Is there a more perfect snack food than the potato chip? In creation, it is simple. In flavor, its varieties are almost endless.

According to Research and Markets, Americans consume more than 6.5 billion pounds of salty snacks per year, a large portion of which are potato chips. For human consumption worldwide, potato chips are second only to rice.

The whole thing started with a hassled short-order cook. In 1853, George Crum, a cook at Moon Lake Lodge in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., served an order of french fries to a customer. The man complained that they were too thick, so Crum made another order sliced more thinly. Again, they were sent back. In a classic fit of cook's pique, Crum sliced the next order so thinly that when they came out of the fryer, they were too thin for the customer to get a fork into.

And the potato chip was born. Today, according to the University of Michigan, the average American eats 16.9 pounds of potato chips a year.

The simplicity of their manufacture means anyone with a ready supply of potatoes and a vat of hot oil can cook potato chips.

Because potatoes have always been the ultimate blank slate, flavors vary radically. The one nearly universal constant is salt. The most popular flavor, according to the Snack Food Association, is plain salted. But the flavor rainbow beyond that is stunning, with regional favorites such as crab chips in Baltimore and various Cajun flavors in Louisiana adding to the nationally known varieties such as barbecue, cheese and sour cream and onion.

Our intrepid tasting panel compares several varieties of plain chips against each other as well as several "cheese" varieties. They were compared on both taste and crunch.

One non-traditional chip, a cheese "veggie" chip from Flat Earth, was included in the testing. Veggie chips are one of the hottest things going in the snack-food industry right now, and we wanted to see how well they stacked up against the real thing.

(Pringles were not included because they are made from made of dehydrated potato flakes mixed with other ingredients.)

The Plain

Cape Cod: 150 calories, 8 grams fat, no cholesterol, 110 mg sodium per serving.
Cape Cod chips are kettle cooked, meaning they are cooked one batch at a time, rather than as part of an assembly line-type process. This results in a crunchier chip but can in some cases yield tooth-breaking hardness. The Cape Cod chips topped our rankings with a score of 95 out of a possible 120 points. Testers liked the well-balanced saltiness and perfect crunch. The only complaint was that the chips tended to be rather small, making dips a messy proposition.

Lay's Original: 150 calories, 10 grams fat, no cholesterol, 180 mg sodium per serving.
Frito-Lay is the largest snack-food maker in the world, but the test results here show the potato chip world may have passed it by. The Lay's original chips brought up the rear of the pack, scoring 68 out of 120 points. Testers pointed to the excessive saltiness and greasy mouth-feel as down marks, as well as a too-light, even somewhat soggy crunch.

Wise All-Natural: 150 calories, 10 grams fat, no cholesterol, 190 mg sodium per serving.
The other continuous-process chip in the testing didn't fare much better than Lay's, garnering 77 out of 120 points. The complaints were similar to those concerning the Lay's chips.

Kettle Lightly Salted: 150 calories, 9 grams fat, no cholesterol, 110 mg sodium per serving.
The Kettle chips (kettle-cooked, of course) prove that lower salt doesn't have to mean weaker flavor, capturing 92 out of 120 points for a solid second-place showing. The crunch of these chips took the highest rating of any tested. Tellingly, this was one of only two bags left empty after the post-testing munching period. Besides the crunch, testers appreciated the fact that the potato flavor, light as it is, was truly present along with the salt.

Full Circle All-Natural150 calories, 9 grams fat, no cholesterol, 100 mg sodium per serving.
The Full Circle chips are sold among the veggie and organic chips in most grocery stores but don't bear the organic label. They are kettle-cooked chips and come with the lowest sodium per serving of any tested. While I applaud their dedication to low sodium, it didn't help in the ratings, with a score of 80 out of 120, landing the chips firmly in the middle of the pack. Testers pointed to a weak flavor and too-hard crunch as demerits but liked the lack of greasy aftertaste after consuming a handful.

So, the largest-selling brand ends up at the back of the pack, and the Massachusetts upstart edges out the gourmet Kettle brand for top pick.

The Cheesy

Ten years ago, this most likely would have been sour cream and onion category, but tastes change with the times, and now that flavor is not even produced by many manufacturers. Almost every one of them, however, produces a cheese flavor, although each is subtly different from the others in the exact type of cheese and what other flavors accompany it.

Kettle New York Cheddar With Herbs: 150 calories, 9 grams fat, no cholesterol, 190 mg sodium per serving.
These were the highest-scoring chips in the entire test, pulling in 110 out of a possible 120 points. Testers pronounced the crunch to be excellent and the cheese flavor strong without being overpowering. This was the other bag left empty after the munching period, and in fact was nearly so after the testing.

Wise Cheddar And Sour Cream Ridgies: 150 calories, 9 grams fat, no cholesterol, 190 mg sodium.
You can say one thing for Wise: They're consistent. The 77 points Wise scored in the plain chips was mirrored in the cheese category, but here that was poor enough for last place. The major knock here was the flavor, which was described as nonexistent and buried by the salt. The color of the chips promised plenty of flavor, but the tastebuds indicated a lack of follow-through.

Cape Cod Cheddar Jack & Sour Cream: 140 calories, 7 grams fat, no cholesterol, 190 mg sodium.
Cape Cod and Kettle were neck-and-neck in the first category, and the same was true here, with the cheddar jack chips netting 107 points. Testers appreciated the clean cheese taste that was unmuddled by other flavor notes and pronounced the crunch to be excellent.

Flat Earth Farmland Cheddar Veggie Crisps: 130 calories, 5 grams fat, no cholesterol, 190 mg sodium.
The one "nonstandard" chip in the test managed a respectable finish, netting 90 out of 120 possible points. The flavor was described as slightly sweet, with a good cheese tang. The crunch, while almost completely unlike a true potato chip, was satisfying. One tester described the texture as a bit bready," and another didn't think the sweet flavor belonged in a cheese chip.

Lay's Cheddar & Sour Cream: 150 calories, 10 grams fat, less than 5 mg cholesterol, 230 mg sodium per serving.
Lay's put the highest salt content in the ratings to good use here, with 96 points putting its chips in the middle of ratings. The flavor scored a near-perfect 58 out of 60 points, with a weak score in the crunch category spoiling the party. One tester mentioned that he could have eaten a whole bag if the crunch had been a bit stouter.

With the cheese-flavored chips, we find the same two brands neck-and-neck at the top of the rankings, with the order reversed.

Conclusions

What is clear from both ratings is that the kettle-cooked chips beat out their continuous-process counterparts. The chips are crunchier, hold flavors better and taste less greasy. They tend to be more expensive -- up to double the price of the continuous-process chips -- but to hardcore chipheads, that doesn't usually matter.

Before we go, my apologies to devotees of such favorites as Zapp's, Utz and the venerable Charles Chips. The sampling was drawn from those available at three grocery stores, two major chain stores and one independent. Those chips were not available at any of them, and thus were not included.