Those who know my eating habits know that I have a particular affinity for salty, crunchy comestibles. I will turn up my nose at all manner of sweets and baked confections, but open a package of Doritos within earshot of my desk, and my face will be burrowing to the bottom of the bag with sickening alacrity.

Any Cheeto unlucky enough to exist within my sphere of perception has a life expectancy measured in mere femtoseconds. Pretzels? Down the hatch. Is that a can of peanuts? Kiss it goodbye. And don’t even get me started on Kake No Tane, just hand me a funnel and a tamping rod. Crunchy and Salty are two of my basic food groups.

Though I am blessed to live in a land boasting a plenitude of edibles both salty and crunchy, there has always been a special place in my heart (right next to the aortic plaque) for chips. Plain chips, flavored chips (anything but soy chips). Within that category, of course, there are the old, predictable classics like barbecue-flavored potato chips. One brand’s barbecue chips are just like the next; an old standby. Not particularly thrilling, certainly nothing to shout about, but perfectly reliable. (Pretty much like my pecker, except that it’s immeasurably easier to convince somebody to put barbecue chips in their mouth.)

I now know how wrong I was (about the chips, that is), for I have tasted the very ambrosia of the Gods. While I had previously sampled some of Kettle Foods’ fine potato chips, finding them tasty indeed, even those toothsome snacks were nothing like their Krinkle Cut Classic Barbecue chips. Oh my. Exquisite is only one of the superlatives one might use to describe this most excellent of chips. Not only is it extremely flavorful, but the flavor is perfect.

You know that sweet, smoky, caramelized flavor of, say, a crispy bit of chicken skin or the nibbly edge of a rib, slathered with barbecue sauce, fresh from the grill? That’s exactly what these taste like. Kettle has captured that taste exactly. Quite simply, I don’t think I will ever deign to touch a plain ol’ BBQ chip again. They are inferior in every measurable respect, nearly beneath contempt. There is no turning back once you have had these Kettle chips; they’re that good. Seriously, pick up a bag, you won’t be disappointed.