Ok I am convinced - I'll go for Walkers Lights in future! (Walkers Lights Simply Salted)

Member Name: SusanLesley

Product:	Walkers Lights Simply Salted
Date:	17/04/08 (151 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Great taste, lower in fat and lower in calories

Disadvantages: None that I can taste

I recently wrote a review on the subject of Walkers Ready Salted Crisps and I began with the sentence 'There's no crisp like Walkers'. I also said at the end of the review that I had tried Walkers Lights and didn't find them as nice as the standard version.

However as I read the review back I realised that maybe at 133 calories and 8.5g of fat per pack they weren't as healthy as they might be so I decided that it was time to try another pack of Walkers Lights to see if my tastes had changed or the crisps had improved for me.

As I have said in other reviews it has to be Ready Salted for me, I can't even stand the smell of most of the flavours let alone the taste! I do have an occasional pack of Salt & Vinegar but that's about as adventurous as I get! To be absolutely correct the Walkers Lights are known as Simply Salted rather than Ready Salted which may imply that the slat content is lower than in the standard version but this is not true they are exactly the same.

To try Walkers Lights I went for a 24g pack which was part of a multi pack of six. The cost was about £1.10 I have just taken a look at the Tesco website to get the correct price but they don't appear there so it looks as though you can only buy them directly from the store.

There are a few different flavours in the Walkers Lights range including Sea Salt and Cracked Pepper, Sour Cream and Chive and Cheese and Onion, but as I have already said it has to be Ready Salted for me.

The Ready Salted variety comes in the traditional bright red bag with a picture of a crisp on the front with the Walkers logo wrapped around it. The word 'lights' is written across the front of the pack in blue. I did wonder if the choice of colour was for psychological reasons - maybe blue is to suggest sky and air and crisps as light as air. Maybe I am just reading too much into it!

Also on the front of the pack is a note to say these crisps are cooked in Sunseed 'one of the healthiest oils there is'. This is actually no different from the standard Walkers crisps as they are all cooked in Sunseed, which is a variety of sunflower oil.

There is also the now familiar information showing the nutrition which is also expressed as a percentage of RDA. (Recommended daily Allowance)

The crisps themselves are made from potatoes (bet you'd never have guessed that then!), sunflower oil and salt. The use of Sunseed means much less saturated fat.

What I am now struggling to understand is that as the ingredients for Walkers standard crisps and Walkers Lights are potatoes, sunflower oil and salt how can the calories and fat be different?

The full comparative nutritional values of between a 25g bag of standard crisps and a 24g bag of Walkers Lights are as follows:

Standard Crisps
Energy 133calories
Protein 1.6g
Carbohydrate 12.3 g
of which is sugars 0.1g
Fat 8.5g
of which is saturates 0.7g
of which is mono-unsaturates 6.8g
of which is polyunsaturates 0.7g
Fibre 1.0g
Sodium 0.2g
Equivalent as salt 0.4g

Energy 113 calories
Protein 1.7g
Carbohydrate 14.6g
of which is sugars 0.1g
Fat 5.3g
of which is saturates 0.5g
of which is mono-unsaturates 4.3g
of which is polyunsaturates 0.5g
Fibre 1.2g
Sodium 0.1g
Equivalent as salt 0.4g

I did try to post these side by side but when I transferred it from Word to Dooyoo it got all mixed up!

They are suitable for vegetarians and are also gluten free. I know it sounds obvious to say that they are suitable for vegetarians but some Walkers crisps that you would expect to be so are not and some of the alleged 'meat' flavours are actually suitable for vegetarians!

Anyway now we have all the nutritional information out of the way, even though it is a bit confusing, lets get on to the taste!

I opened the bag of Walkers Lights to find the bag about half full which is pretty much the norm for packets of crisps is these days!

The smell was just the same as the standard crisps - just crispy!

The taste of Walkers Lights is very similar to that is the standard Ready Salted crisps but is considerably less greasy. They are light and lovely and crunchy. Apparently the potatoes used by Walkers in the manufacture of all their crisps are specially grown for Walkers, so maybe that makes a difference. I have to admit that I like the taste of salt far too much for my own good but although these don't contain too much salt they are salty enough to satisfy my craving.

I think I can safely say that I have changed my mind and will go for Walkers Lights in future - at least it saves a few calories!

This review will probably appear on Ciao at some point in the future.

Summary: A great lower calorie crisp!