The humble chip - we know it, we love it and it goes with absolutely everything. Whether stuffed in a sandwich or nestled at the side of a nice piece of steak or fish, it could be argued that the potatoes have reached the pinnacle of their evolution in chip form.
While chips from the chippy are absolutely amazing as a treat, everyone should and probably does have a bag of the frozen variety on standby in the freezer for convenience. But not all frozen chips are created equal.
Though it may be easy just to pick up a packet of a popular brand such as Aunty Bessie's or some McCain's microwave chips, each of the big supermarkets sell 'own brand' options of their own. And these don't just stop at the straight up oven chip.
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They include varieties such as 'chunky,' 'skinny,' 'crinkle cut,' and 'straight'. But the real question is, as potatoes are pretty tasteless (sorry spuds), is there any difference between the brands? And if so, which supermarket can really claim the honour of selling the ultimate bag own brand frozen oven chips?.
In a bid to find some sort of answer to these seriously important philosophical questions, I decided to try the chips from Asda, Aldi, Marks and Spencer and Tesco. In each store, I picked up their 'homestyle' options to give each supermarket an equal footing as I put them to the test.
There was around a £1 difference between the cheapest and most expensive - but the difference didn't stop there. Each of the chips were cooked at the appropriate temperatures and specifications according to the packaging as part of the test.
And given chips are best paired with a good sauce, I tried each with brown sauce and ketchup, which we recently rated here. Here's how they fared when I compared on taste and value, starting with the cheapest.
Aldi - £1.49
Aldi, as you might expect, offered the cheapest available option and with that came what tasted like the cheapest chip. What you get is a big bag of very basic looking chips, which even after a massively overextended cooking period still come out looking Dracula on a good day - pale.
I could've sworn it may be impossible to in fact brown these chips, as their outside layer looks no different to their inside layer and holds the same texture to. In terms of taste they matched their complexion, offering a pale amount of taste that could have replicated by peeling a potato and leaving it in the oven for a short amount of time.
Ok, I'll admit that's what a chip is, but even through slicing them myself and cooking them in the same way, they'd still have more flavour than these.
3/10
Tesco - £1.85
Tesco's chips turned out the crispiest by far, a far step away from the pale monstrosities of Aldi, much more happily a rich golden brown colour. Of all four brands they certainly cooked the best, despite needing extra time, and it showed in the quality of the finished product.
Despite finding a few semi-empty chips, the overall taste of this batch was solid, tasting the most like chips, and the least like and overly warm potato. The more solid nature though made them much better for sauce dipping, as I wasn't a risk of a structural collapse as I did so.
Tesco certainly seemed to offer the best bang for your buck.
8/10
Asda - £2.45
Asda's chips cooked as well as Tesco, leaving them with that pleasing texture and colour when done. They also cooked the closest to their actual cooking time, saving on those pricy oven bills, though the trade-off was the leap up from the price of Tesco's chips.
While they did crisp well, they did not however, taste well, leaving a rather lacklustre after taste in the mouth, which had to be covered up with a healthy dollop of sauce. These chips are ideal for that purpose, but given how much extra they cost over Tesco, it's probably not worth your time.
6/10
M&S - £2.50
Sometimes price doesn't always make nice, and that certainly the case here. It would be easy to expect M&S and their often premium brands would be the easy winner for this list, but that couldn't be further from the truth.
These chips can only be described in one way - boring. Even after an extended visit to the oven, a nice golden brown hue on the outside, these chips were devoid of flavour, the only reason they are scraping a 2 is because they cooked better than Aldi chips.
This is one premium brand I think is best avoided.
2/10
For me, there was a very clear winner here. Tesco offers both the better chip and among the better value in my humble opinion but of course - feel free to try them all and pick your personal favourite!
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