CHIP OFF THE OLD BLOCK

Ottawa mom pitches iconic Canadian sandwich as the next best Lay’s potato chip flavour

Angela Batley of Ottawa never imagined she’d end up a finalist in Lay’s Canada Do Us a Flavour Contest when she entered on a whim last winter.

Too cold to venture outside, Batley and her six-year-old son Will had snuggled in for a “movie marathon” when they ripped open a bag of potato chips and saw the ad for the national contest calling for a new flavour for the popular snack food.

They started playfully bouncing around ideas — “Will was making all kinds of crazy combinations, (including) hotdogs with mustard and chocolate,” recalls his mom with a laugh — when Batley suggested one of Will’s favourite sandwich: grilled cheese with ketchup.

“Who doesn’t love a grilled cheese sandwich? It’s so Canadian,” says the pharmaceutical sales rep, whose entry was chosen from more than 600,000 contest submissions across Canada. “It’s a good family combo.”

Though she’s not a foodie and admits she usually burns grilled cheese when she makes it, Batley thought the blend of cheese, tomato and butter would make a winning combination for the Lay’s chip lineup.

The other three flavours to make the shortlist are Perogy Platter with Bacon and Onions from Lucas Crawford of Edmonton, Maple Moose from Tyler LeFrense of Isle aux Morts, Newfoundland and Creamy Garlic Caesar from Jill Munro of Vancouver.

“We were overwhelmed by the positive response” to the contest, says Susan Irving, core marketing director for PepsiCo Foods, the parent company for Frito-Lay Canada that makes Lay’s chips.

“Who doesn’t love snacking on potato chips?”

And it probably didn’t hurt to have Canada’s goofy comedian Martin Short as the pitchman for the contest.

Though she wouldn’t give examples of some of the wackier flavours people sent in, Irving says all submissions were subjected to “strict judging” based on three simple criteria: the name of the new flavour, its three key ingredients and what was the inspiration behind it.

“It was interesting to see the diversity ... Canada is such a diverse country and it was reflected in the entries,” Irving says.

Now it’s up to Canadians to choose the winner of the $50,000 grand prize and one per cent of the future sales of the new chips.

All four flavours are on store shelves for a limited time. but “when they’re gone, they’re gone,” says Irving.

You have until Oct. 16 to cast a vote for your favourite flavour. Go to www.lays.ca/Flavour or text “VOTE” to 101010. The winner will be announced in November.

Batley, 38, says if she wins the contest, she’d like to take her son and husband on a trip.

“I’d love to go somewhere on a family vacation,” she says, admitting it would likely be to Disney World to appease her young son.

As for the taste of her Grilled Cheese & Ketchup chips, Batley says she’s impressed with the end result. “It’s not overwhelming.”

For her son Will, she says it was love at first bite. “He likes them better than a real grilled cheese sandwich.”

Recruiting 10 colleagues — five men and five women — to sample four bags of potato chips was easy. Getting my panel of snackers to give me more than one-word reviews or screwed up faces was the hard part.

Back in February, Lay’s Canada launched a national Do Us a Flavour Contest to find a new taste for their potato chips. With the promise of a $50,000 grand prize and one per cent of the future sales of the winning chips, more than 600,000 entries flooded in from coast to coast by the April 15 deadline.

It took several months for the folks at Frito-Lay Canada to narrow the plethora of clever concoctions to four finalists: Grilled Cheese & Ketchup, Perogy Platter, Maple Moose and Creamy Garlic Caesar. Lay’s is now counting on the public’s taste buds to choose the winning flavour. Online voting started July 30 and runs until Oct. 16.

Before the winner is announced in November, I decided to hold my own taste test of the four finalists. Now before you fire off an angry email or leave me a huffy voice message, I realize 10 people does not make a nation. But my friends in the newsroom have munched on their share of potato chips, so I figured my random sampling could make an interesting read.

To be honest, there was no clear winner. The top chip was a toss-up between Creamy Garlic Caesar suggested by Janet Munro of Vancouver and Perogy Platter by Edmonton’s Lucas Crawford. Sorry Angela Batley of Ottawa, but only one panellist liked your Grilled Cheese & Ketchup creation while no one gave a thumb’s up to Maple Moose by Tyler LeFrense of Newfoundland.

Below are some of the comments from the office guinea pigs about each offering.

You be the judge. Vote for your favourite at Lays.ca/Flavour on Facebook or by texting

“VOTE” to 101010.

JEAN LEVAC/OTTAWA CITIZEN Angela Batley, with her son Will, is one of four finalists in Lay’s Do Us a Flavour Contest with her Grilled Cheese & Ketchup chips.

PEROGY PLATTER With a mild smokey bacon flavour, these chips were an easy eat. But some testers found them too bland — “Nothing really hits it out of the park,” said one senior writer — while another colleague, who makes perogies from scratch, was disappointed by the mild taste. “As a perogy lover, I could not get my fix from these chips.”

GRILLED CHEESE & KETCHUP Many on the panel were lost for words to describe the taste of these chips, but their facial expressions spoke volumes. “It doesn’t taste like anything I’ve ever tasted,” one tester grimaced. The chips were cheesy, but had a bad aftertaste. All agreed they tasted nothing like the real thing.

CREAMY GARLIC CAESAR Similar in taste to Sour Cream & Onion chips, but much milder and less messy — your fingers aren’t left coated in thick, white powder — the consensus was “Been there, ate that.” Even before he wolfed down a handful, one editor, however, was quick to rule them out: “Who wants a salad in a chip?”

MAPLE MOOSE This chip not only failed the taste test, but the sniff test as well. “It smells like medicine,” said one panellist after taking a big whiff of the freshly opened bag. She found the flavour equally pungent: “It tastes like burnt plastic ... there’s nothing sweet about it.