The Healthiest Chips With As Many Calories As An APPLE – And Which To Avoid, According To Top Dietitian

Forget expensive chorizo-flavoured chips – supermarket sales figures show that cheap, retro brands like Frazzles and Nik Naks are popular again.

According to new figures, sales of some of these old favorites have increased by almost 50 percent in the past year. And fans will be happy to know that not only do they come with a more attractive price tag, they’re also good news for your waistline.

Analysis by MailOnline has found that many retro crisps are surprisingly low in calories, salt and saturated fat. This is in line with a wider trend of health promotion measures in the crisp market, which aim to drastically reduce salt and fat content.

The average packet of crisps on sale in the UK today contains about half the amount of salt it contained in 1991, according to the Potato Processors’ Association.

Here, dietitians tell MailOnline which package is the healthiest.

Pom Bears, Quavers and Wotsits are the best crunchy snacks, Dr Duane Mellor, dietitian and spokesperson for the British Dietetic Association, told MailOnline.

He explains that these brands come in small sachets and therefore contain smaller portions, and fewer calories, salt and saturated fat.

“While some chips are labeled as having fewer calories or less fat, it appears that the weight of the bag determines whether a snack is lower in fat, calories and salt,” he said.

“Perhaps not surprisingly, bags weighing less than 16 grams tend to be the least fat and salt-dense,” he added.

While he stresses that these snacks aren’t the ‘healthiest’ ones, as a piece of fruit is always a better option, smaller and lighter pouches are a better option if you’re looking for a salty snack.

But many popular chip brands from the 90s come in light and small portion packs.

The retro chips with one of the lowest calories are Space Raiders with pickled onion flavor. A 13 gram bag contains 63 calories, about the same as an apple.

Pom Bear Original chips are also low in calories: a 13 gram bag contains only 66 calories.

An 18g bag of ready-to-eat salted chips contains only 78 calories. The 16.5g Wotsits with cheese flavour contain 82 calories.

A 22-gram bag of Salt and Vinegar Squares contains 97 calories, as does a 20-gram bag of Frazzles.

To put that in perspective, you’d have to eat about five bags of Monster Munch (98 cal), Frazzles, or Squares to get roughly the same number of calories as one large serving of McDonald’s Fries (444 cal).

But not all ’90s revivals are better for your waistline.

A 35g bag of Skips prawn cocktail flavoured contains 191 calories, a 45g retro bag of Nice ‘N’ Spicy Nik Naks contains 255 calories and a pack of Discos with salt and vinegar contains 262 calories in a 50g bag.

For an average woman, 2,000 calories per day is recommended to maintain a healthy weight. For an average man, 2,500 calories per day is recommended.

If you eat more calories than you burn, you will gain weight over time. And bObesity may increase the risk of developing type 2 diabetesheart disease, cancer and strokes.

According to Vanessa Richardson of the UK Potato Processors’ Association, chips have been “significantly reformed” over the past 30 years to make them healthier.

She said: ‘I don’t think we would be so bold as to say that crisps and savoury snacks are necessarily ‘healthy’, but they have been rewritten considerably in recent years to improve their nutritional value and make them healthier.

‘We advocate responsible snacking and see chips as a treat that should be eaten in moderation and be part of a healthy, balanced diet.’

It’s not just about the calories. Companies have gotten stricter about salt, cutting the amount of salt in potato chips by 53 percent since 1991, according to 2022 data from the Snack, Nut and Crisp Manufacturers Association and McCance and Widdowson’s 1991 The Composition of Food.

Crisps provide less than 2 percent of adults’ salt intake. The biggest contributor is meat and meat products at 26 percent, followed by bread at 15 percent, according to the UK Potato Processors’ Association.

According to the National Diet and Nutrition Survey 2016 to 2019, salty snacks contribute only 3 percent of an adult’s daily fat intake.

According to the NHS, around three quarters of the salt in our diet comes from packaged foods.

Eating more salt than the NHS recommended 6g a day can lead to high blood pressure and an increased risk of heart attacks and strokes.

Adults should consume less than 6 grams of salt and 20 grams of saturated fat (women) and 30 grams (men) per day.

Pom Bears are the healthiest option if you want chips with less salt. One 13g bag contains 0.17g of salt, which is just a pinch.

For comparison, a bag of Nice ‘N’ Spicy Nik Naks contains 0.81 grams of salt, about four times as much as a bag of Pom Bears.

Wotsits with 0.26 grams of salt and Monster Munch with 0.31 grams of salt also contain less salt than the prawn cocktail Skips with 0.77 grams of salt.

However, a 32.5 gram bag of Walker’s Ready Salted chips contains almost half the amount of salt of a pack of Skips, just 0.46 grams.

As for saturated fat, French Fries, Squares, Space Raiders and Pom Bears all contain just 0.3 grams per bag.

For comparison, a bag of Nik Naks contains 1.5 grams, while a 32.5 gram bag of Walker’s Ready Salted chips contains 0.8 grams.

A serving of large McDonald’s fries contains 2 grams of saturated fat.

A diet high in saturated fat can raise your cholesterol, increasing your risk of heart disease, according to the NHS. Savoury snacks, cakes and pastries are all high in saturated fat.