My latest trip to Trader Joe’s landed a bounty of goodies including this cool looking bag of Ghost Pepper potato chips.
I am not a spicy food junkie but I do like crunchy heat so I was looking forward to giving these chips a try. It turns out that these are pretty tasty chips but the heat does not live up to expectations.
Ghost Pepper Chips Nutrition and Ingredients
Let’s take a closer look at what you get with this bag of chips.
Nutrition Facts
You get seven ounces of chips per bag. One ounce, about 13 chips, is a single serving.
The nutritional facts for a single serving are:
- Calories: 140
- Fat: 8g (10% DV)
- Cholesterol: 0mg (0% DV)
- Sodium: 160mg (7% DV)
- Carbohydrates: 17g (6% DV)
- Protein: 2g
Ingredient List
The chips have the following ingredients:
- Potatoes
- Sunflower oil
- Ghost pepper seasoning
- Maltodextrin
- Spices (black pepper, cumin, ghost chili pepper, jalapeno, parsley)
- Dextrose
- Sugar
- Onion powder
- Garlic powder
- Yeast extract
- Citric acid
- Vinegar
- Chili pepper flavor
- Smoke flavor
- Salt
The seven ounce bag of chips costs $2.49.
How Do Trader Joe’s Ghost Pepper Chips Taste?
The Ghost Pepper potato chips at Trader Joe’s are NOT spicy. Flaming Hot Cheetos and Trader Joe’s Spicy Vegetable Rinds are much spicier than these potato chips.
I showed the bag of Ghost Pepper chips to my daughter, offered her one and she said, “Oh, hell no!” She is not into ghost peppers at any level and think foods that are that spicy are best reserved for her idiot brother.
I convinced her to eat one chip at which point she said, “Oh, these aren’t spicy at all.”
When I ate a handful of chips at once then I did get a glimmer of heat in the back of my throat. Sometimes I would get a whisp of heat from a single chip.
Go back and look at the ingredient list above and you will see how little ghost pepper is actually in the mix.
Once you get past the fact that these are NOT spicy chips they are in fact quite tasty. I love the lattice cut, the chips are crisp and there is a great sweet and savory balance going on.
I am glad I bought the chips and will gladly eat the whole bag but I am disappointed that the are not real Ghost Pepper chips.
These chips follow the pattern of other Trader Joe’s products like their chipotle black bean dip that promise heat but do not deliver.
Customer Reviews of Trader Joe’s Ghost Pepper Chips
You can buy these chips on Amazon so I decided to look up the customer reviews to see if other folks had the same experience as me.
There were not a ton of reviews on Amazon, only about 180, but I think they paint a pretty good picture.
People are pretty neutral about the product with only 60% of reviewers leaving a 5 Star Review.
When I looked at the negative reviews I saw a steady theme of comments from folks who felt let down and misled by the promise of Ghost Peppers flavors that never showed up.
A couple of these comments are shown below and they indicate that I am not the only person who thinks the spice level on these chips is a joke.
The Chips Have Cute Packaging
For what it is worth I think the packaging for the chips is cute.
The red and black color scheme really pops and the massive white GHOST PEPPER with the funky font on the front of the bag is intimidating.
The chips even have a cute poem on the back of the bag.
These chips are tasty but I doubt that I will buy them again.