Junk Food Nation, as I watched Tom Brady destroy the Miami Dolphins last night, I began to wonder: what was the greatest LIVE sports moment I’d ever seen?  The some of the highest and lowest moments of sports I’d seen on TV were easy, and I remembered exactly where I was each time:

HIGHS: Games 4 and 5 of the 2001 World Series (tiny apartment in NYC), Aaron Boone’s HR in the 2003 ALCS off Tim Wakefield (ex-girlfriend’s couch as she slept, I was jumping up and down making no sound), 2011 Women’s World Cup Quarterfinal (condo living room)

LOWS: Super Bowls 1990-1993 (parents’ living room, lying on the ground), Game 4 of the 2004 ALCS (law school apartment, watching in horror as Dave Roberts stole second)

But LIVE sports moments? Like, seen it with my own eyes, hugged fans near me, moment? Err…that’s a toughie. More after the jump.

Today’s junk food is derived from another junk food I love. In each junk food category, I have my favorites. Cookies = Oreos. Corn Chips = Doritos. And within potato chips, I have a special, special weakness for the following:

Ruffles Cheddar & Sour Cream potato chips are a Fourth of July flavor firework packet of amazingness. I’m not reviewing these, but I’d be remiss not to mention that these chips have everything I look for – great flavor, great crunch, and that certain something that makes you want to but chip after chip after chip into your mouth.  Ruffles Cheddar & Sour Cream – you complete me.

So when I walked down the grocery aisle and saw these Pepperidge Farm cracker chips, I was intrigued. Unless I’m blind, it was the first snack I’d seen that attempted to also do a pure cheddar and sour cream flavor on a chip besides Ruffles.  I felt like Pepperidge Farm was trying to be a cover band, playing other companies’ greatest hits. Dare they try this??

These Cheddar & Sour Cream Potato Cracker Chips are so new, they’re not even on the company website. Delivered in a lightweight foil/plastic bag, I was eager to try these.

The concept of cracker chips is an interesting one.  I guess crackers are a baked good made from flour dough.  Chips, as a word, is pretty subjective – potato chips are thin sliced potatoes cooked into a crisp, corn chips are thin slices of cornmeal substance, cooked into a chip.  I guess cracker chips are essentially flour dough chips…

You know, this discussion is as boring to read as it is to type.  Moving on.

I appreciate that they enlarged the picture to show the texture of the chip, and I like seeing what these will look like. Lots of flavor right on the chip, it looks like, with some good dips and curves on the surface to add some flair.

Honestly, though, does anyone ever fill chip bowls to OVERFLOWING? The picture above looks like an elaborate Jenga puzzle.  Moreover, who uses chip bowls? I prefer to tip bag back, dump chips into mouth. Yep…that’s attractive.

See this picture wants to suck me back into the discussion of chips versus crackers…but I’m not gonna do it.

These cracker chips, on first glance, looked tasty! As the poured out of the bag, I could feel/see the crispness just in the way they fell over each other and the sounds they made.  Definitely no rhyme or reason to the shapes of the cracker chips, however.  Did they plan it this way?

Yep, they might’ve planned it this way. No consistency of shape didn’t bother me though. Each chip was visibly doused with light orange colored powder, which is all I cared about.

When I opened the bag, the same flavor odor wafted up that I was so familiar with from the Ruffles version. Artificially bright cheese smell, with some onion-y and garlic-y undertones. Delicious.

One bite and I was sold.  These were VERY good.  NOT like the Ruffles brand potato chip, mind you, those will always be in a class of their own. But these were a great alternative – or maybe not even an alternative, but a stand alone snack on its own.

They were VERY crispy – often time “cracker chips” tend to be more crunchy than crispy, but these were light, airy, and crispy just like a regular potato or corn chip. Provided a good solid crunch on the teeth that was very satisfying.

Flavor-wise, very good.  Cheddar-y cheddar-y cheddar-y – with a good bit of onion and garlic taste to the background, just like (1) a real baked potato with all the fixins, and (2) the Ruffles chip. Before I knew it, I’d plowed through much of the bag.

Although not exactly the same, these cracker chips had the same extra something that the Ruffles version had – eatability. They were very easy to eat – there was no bad aftertaste or greasy feeling that prevented you from popping another crisp into your mouth.

You cover of a classic was awesome, Pepperidge Farms. Nice work.

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I’ve been to a ton of sporting events live, but none were that memorable. I’ve never been to a post-season event, nor an all-star game. I guess my greatest LIVE sports moment was witnessing Ryan Zimmerman hit a walk-off home run in the first game in the new Nationals Stadium.  Brand new stadium, I was there with some friends, and when Zimmerman hit the HR off a division rival, the whole place exploded!  It was quite an adrenaline rush.

Wow. I need to get out more.

What’s your greatest sports moment? Let me know in the comments below, or on Twitter @junkfoodguy.

Sincerely, Junk Food Guy