EDITOR’S NOTE: After we wrote this post but before it was published, Aldi appears to have shifted from these white rounds to selling “mini-rounds.”
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Let’s talk about nachos for a moment.
If you’ve ever gone to a restaurant or venue and ordered “nachos,” what you get will entirely depend on where you are. If you’re at a Tex-Mex restaurant or an Americana-style restaurant with Tex-Mex chops, you’re likely to get homemade tortilla chips — or something close to it — topped with things like meat, cheese, sour cream, jalapenos, and so on.
If, on the other hand, you’re at, say, a carnival or perhaps a sports stadium, you may get something different. Your chips may look like they came out of a bag, and more often than not they’ll come alongside a nondescript plastic container of cheese dip. As a pointed example: during a recent day trip my daughter ordered “nacho chips” from a popular classic diner, and she was served a sealed bag of chips and a plastic cup of cheese in a plastic clamshell — about as prepackaged as it gets.
Have you ever wanted tortilla chips that would be right at home in a clear plastic tray next to yellow nacho cheese dip? Well, then I have the perfect chips for you.
Clancy’s White Rounds Tortilla Chips are an Aldi Regular Buy. You can find them in stores every day, at all times of the year.
They come in a distinctive 13-ounce yellow plastic bag and cost $1.95. At 15 cents an ounce, these are the cheapest tortilla chips that Aldi sells, and they’re as cheap as anything I can find. Walmart, for instance, sells round chips like this for around the same price per ounce, but you’ll have to get a bigger bag at Walmart for your trouble. Aldi, as it often does, is competitive on price here.
To their credit, these chips are relatively simple. Ingredients consist of white corn, vegetable oil, and salt. That’s it. There are no artificial flavors. Each one-ounce serving has 7 grams of fat, 115 milligrams of sodium, and 15 grams of carbs … although any chip lover will tell you that most people are likely to eat more than a single serving. For that reason, I view these as a sometimes food.
Nutrition information and ingredients. (Click to enlarge.)
Honestly, these exceeded my expectations. They’re fresh and not too stiff, with a good amount of salt but not too salty. They might not hold up quite as well to a heavy helping of toppings like some chips might, and they certainly aren’t homemade, but I would rate them as better than chips I’ve gotten at the ballpark or the local circus. They’re well suited to dipping in cheese and would be fine enough for other toppings.
The Verdict:
Clancy’s White Rounds Tortilla Chips are a competent budget tortilla chip. They’re not restaurant style, but if you’re looking for something on the cheap, such as something to serve at a larger gathering where your attendees aren’t too fussy about getting homemade chips, these are a reliable option that have a better taste and texture than we would have expected. They’re also as inexpensive as any I can find.
Yes, they WERE an excellent white corn tortilla chip. And I used them for homemade nachos. But they don’t carry them anymore & have substituted with the mini-rounds as you noted. The minis don’t work as well for me – but they are still less expensive than any other brand.
These are my fav tortilla chips of any brand!
I liked them too! The smaller ones are OK but not as good for nachos
I thought the same thing: smaller chips don’t seem as ideal for nachos.