The rise of American Snacks in Ireland

PTH2009

How come all these 'American snacks' are starting too appear in a lot of places in Ireland. Is it because of kids watching all these 'American YouTube stars/social media' who are wolfing them all down etc

I did buy a mega box a few years ago from an online store with a load of different things from the states and I'd actually prefer our snacks tbh. I did like 'Butterfinger (surprised they never had a European version), 'the jolly ranchers 'are pretty good and 'Herrs Jalapeño poper Chips (crisps)'. Would you call things like 'Oreo', 'Sour Patch Kids' and 'Herseys' Fully American products now. Also that soft drink brand with the glass bottles and tropical flavours (can't think of the name) are in a lot of places now

That 'Kingdom Of Sweets' or whatever the name of those chain of stores are can be very expensive and best avoided for numerous reasons (ie your fucked if you have a sweet tooth). Local Supervalu has an American section with a few interesting snacks and picked up a bag of 'Goldfish Baked snack crackers' which are 100% cheese and like eating cardboard

Our Milky Way is King over there version

What's everyone else's favourite American snacks ?

maninasia

None, never touch it.

No offence and I know it’s an acquired taste, but American chocolate has a slight taste of vomit, caused by butyric acid which is produced during a process they put the milk though.

If you’ve grown up with that flavour, you don’t taste it or describe it as “tangy”.

All European consumer will detect that as somewhat puke like.

Everything else seems to be full of peanut butter…

road_high

They are insanely expensive and nothing special from the odd few I’ve tried.

kowloon

I don't understand the popularity of Oreos. If they were part of any of those Christmas tins of biscuits they'd be the last ones left after all the good ones are eaten. Are they even all that cheap?

Yurt2

CIA plot. Leo Varadkar the WEF Soros shill cut a deal with the Build a Burger Group to let them all in to bankrupt Ritchie's Milky Mints. Which is our birthright.

The country's in a hape, where are the true patriots?

Collie D

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120062948#Comment_120062948

I thought it was just me. Incredibly bland. Ten years ago an Oreo was something in an American movie - now it seems like they’re in **** everything.

AllForIt

Aren't all 'snacks' we eat here originally from the US, which would have started from back in I dunno the 50's. Okay they might have filtered over her from the UK but the UK imported them from the US.

Strumms

All my American family plunder the supermarket when they are back here to bring back Irish chocolate… you think it’s heroin they way they go for it. Same if we visit them… “don’t forget to take us Cadbury’s and King crisps ”

had a Hersheys bar recently, not great. Not fan of a lot of their confectionery, found it very artificial tasting. Their chocolate has the texture of plastic in many cases.

Ubbquittious

Door Eedoes

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120062971#Comment_120062971

Not really no. A lot of snack food and mass produced confectionery concepts grew up in parallel due to availability of ingredients and food production technology.

There wasn’t a whole lot of crossover between UK and US snacks and confectionary for example, with the major exception being soft drinks - notably Coca Cola. Irish snack food, due to proximity, tends to be a lot closer to British stuff.

Crisps seem to have originated in England in the early 1800s. They may have been inspired by something going on in Belgium or France earlier than that again.

Corn puffed snacks are more of an American thing though, due to the abundance of corn there.

Sweets, candies and chocolates don’t have a much in common. Quite different and different taste and textures are preferred.

AllForIt

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120063011#Comment_120063011

I was thinking more in terms of really crap junk food unlike say boiled sweets. Like for example highly processed carbs like Pringles/Monster Munch type things and hydrogenated chocolate which keeps on the shelves for years unlike real chocolate which would go off even if it had a bitta sugar added. Wasn't all that type of processing invented in the US? I just imaged it would have been.

Nigel Fairservice

My local Super Valu seems to have an American section where you can buy American snacks. Not too fond of them. Much prefer the Irish/British stuff. When I lived in Canada I used to to buy the odd bag of Taytos in my local British/Irish shop. They were nearly $5 a bag but worth it the odd time. There are lots of American candy shops in London, many I think are being investigated for tax evasion.

vicwatson

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058278110/the-rise-of-american-snacks-in-ireland

“Store”?

freshpopcorn

I was a child in the 90's/00's. When I was watching Americian programs. You'd see American Candy(as they'd call it).

It sounded interesting and of course you'd want to try it but it wasn't really an option.

Now with the Internet, online shopping parents buy it for their kids and you've fellas my age trying to cling onto their childhood.

So, I suppose there is a market for it.

I tried a few things in SuperValu but it wasn't anything special.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120063041#Comment_120063041

Does me head in

You go shopping not storing ffs.

whisky_galore

The eternal Irish fascination with all things Yank.

Apparently there will be a Wendy's opening at some point, yet again insane queues for what is basically junk food.

The J Stands for Jay

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120063208#Comment_120063208

Krispy Kreme donuts are shite compared to all the local donut shops. Wendy's is better than McDonald's or Burger King, but queuing for any of those is ridiculous.

Igotadose

As ex-pat USA here, it's tricky. It's what you were raised on; I've tried quite awhile to find local 'equivalents' for the sweets (!) I enjoyed in the US, like York Peppermint patties and obscure chocolates like Scharffenbergers, to no luck. Really tried to learn to enjoy maltesers and various Cadbury chocolates, but just couldn't abide them.

As for crisps, just not going well. Sure, i can choke down a bag of taytos once in awhile, but bizarre flavours (prawn cocktail? Gag.) or even more amusingly named things like Buffalo chips just don't work. Keoghs sea salt is a fair equivalent to some US brands like Lays and Wise, but still not quite a match. I guess Walker's ready salt is probably the go-to crisp for me these days, it's thin and greasy like US crisps.

Krispy Kreme donuts are vile. Unless eaten warm fresh from the oven, they're grease bombs with cheap sugar frosting. Couldn't abide them in the US at all. In Ireland, really haven't looked into donuts beyond the occasional foray into the local bakeries, which have been really underwhelming, but most store-bought Irish pastry is crap, what with its boring flavorless British roots.

dxhound2005

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120063011#Comment_120063011

Corn ?

These are phenomenal.

Everything else - awful. American food is terrible. McDonalds, Oreos, Subway, Hersheys - all gross.

whisky_galore

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120063275#Comment_120063275

I do agree that we are ill served with bakeries here, and most of what they have is unadventurous fare.

It's pretty telling when there's extreme weather, the blandest of bland white processed bread flies off the shelves, Brennans.

MarkR

Grape jelly is my dark secret. Can't understand why it's not around here, bar speciality shops.

xper

Never understood why Peanut Butter M&Ms were not available here when the other varieties were (for years anyway, maybe they are now). They’re the business.

other than that, I find American snacks and candy shite. It’s all about what you grew up with.

being familiar with the name through mentions in films and tv, I remember one of the first snack foods I tried in the states was a Twinky. Jesus, they are an abomination of a proceeded foodstuff

road_high

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120062948#Comment_120062948

The same. They’re like bland bourbon biscuits. Don’t get the obsession with them at all

Badly Drunk Boy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120063275#Comment_120063275

 I guess Walker's ready salt is probably the go-to crisp for me these days, it's thin and greasy like US crisps.

Walker's are terrible (I always expect more from them when I try them but am always disappointed) and any ready salted crisps are a non-event, bland...the Coldplay of crisps.

El Gato De Negocios

Aside from Reeses peanut butter cups, American confectionery that Ive tried is crap, the Reeses though, they are crack to me.

Jafin

I get the odd few here and there, but not too much. If I ever pass a box of Reese's Puffs Cereal in a shop I won't ever let it pass me by. Quite simply one of the tastiest breakfast cereals I've ever tasted (loaded with sugar though of course). Peanut Butter M&Ms are on a different level too. Last thing I'd normally be on the lookout for as well is Grape Fanta. First had the Grape Fanta in Singapore and it's one of the best soft drinks I've ever tasted. It's a shame grape flavoured things aren't the norm over here.

retalivity

A lot of those american sweet shops are/were apprently fronts for money laundering, especially in London, was in the news a few months ago.

The sweets themselves though, absolute cack, with the few rare exceptions (The snyders pretzel pieces mentioned above being one). Cadbury's being bought by US conglomerate Mondelez 10 or so years back was a travesty, and you can see the deterioration in quality with them since, wouldn't touch a dairy milk any more now. Same cheap powdery crap that you get in most american chocolate.

Montage of Feck

Pedant alert!!! Sweets really shouldn't be considered as snacks, the dictionary definition of a snack is a small amount of food eaten between meals.

American "chocolate" doesn't even meet the minimum standards to be called chocolate in Europe and in reality is probably closer to an industrial waste product than actual food.

road_high

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120063624#Comment_120063624

I was in London recently and couldn’t get over the amount of them. In really high profile locations- nobody seemed to be buying anything and the prices laughable tbh. Must be at least 3 on Oxford Street

banie01

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120062948#Comment_120062948

Oreos, plain and double stuffed are gack. They are a biscuit that is utterly transformed when chocolate (With a non yank chocolate) covered tho.

The Cadbury coated Oreo is a pancreas killer 😲

Mad_maxx

Europeans beat the pants off Americans in many areas

cars are one , chocolate and sweet treats in general are another

Glaceon

My wife is American so she mentioned how much easier it is to get American snacks now, even compared to when she came over here first around 2010. But she admits that Hersheys is waxy crap after tasting what we have here. Sarris chocolate is very good but I doubt you'd find it over here.

Igotadose

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120063624#Comment_120063624

Ahh, that explains Cadbury's. When I lived in the US years ago (90's), whenever a coworker or friend got a trip to the UK, we all begged them to bring back Dairy Milk bars and they were just... amazing.

Then, fast forward to a few years ago, moved here, dairy milk - Yuck! Dairy milk bought in the UK - disgusting! Might as well eat garbage like Hershey's.

We have ordered from an online US candy store here in Ireland for things like Reese's chips for baking as well as butterscotch chips, which are weirdly impossible to find outside the US.

Graham crackers are approximated by Digestives, a good enough substitute.

HalloweenJack

I only got over to the States for the first time last December and I was determined to eat as much of the crap that my previous 33 years of pop culture had exposed me to.

Peanut Butter M&Ms are amazing. I remember getting Christmas-themed hot chocolate in 7/11s which was great. I tried a shitload of all that other 'candy' and I wasn't overwhelmed. Butterfingers were decent but the other stuff was much of a muchness. The chocolate is dour and not European standard.

What I came away with was the knowledge that Americans are great hype merchants, probably to do with their highly consumerised society and the need to constantly be selling stuff, but I wouldn't be trusting them for food recommendations because most of what they consume is highly processed shite.

PTH2009

Is there any big difference to the American Coca Cola and Pepsi ?? Always see the versions advertised on American candy sites

I know in Europe they have the 'Real full sugar Fanta'

Is there a US version of 'Lucoazade' ?

fineso.mom

I'm sure I bought butterscotch chips from Aldi recently, in the baking section with the dark chocolate and milk chocolate chips.

Igotadose

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120063901#Comment_120063901

US soft drinks don't contain sugar as a rule, certainly not Coke or Pepsi. Seems like they do outside the US and imo taste better (though, I'm old enough to remember when they used to contain sugar in the US, then came the horror that is High Fructose Corn Syrup.)

Glaceon

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120063901#Comment_120063901

American Coca Cola is made with high-fructose corn syrup instead of beet sugar. I personally don't notice much of a difference between them. But you can get imported Mexican Coke in glass bottles and that's made with cane sugar instead.

Doc07

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120063715#Comment_120063715

Yes noticed that in London last year, makes the area look awful with glaring neon and horrible colours. They stand out a lot even when passing on the bus tour. Selling all types of crap junk food and cereals. Kids thought it was great of course…

PTH2009

https://youtu.be/zRAJdMdgB70

You'd love to punch the hell out of the 2 of them but shows the difference in quality

Don't like anything American where there is an obvious taste of that American spew tang.

Reese's peanut butter cups I do find ok even though I don't really like peanut butter normally.

But they are very bad value.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120063367#Comment_120063367

The puffed up snacks like monster munch are made from corn. Also American products are full of high fructose corn syrup rather than beet or cane sugar.

recyclops

American sour skittles are so much nicer than the ones we can pick up here, they are actually sour

Homelander

Could take or leave most American snacks but there's plenty of decent ones. The only thing I don't like is American chocolate.

The one thing I go out of my way to get is Herr's Carolina Reaper cheese puffs. They are proper hot, most spicy crisps here aren't remotely spicy. The only semi-decent ones I can think of are the Pringles Xtreme Chili Cheese.

Space Dog

Unfortunately Cinnamon Toast Crunch is my favourite cereal ever, so I indulge a few times a year. And I do love a Twinkie from time to time.

PTH2009

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120064681#Comment_120064681

Always here of Twinkies but what kind of 'Cakes' are they ??

Fecked if I'm paying €9 for a box

Igotadose

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120064841#Comment_120064841

Weird and yellow, with a white filling that withstands most forces of nature. A caver friend described inadvertently leaving a bag in a cave, coming back some years later, bag's gone, yellow cake is gone, but the filling was intact and perfect looking. I haven't touched one since. Terrifying.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120064841#Comment_120064841

"golden sponge cake with a creamy filling"

utter muck full of pretty much the most processed ingredients legally usable in human "food"

I imagine if you were eating them on the regular you'd have as fat a hole as that cop in die hard

Markus Antonius

I got a box of Lucky Charms for old times sake (they used to sell these here in the 90s didn't they?)

I was thinking I'm probably looking back at them with rose-tinted glasses, but no. They are delicious! Tasted as good as I remember!