I just purchased a bag of Ruffles Thick Cut Cheddar Baked Potato chips and immediately was struck by how much they remind me of O'Grady's Au Gratin chips. Although it has been many years since they disappeared, this Ruffles flavor brought back what is seared into my taste-memory for O'Grady's Au Gratin potato chips.
I wanted to get opinions from other 'hounders who remember O'Grady's and have tried this variety of Ruffles. If anything, I remember that O'Grady's may have been even thicker than the Ruffles but that doesn't detract from the taste.
I remember being really mystified as to why this product just disappeared from the shelves when my friends and I could not get our parents to buy them fast enough. Maybe, they are back.
I bought the Ruffles Thick Cut Cheddar Baked Potato chips for the sole reason - that hopefully I would be biting into a piece of my childhood in the form of a thick-cut cheddar-flavored potato chip. And my goodness, these ruffles sure do bring me back! I agree with the thickness of the chips, they don't seem to be as thick as the original O'Grady's, but they do have a lot of the same tasty color and flavor characteristics. I too was left mystified when they disappeared off the shelves! I hope that these Ruffles are here to stay.
Unfortunately, the storms in the Midwest wiped out much of the potato crops. Believe it or not , the last month or so Lays and Ruffles have been on very short supply. Some of the products (Some flavored Lays, Reduced fat Ruffles, natural Ruffles and Lays, and last but not least thick Cut Ruffles) have not been supplied at all. These products should be starting to be shipped shortly.
After reading the original post I bought the Thick Cut Ruffles and YES! YES! YES! They are totally O'Grady's Au Gratin, the only potato chip I have truly loved. Since then, I haven't been able to find the Thick Cut anywhere - not even online! I just came back from the ginormous Lucky's - which has every chip known to man - and they are sadly missing. cc84 - where do you live and where did you find them? I am going to start obsessing and stalking eBay for sightings of them - I will buy a crate if I have to! :)
just bought a small bag of Ruffles Thick Cut Au Gratin from the local vending machine (Ottawa), and these are as close to O'Grady's as I can remember - the thickness, the spacing of the ridges, the crunch, and the flavour!!! Maybe the originals had more stuff on top, but that may be a batch-to-batch variation. Time to hit the local grocery store to find these in the big bags!!!
Hi ... I used to work at Frito. Maybe this background info might help:
1) The new thick-cut Ruffles come close to the original O'Grady's -- BUT the new Ruffles are slightly thinner and MUCH easier/faster to make.
2) O'Grady's had slightly more "crunch" to them.
3) O'Grady's extra crispness was made possible because the slightly thicker-potato slices were first soaked in a cold brine solution before they entered the Ruffles fryer (this brine processing was a MAJOR discovery for Frito).
4) BUT this extra "brine processing" step also meant that O'Grady's manufacturing cost would always be slightly more expensive for Frito (versus producing a Ruffles or a Lay's chip).
5) This "brine" step increased Frito's mfg'g costs in 3 ways: a) slightly slower chip output: the soaking added an extra 30-50 seconds to the chip process, b) factory floor space: the O'Grady's "brine" tank/machine was large & required the removal of at least one Ruffles fryer from every plant, and c) extra machine costs: the tank / extra motors / extra conveyors / sprayers for the "brine" process added yet another cost.
6) Most of the people who bought O'Grady's (including me) had previously been loyal Ruffles purchasers (Frito exec's said: "our higher-profit Ruffles are being 'cannibalized' by the slightly-less profitable O'Grady's). O'Grady's didn't attrack many store brand or competitive users.
In SUMMARY: O'Grady's was very-very popular and it took several years for Frito-Lay / PepsiCo to figure out the problem caused by lower profit-margins & cannibalization. The decision to halt O'Grady's was contentious and drew many complaints from consumers & store mgrs.
This new thick-cut Ruffles seems to be a good compromise: a) it tastes similar to O'Grady's (in most consumer's minds) , and b) it avoids the delays/costs of the unique "brine" process. .... Well ... hope this info helps. dave in austin, texas
It looks like this chip has been brought back - to South Africa. The company Simba, which is under the PepsiCo International umbrella has relaunched O'Gradys chips after shelving the product back in 2005. Massive consumer demand got the chips back into production.
More information with pictures here:
http://www.fastmoving.co.za/fmcg-supp...
They offer "baked cheese" (au gratin I assume) and sour cream & onion flavors.
I can't believe that this just happened. Just yesterday I got the same Ruffles Thick Cut Cheddar Baked chips and immediately turned to my husband and asked if he remembered the Au Gratin Chips. He is younger than me, and did not remember them...but, I certainly do. Tasting those was like a flashback to the best chip ever. I just googled Au gratin chips to find out what happened to them and saw your comment.
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