I first discovered this brand in 2019, when I was pleasantly surprised by finding their Nacho chips in a No Frills.
As I explained in that article, I was having trouble at the time finding the chips at my favourite grocery stores. Even No Frills seemed to stop carrying the brand after the day I’d discovered them.
After perusing their website, I discovered they had thankfully not only didn’t discontinue the Nacho flavour, but had others as well! And, perhaps the best news, is that all their flavours are vegan!
Being cautiously excited at discovering a new vegan company, I set my sights on trying some of their other flavours. The next flavour I was interested in trying was their Sweet and Spicy Ranch chips. But just like the Nacho flavour, I couldn’t find the Ranch anywhere.
Not content on giving up, I discovered VeganSupply sells a variety of Que Pasa’s chip flavours, but as my luck would have it, they were sold out when I tried getting a bag. This irritation brought me to March of this year (2022), when I decided to try a new-ish wellness website called Well.ca.
I discovered that not only did Well carry supplements, personal products and other wellness products, but they also had quite an array of vegan foods available! In this order, I decided to get a few other products I wasn’t able to find elsewhere that I was planning on using in future reviews. This included Watermelon La Croix, Dandelion Tea, these Ranch chips, and a few other items.
To my great pleasure, I received 0 notices about the Que Pasa chips being out of stock, and actually (finally) got my hands on them when the order arrived.
Now, I’ll be honest, I was so excited to see a chip bag that said Vegan Ranch on it, that I completely missed the Sweet and Spicy part of the name.
Luckily for me, I spotted the full name before digging in, so I was able to ration my taste test appropriately. The bag I bought was the same size as the Nacho ones had been, and while they were slightly more expensive (Well had them listed for $4.79, but No Frills had them for $3.49), I was more than happy to pay the difference considering I was having so much trouble finding them.
These chips were also more sweet than spicy for me. Being the detail oriented flavour taster that I am, the first chip I tried, I licked some of the flavouring off to get a more complete profile.
Keeping in mind I haven’t had actual ranch flavoured anything in… probably close to 15-ish years, I personally didn’t think these chips tasted ‘ranch-y’. They at least didn’t taste like the vegan Ranch dips/salad dressings I’ve gotten used to. The flavouring actually reminded me of being closer to maple syrup than ranch.
The heat also didn’t come until swallowing, but luckily it wasn’t too overpowering. There was a little tingle in the back of my throat, but I was able to eat a few at a time without feeling the need to reach for water. There was also no sweating happening, unlike when I eat Sweet Chili Heat Doritos.
I’m not usually a big fan of contrasting flavour profiles in the same dish/food. I just got used to chocolate covered pretzels not too long ago. That said, I really thought the sweetness of the chip when chewing really helped to balance out the heat experienced when swallowing.
They complimented each other nicely, and while I would’ve loved these chips more if they didn’t have that kick at the end, I also can’t say they weren’t good. I will say that even though the Nacho ones were spicier, if given a choice, I’d probably pick the Nacho flavour over these ones.
Have you tried these Que Pasa Sweet and Spicy Ranch chips? How’d you like them? Let me know in the comments!
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