Review: 4 kinds of Korean Nongshim chips (now available at Xenos)

Not too long ago, I visited the Xenos store in Rotterdam city center and I happened to discover that they were selling Korean chips. They were only 1 euro per pack. Of course, I bought all 4 kinds to try out.

Onion flavoured rings 50 g

These are light, rice puff like, fried onion rings shaped chips with a realistic and rich fried onion rings flavor infused inside the chips instead of sprinkled as a powder on top. I like that it isn't too salty. The flavor somehow reminds me a bit of food from the Burger King. It is my favorite out of the four as it is light on the stomach, but you still get a satisfying feeling that you just ate chips (aka: sinned). It also has less content in a bag, so I can empty a pack of chips, after eating only 50 g and not 200 or 300g like with other chips I can find in the supermarket.

Honey flavored twist snacks - Honey and apple 75 g

These are the hardest snacks of the four. The exterior is close to the hardness of pretzels (not similar in flavor though) and inside, it has a similar rice cracker texture as the other snacks. It has a delicately sweet, mild honey flavor and a faint apple juice end taste (not too sour or sweet). On the outside, it has a glossy and hard coat of honey, which is similar to the glaze that sweet popcorn has. It actually tastes a bit like popcorn, when you chew it longer. I never tried something like this before, so it is a nice change.

Shrimp flavoured crackers 75g

As I am used to the heavy flavored Calbee shrimp chips, I was surprised by the light flavor of these shrimp flavoured crackers. It is not as salty and full of shrimp flavor. But after eating a few more or putting a few in your mouth at once, you do taste the flavors better. However, sometimes I feel like I just ate an unflavored rice cracker. Maybe, they seasoned it a bit too light and missed a few in the process.

Shrimp flavoured crackers - hot and spicy 75 g

At first, I was a bit concerned about the words hot and spicy on the packaging as Koreans can handle a lot of spiciness. But after carefully putting a shrimp cracker - that looked unusually orange/red -  in my mouth, it luckily didn't taste very spicy. It has a sweet chili - shrimp flavor. You just get a short spicy sensation that doesn't linger and it also doesn't make me feel uncomfortable (such as a painful burning sensation or upset stomach). The spiciness brought out the shrimp flavor too.

I am not sure if these will be permanent items in the Xenos stores, but when I went yesterday, I could only find the honey flavored twist snacks and the shrimp flavored crackers - hot and spicy. So if you still want to get these, you will need to be fast. My mom told me that she also found the onion flavoured rings at the Amazing Oriental supermarket, so luckily, I can still buy it if they stopped selling it at the Xenos stores.