me wishing I had some original Nacho Cheese instead, with its sharp cheese wallop.  This was almost in 2-NOM territory, but I had to go low.

Doritos Ultimate Cheddar:- Passable

Original Doritos Nacho Cheese(for comparison):- Good

Doritos Jumpin' Jack

Doritos rolled out another limited edition flavor along with their continually-iterated Sour Cream & Onion.  This newbie is called Jumpin' Jack, and it has its own branded emblem and everything!

Let's face it: pepper jack cheese is freaking delicious, so much so that it should be incorporated to all of our favorite foods; it was simply a matter of time until this product was created.  Granted, Doritos already has several examples of its attempts in combining cheese, chiles, and spices (as does Cheetos and Fritos, for that matter), so this really isn't a new idea.

Whatever they changed this time, they got it right.  The flavor powder dusting on the chips looks lite, but these pack as much flavor as any Doritos mainstay.  Put a bit too simply, these taste like a spicy combination of the brand's flagship flavors Nacho Cheese and Cool Ranch.  I actually crushed a handful of both the former and the latter and ate it with a spoon out of a bowl to see how right I was, and I wasn't far off.

The lady of the house commented that the cheese in the mix tasted a bit like plastic cheese.  I think that's her way of articulating the difference between this snack's light, young, and overly-creamy cheese flavor, as opposed to the fairly aged flavor of Nacho Cheese's seasoning.  And this cheese character invokes Monterey Jack surprisingly well.

Said creaminess on the tongue is cut by "spices"-- like onion, garlic, cumin, maybe coriander-- and chile, most of which is clearly jalapeno.  It doesn't get more complicated than that and there's not much more to say, but the balance in the seasoning is immaculate.  You'll keep reaching for these until they're gone.

These are just a hair away from 4-NOMs.


Doritos Jumpin' Jack:- Great
Original Doritos Nacho Cheese(for comparison):-Great

Lay's Do Us a Flavor

 

 

Lays has pulled a DEWmocracy-like move and has issued three limited time wacky flavors so that consumers can vote one of them into permanence. 

I often denigrate brands for not embracing creativity enough when it comes to limited time offerings, which is a time when truly wild ideas can be tested; too often marketers attempt to strike a balance between creativity and profitability, in my opinion.

In the case of these three varieties, while they certainly didn't lack creativity, I think they might have lacked finesse.

Chicken and Waffles: Easily my favorite of the three, this attempts to recreate the real-yet-odd southern American dish chicken and waffles.  While I prefer my chicken and waffles with the savory gravy or butter option, Lays opted to go full-wierd and use the maple syrup-topped version as their inspiration.  Although I usually dislike maple syrup, and I admit that McDonald's McGriddles is one of the most disgusting things I've ever had, these chips are pretty good.  They claim to have chicken flavor on them, but I don't taste it.  Instead, it seems that Lays attempted to invoke a chicken broth flavor with onions, garlic, and thyme.  Over this savory mix are notes of maple syrup and, while strange, it works.  They really missed the chance to make this stuff taste like chicken, though.  Chicken in a Biskit has been flavoring their crackers with full-on chicken bullion for years, and they're really great.  Anyway, would I buy these chips regularly?  I'm not sure yet.

Cheesy Garlic Bread: Cheesy garlic bread sounds like a lovely potato chip idea until you open the bag and realize that the cheese they used here is in the orange American cheese style.  Yes, instead of using an asiago- or parmesan-inspired powder, like the kind that might go onto a Mediterranean flavor, Lays has gone with possibly the same powder that they use for their Cheddar and Sour Cream chips.  This seems like an odd choice, since I doubt many people have had orange cheese on their garlic bread.  In kind, the flavor also doesn't really work on the chip.  While not bad, the flavor combinations seem misplaced.  The only thing saving this snack is the garlic flavor, which not only is firstly reminiscent of a simple garlic powder, but they somehow managed to secondly invoke the sweet taste of roasted garlic, which adds a bit of intrigue that I can't ignore.

Sriracha: What the hell?  Nothing about these remind me of sriracha.  In brutal honesty, it seems like Lays took the Cheesy Garlic Bread chips above and sprinkled on hot sauce and vinegar.  Looking at the ingredient list, it uncannily proclaims that both cheese and sour cream powders are on these chips.  What's worse, instead of mimicking the not-too-vinegary, sweet, smooth flavor of sriracha, these chips contain a biting and pointed acidity, with a hot sauce note that's highly similar to the aged pepper sauce flavor of Tabasco.  While orange cheese and Tabasco don't exactly taste bad together, the combination is very unsettling, and in no way mimics what's on the front of the bag.

What's my vote for this contest?  Chicken and Waffles.


Lay's Chicken and Waffles:- Good
Lay's Cheesy Garlic Bread:- Passable
Lay's Sriracha:- Passable
Original Lay's(for comparison):- Great

Acquired: Giant