The Demise of Lays Potato Chips

Sooo.

My sister and mom and I are sitting around eating Mike's Subs and Lays potato chips, and since there were a couple of bags of potato chips open (we had some left over, some new ones, different size bags), my sister was eating out of one and my mom and I out of another. My sister made some faces and declared that her bag tasted awful.

"It tastes rancid! When are these from?" She checks the date. "No, they're still good. What the hell is wrong with them? You try one and tell me if I'm crazy."

I tried one, and then another, and no, she wasn't crazy, they tasted bad. Like a bag you had sitting around for a while, and not like Lays either, like a cheap off-brand you had to get that has little burnt bits and greenish chips and stuff. And there [i]were[/i] brown chips and yucky-looking ones in there! This after I had just had a long conversation with someone about how amazing it is that (Lays) potato chips are so perfect and fresh and crisp and gorgeous all the time, and I didn't understand how they did it. I thought I saw something on the Food Network about how a beam of light was passed over each chip and the yucky ones were dropped out, but I think those were Utz chips. At any rate, these Lays one simply didn't make the grade. But the ones my mom and I were eating tasted fine, normal. So my sister started eating those.

Of course, I was fascinated by the grossness of the other chips, so I started eating those, dissecting the taste, examining each chip (although I usually examine my chips---like fries, I like certain shapes and textures better than others, and I eat those first). But something was up with these chips, I decided. I looked at the date again, sure I'd see that they went bad in May and my sister just wasn't caught up with her months yet. And there it was. Made with [i]sunflower oil[/i].

Oh my gosh! Made with sunflower oil. Mystery solved. How did we end up with the sunflower oil one, though? we wondered. Must have just gotten it by mistake. So the next time we were at A & P, we looked at the label. And there it was. All over. On every bag. All of them made with the foul sunflower oil. Catastrophe! We were able to find one of those huge party-sized bags that was still made normally, but sure enough, Lays is changing all of its chips over to sunflower oil. [URL=http://abcnews.go.com/Health/story?id=1919267&page=1]http://abcnews.go.com/Health/story?id=1919267&page=1[/URL] Why? Because they're idiots. All it does is cut some trans-fats. If you're eating regular full-fat potato chips with abandon, you're not really the healthiest mama on earth already, and if you are eating them in moderation, a little trans-fat is not going to kill you. They're only doing it to [i]appear[/i] healthier, and they're utter fools to do that, because people who like their potato chips are not avoiding buying them because they're unhealthy. Lays has the lion's share of the market on chips. They're the most popular brand. (They're Ruffles, too, remember. And all the non-potato chips.) Cutting the trans-fats is not going to make the already-healthy people run out and buy Lays potato chips when there's still 7+ grams of fat in an ounce! So what's going to happen?
[URL=http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/food/2006-05-02-frito-lays-usat_x.htm]http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/f...lays-usat_x.htm[/URL]

I'll tell you what's going to happen with me. When I returned to Oregon I found out that they're doing it in a sweep, starting with the Northeast. So I'm going to keep buying my Lays. I'm going to buy them like they're going out of style. Until they hit me with their putrid sunflower oil wave. Then I'm going to find another brand that isn't cowtowing to pressure to conform to a stupid public image. I'll hope that Lays realizes that no one is going to buy their silly, chemical-burnt-garbage-tasting sunflower oil chips and go back to making the beautiful, crispy, sunny yellow chips everyone loves. But if they don't, they can suck it. It's bad enough that we have to have all talk and argument about oil this and oil that in political circles. We shouldn't have stupid, unnecessary oil-based hardships in our snack food selections. Come on. Lay off.

P.S. I plan to rant about the useless assholes who are trying to sue KFC for their use of trans fats, which is kind of a related issue, but I'm not going to do it now.

Also, I don't know if this website is for real or if they have scientific basis for what they say, but maybe this explains why the chips taste like burnt rotten potatoes:
[URL=http://www.mercola.com/2006/may/23/the_new_potato_chip_scam_dont_let_them_deceive_you.htm]http://www.mercola.com/2006/may/23/the_new...deceive_you.htm[/URL]