#olw

OLW Cheez Cruncherz (Sweden)

Another scream product from OLW. We remain in the realm of cheese snacks and from my experience, that can go one of two ways.

Crunchier than Estrella Linssisnacks, not as crunchy as Taffel Juusto-Crunch. They're on the small side, which isn't necessarily a problem for these kinds of snacks. They are however quite dry, which has become OLW signature feature at this point.

Flavor-wise we are unfortunately leaning towards Taffel Crun'Cheez with these ones. Very potent salt, giving me an instant adverse reaction. They taste a bit like cheese, in the sense that that is the flavor they have. And not much else. It's not strong, barely there after the wave of saltiness has faded, but I guess it's different enough from normal cheese snacks that I can admit the presence of sour cream & onion. They don't assault or offend me, but we are not friends.

If you crave cheese snacks you ain't picking these. If you crave screams you ain't picking these. It's impressive how many disappointing, mediocre scream variants OLW has managed to push out.

OLW Ringar (Sweden)

Same flavoring as the previous OLW chips, but being made out of corn instead of potato adds a lot. The flavor is sweeter and stronger, and yet the structure is softer, which makes these a fun deviation from the norm. Not necessarily for better or for worse - just different.

Perhaps I'm just not used to corn, but after a while it starts to feel like too much. It doesn't have the same airy property of potato chips. And yet, they feel dry in my mouth somehow. Seems like a reoccurring OLW theme.

OLW Stjärnor (Sweden)

The extremely mild flavor and the structure of the stars reminds me of Estrella Pom-Bear. Based on that and the fact that these too have a funky shape, I'm thinking they're the "kids' chips" type. That's fine, but just not for me. I don't enjoy tasting the potato-rice-corn pulp they're made of.

There are issues though, which is why this is ranked lower than Pom-Bear. They still have a stinging saltiness at times, and the stars stop being fun when they're poking the inside of your mouth with their hard, pointy ends. They should have made these softer, considering the shape.

Pretty unremarkable otherwise.

OLW (Sweden)

OLW, the brand that originally lead me to the rabbithole of online snack stores and caused an explosion of new chips on my to-test list. These were recommended by an online acquaintance who quite likes them.

I can see why. They have a very nice cut and crunch to them and good flavoring. They have a similar problem to Estrella Manhattan where the salt and onion sting, which isn't quite pleasant for me. They're also not very creamy and there we have an explanation to the sharp mouthfeel. You can't leave out the cream in sour cream or you get very bitey end result.

Another odd feature is that they are dry. Very much like Taffel Broadway Low-Fat are. We will see that this is a reoccurring theme with OLW products later on.