Pop-up Chip Bag Displays
Purcellville Library: New Year and SuperBowl 2026
Top Row, L to R
sWEDEN: OLW Browned Butter and Ramps Flavor
A newer acquisition, this bag was purchased in Malmo, Sweden in September 2025 while attending the 30th birthday party of my stepson. Browned butter is all the rage in chips in Sweden, and every brand is offering one or more variation of this flavor at the moment.
ROMANIA: LAY’S SWISS CHEESE FLAVOR
What is ‘new” about cheese flavor, you ask? Maybe for many markets, cheese seems old hat, but in 2005 when I purchased this bag in Constanta, Romania, it was a revelation. I was bumming around the Black Sea with a journalist friend who was covering the underground coin--trade.
WALES: kettle fLAMED sTEAK fLAVOR
My friend and former business partner run an arts organization on the Isle of Angelsey. I try to participate in as many of their exhibitions and projects as possible. In 2020, I found these ‘crisps’ in a shop in Llangoed, right after petting a Great Horned Owl that was tethered to a post outside.
Egypt: Chipsy Lime and Chili Flavor
Purchased in the Al-Fayoum oasis hotel, where I had traveled with my business partner (see above) to escape an arts conference down the Nile in Cairo. I rode a donkey for the first time during that trip
NORWAY: MAARUD ONION, RAMP, AND MILD CHILI FLAVOR
My husband is Icelandic. I married him despite knowing that there are no Icelandic chips companies. The last time we were in Iceland in August 2025, I bought these chips, which they have to import from Norway. Looks like there may be a business opportunity there?
turkey: migros store-brand sucuk flavor
Aside from running an art center in Istanbul with abovementioned business partner, I also made money working for a company that monitored products new to the Turkish market. One of my product purchasing locations was Migros. Sucuk is a quesey sort of sausage made of ????
poland: ham flavor
I’m not sure of the brand name of these chips, but they want you to know they are made from Country-Style Potatoes (WIEJSKIE ZIEMNIACZKI)—whatever those are. The real spelling of my last name is Wyszynska so when I go to Poland, I like to buy chips named with lots of ‘Z’s and lacking vowels.
USA: Kettle Truffel and sea salt
In 2024 I was diagnosed and underwent treatment for cancer. Because of my health care coverage, I had to drive 3 hours to Morgantown, WV for every appointment, surgery, and test. I purchased this bag to cheer myself somewhere along I-68 as my husband drove me towards potentially scary news.
SWEDEN: cHILI AND bEARNAISE sAUCE fLAVOR
The company, OLW, is the instigator of the Swedish “tradition” of Fredagsmys—Friday Cozy. You come home in the dark after work, turn on the TV and eat a bunch of junk food with your family. There is even a song for it. I don’t really find potato chips ‘cozy’, surprisingly.
Middle Row, L to R
poland: Chakalaka flavor
My family is Polish. My relative, Stefan Wyszynski, is a saint. Literally. But I first went to Poland for an arts conference and met a man there who became my boyfriend for a time. So I kept going back. In 2009, I bought this bag featuring a traditional South African flavor. Did you know that sushi is jokingly considered Polish cuisine. So, not so weird Poles might be into curry and tomato flavors?
EGYPT: MASRAWY KABOB FLAVOR
I love Cairo. In 2009 I went to a party in the Zamalek District at the residence of the Spanish Cultural attache. I was mad at him for not hiring me to foot juggle at the party, but went anyway because everyone else at the conference was going. I got drunk and bragged that I had been drinking water straight from the tap for days and still hadn’t gotten sick. That night I got sick. Was it the water? The alcohol? Or the chips?
USA: Smoked Gouda Flavor
My husband became a U.S. citizen in 2020 during the height of the pandemic. Because most government offices were closed, the only place he could do his test and ceremony was in Pittsburg, PA. I wasn’t allowed into the building, so I ate these chips in the car. Pennsylvania has the most per capita chip companies in the US, FYI.
POLAND: Lorenz Grilled beef ribs
Yes, Poland releases tons of “NEW” chips flavors all the time. When I bought this bag in Gdansk in 2010, I had just visited an art center in the shipyards which were the site of Lech Walesa’s “Solidarity” movement.. My grandfather’s cousin(?)—the Cardinal Wyszynski—was Walesa’s mediator through the whole thing. It was the start of a NEW way to treat workers in Poland.
england: walker’s keralan curry
The band Def Leppard is from Sheffield. As are a ton of other bands. I didn’t see any music while I was there, though. I was visiting my friend, Richard. I almost walked into the street in front of a car because I looked the wrong way into traffic. I was trying to cross to buy these chips at an outdoor kiosk.
TURKEY: Cipso Anatolian pastirma Flavor
Part of a ‘regional flavors’ series, the brand decided Anatolia is characterized by pastrma. I don’t know if you recognize the word, but the flavor is basically pastrami. I bought the bag in 2012 in Istanbul, where I only ate pastrami once in ten years ‘cuz it would have been impolite not to.
JAPAN: UME (pickled plum) and wasabi flavor
I would love to tell you I had been to Japan, but I bought this bag at H-Mart in Frederick, Maryland. I HAVE been to Japantown in San Francisco where I lived for several years. It was my go-to neighborhood for cute Christmas gifts: buckwheat neck pillows, leather-bound journals, and hamster calendars.
italy; san carlo proscuitto
Mi amore, mi amore, espresso macchiato macchiato por favore . . . Not to be stereotyping Italians, I just wanted to quote one of my favorite entries from last year’s “Eurovision Song Contest” My parents brought this bag home with them after vacation in Italy. They ate the chips.