Loaded crisps: four recipes for the ‘perfect finger food’ – ranked from best to worst
Ready salted, prawn cocktail, pickled onion and smoky bacon – crisps are undoubtedly the nation’s favourite snack food, subject to a variety of staple and sometimes suspicious flavour varieties.According to one recent report, they were the UK’s snack of choice on 94% of “all consumption occasions”, often enjoyed with a complementary dip, or served in a packet ripped open on a pub table.But now, the humble bag of crisps is having a revamp.Enter: the loaded crisp bag.It’s a lot like loaded fries or nachos, in that it can be a vehicle for a whole gamut of flavours – as served, for example, at Pablos, a fast food outlet in Nottingham where anything from ground beef to molten cheese is dolloped into an opened bag of crisps.
Commonly known as basque nachos because they mimic the region’s culinary tradition of bite-size snacks (pintxos), and apparently inspired by a dish served at the Basque-inspired restaurant Ernesto’s in New York City, the trend took off on TikTok with videos showcasing people’s homemade crisp creations,Also sometimes called “soggy crisps” and “crisp charcuterie”, loaded crisps are perfect picnic grub or a party pleaser,Customisable, quick and easy to make – you simply drop your desired ingredients into an opened bag of crisps, no cooking required,Here are four popular loaded crisp recipes, prepared by me in a matter of minutes, ranked from best to worstThere’s a lot going on here,Cheese on cheese crisps, cured meat, crunchy pickles with a herby garnish – it’s like a deconstructed sandwich, an entire meal in a thin foil bag.
But by some miracle, it works.Pipers are probably one of the best crisp options for this because they are thickly cut, making them sturdy enough to hold the weight of the toppings.And there’s a lot of toppings here – it is a messy nightmare to eat but tastes absolutely delicious.4/5It is impossible to make a bag of crisps taste “fresh”, but this plant-based loaded crisp option comes surprisingly close.Unlike the other recipes in this list, the salt content is manageable and the base lentil crisps are light, which makes this recipe less stodgy than others – although, if left for a while, the wet ingredients do make it sloppy.
The biggest advantage is that the crisps’ curved shape makes it easier to scoop the hummus,Perfect finger food,4/5Walkers’ ready salted is the most traditional and instantly recognisable flavour out there, but it is also probably the most boring, which makes it apt for an upgrade,Here it is transformed into a makeshift charcuterie board,Admittedly, a salted cracker would probably work better than this greasy potato base.
The sprigs of thyme can feel a bit like chewing foliage, so remove the stems and sprinkle the tiny leaves for a more digestible experience,The red packaging looks slightly comical alongside these particular contents, but the sweet and salty mix is well worth trying,3/5As one perceptive commenter on this by-the-sea TikTok recipe has observed, this particular crisp concoction “would just be horrendously salty”,And no surprise, it absolutely is,Torres truffle crisps have more than enough flavour alone, so topping them with extra salty snacks tastes a lot like drinking the ocean.
The residue of oil from the anchovies and brine from the olives also makes for a soggy potato lacking in crunch.Even a real salt lover would find this difficult to stomach for more than two mouthfuls.2/5
Teenage girls sue Musk’s xAI, accusing Grok tool of creating child sexual abuse material
A group of three teenage girls, two of whom are minors, filed a lawsuit on Monday against Elon Musk’s xAI artificial intelligence company alleging that its Grok image generator used photos of them to produce and distribute child sexual abuse material. The class-action lawsuit is the first filed by minors following Grok’s rampant generation of nonconsensual nude images earlier this year.“xAI chose to profit off the sexual predation of real people, including children, despite knowing full well the consequences of creating such a dangerous product,” Vanessa Baehr-Jones, a lawyer for the plaintiffs, said in a statement.The suit, which was brought by three Tennessee teenagers but filed in California, where xAI is headquartered, details how the girls discovered that nude, AI-altered images of them were uploaded to a Discord server and shared online without their knowledge.After they alerted law enforcement to the images, according to the complaint, police arrested a suspect later that month and found child sexual abuse material (CSAM) on his phone that was allegedly produced using xAI’s image and video generation technology
Google scraps AI search feature that crowdsourced amateur medical advice
Google has dropped a new artificial intelligence search feature that gave users crowdsourced health advice from amateurs around the world.The company had said its launch of “What People Suggest”, which provided tips from strangers, showed “the potential of AI to transform health outcomes across the globe”.But Google has since quietly removed the feature, according to three people familiar with the decision.A Google spokesperson confirmed “What People Suggest” had been scrapped. The move came as part of a “broader simplification” of its search page and had nothing to do with the quality or safety of the new feature, the spokesperson said
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AI has exposed age-old problems with university coursework | Letter
The frustration many academics are expressing about artificial intelligence and critical thinking is understandable (‘I wish I could push ChatGPT off a cliff’: professors scramble to save critical thinking in an age of AI, 10 March). But from my experience working with students on academic writing, blaming AI risks masking a problem that universities have lived with for years.In my work with students, I have long seen the ways in which thinking can be outsourced when assessment allows it: essay mills, shared past papers, model essays passed between cohorts, or heavy reliance on tutors and friends to structure assignments. Artificial intelligence did not invent this behaviour. It has simply industrialised a shortcut that already existed
Trump administration reportedly set to be paid $10bn for brokering TikTok deal
Donald Trump’s administration is reportedly poised to be paid $10bn by investors as part of a deal to create a US-controlled version of TikTok.The $10bn, considered by the US government as a sort of transaction fee, will be paid by the administration-friendly investors who took control of TikTok’s US operations from its Chinese parent company, ByteDance, according to reporting that first appeared in the Wall Street Journal.The investors in the popular social media app include software company Oracle; MGX, an investment firm based in the United Arab Emirates; and private equity business Silver Lake. These entities, along with other backers, paid $2.5bn to the US treasury when the deal closed in January and are set to make further payments in the unusual arrangement until the total hits $10bn
Meta and Google trial: are infinite scroll and autoplay creating addicts?
It was as “easy as ABC”, claimed the lawyer prosecuting a landmark social media harm case against Meta and Google which heard closing arguments this week. The defendants were guilty, said Mark Lanier, of “addicting the brains of children”. Not true, replied the tech companies. Meta insisted providing young people with a “safer, healthier experience has always been core to our work”.Features such as autoplay videos, infinite scrolling and constantly chirruping alerts woven into the fabric of online platforms were central to the six-week trial in Los Angeles, which has been compared to the cases against tobacco companies in the 1990s
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