Product information
About
Thick, ridged potato chips with flakes of cheese melted onto them. Calbee drops the cheese on the instant the chips leave the fryer, so it fuses into the surface instead of dusting it. It leads on cheese, with a savoury-sweet tomato and oregano note and a little warmth behind it, not the pepperoni-pizza flavour the name suggests. This is the bag Japan sells, which is not the Calbee pizza chip on the Australian supermarket shelf.
ピザポテト: "piza poteto". The black bag with the Italian flag stripe across the top.
What you're getting
- You can see the cheese on the chip: flakes part-melted into it rather than sprayed on as powder. Expect it rich and heavy; that is the design, not an accident.
- Ridged and thick-cut: a deep crunch, with grooves built to hold more cheese. More substantial than a standard potato chip, and nowhere near as hard as Calbee's Kataage chips, its other range, fried long and slow until the chip itself dries out.
- There is meat in it: the seasoning is built on beef powder and little salami-style pieces, with chicken and gelatine derivatives as well. That catches most people out on a potato chip, and it means it is not vegetarian, halal or kosher.
- It is a small bag: 60 g is about a third of an Australian chip bag. That is the Japanese size, not a short fill.
- The cheese lands unevenly: some chips carry a thick patch, some almost none. That is how it is topped, and it is not a fault.
- Allergens: contains milk, wheat, soy and apple; the milk is in the cheese flakes and the cheese powder. Australia's allergen chart has no apple category, so apple cannot appear in the pack's allergen box here — check the ingredients, not the chart; ours is the fuller list.
- Allergens, one more: the beef, pork, chicken and gelatine in the ingredients are declared allergens in Japan and ordinary ingredients here.
Two things worth knowing before you buy. The Calbee pizza chips in Australian supermarkets are a different product: a 55 g Hong Kong-made bag seasoned with cheese powder rather than melted flakes, so this will not taste like the one you may have tried here. And do not put these in the microwave to melt the cheese: you will find that tip online, but Calbee itself says not to, because a snack this low in moisture and high in oil can smoke or catch fire.
Ingredients
The maker's ingredient list, translated from the Japanese pack. Anything after the break is an additive — the Japanese label lists those separately.
Potato (Japanese or American), vegetable oil, cheese-flavour flakes, sugar, glucose, salt, garlic powder, hydrolysed protein (contains soy), powdered vegetable fat, beef powder (contains wheat, chicken, gelatine), vegetable extract powder, cheese powder, meat-flavour seasoning, red chilli, parsley, salami-style chips (contains pork), beef extract powder, oregano, tomato powder
seasoning (amino acids etc.), flavouring (apple-derived), colours (carotenoid, caramel, red koji), emulsifier, acidity regulator, spice extract, smoke flavouring, sweetener (stevia)
The printed label on the pack is always the authority on ingredients and allergens, not this page — please read it in full before you rely on our summary. If you are unsure about an ingredient, contact us.
Allergens
The maker declares:
- Allergens
-
- Milk
- Wheat
- Soy
- Apple
- Dietary notes
-
The seasoning is built on beef powder and little salami-style pieces, with chicken and gelatine derivatives as well. That is four kinds of meat in a potato chip, which catches most people out. It is not vegetarian, halal or kosher.
The printed label on the pack is always the authority on ingredients and allergens, not this page — please read it in full before you rely on our summary. If you are unsure about an ingredient, contact us.
Details
- Maker
- Calbee
- Net contents
- One 60 g bag, single serve
Our guide
How to eat it
- Have something fizzy beside you. It is rich and salty, and a beer or a cola cuts through it.
- Don't judge it on the first chip. The cheese is spread unevenly through the bag: a bare chip early, and the next handful can be thick with it.
- Don't microwave them to re-melt the cheese. There is a tip going round about doing that, and Calbee's own advice is not to: a snack this low in moisture and high in oil can smoke or catch fire.
- It leaves a cheese-and-garlic aftertaste that hangs about. Worth knowing if you are eating them before you see anyone.
In their own words
What Japanese buyers say
What do the numbers mean?
Counts of how many reviews mentioned each thing, not a score. One review can mention several. Every quote is our translation, with the original Japanese beneath it.
- What they like
Thick chips with a tomato-and-spice pizza flavour plus a rich cheesiness — highly satisfying.
厚みのあるチップスでトマト・スパイスのピザの風味に濃厚なチーズ感があって満足感が高い。
from mognavi
- What they grumble about
It's tasty, but my impression is there's little in it for the size of the bag.
美味しいですが、袋に対して量が少ないという印象です。
mentioned in 11 of 84 reviews we readfrom monolog
- What they like
I love that crunchy zaku-zaku texture too, it's genuinely delicious!
ザクザク食感もホント美味しくて好き!
from monolog
- What they like
Other companies put out pizza-flavour chips, but they're still no match for the real Pizza Potato!
他社でピザ味のポテチが出ていますが、やっぱり本物のピザポテトには敵いませんね!
from monolog
- What they like
Ridged potato that's neither too thin nor too thick, topped here and there with cheese of a soft texture.
薄すぎず厚すぎないギザギザのポテトに、所々やわらかい食感のチーズがトッピング。
from mognavi
- What they grumble about
There was hardly any cheese on it at all. Really disappointing.
チーズがほとんどついていませんでした。すごくがっかりです
mentioned in 6 of 84 reviews we readfrom monolog
- What they like
When you open it, it smells of real pizza.
開封すると、本物のピザの香りがします。
from mognavi
- What they like
A snack that goes with fizzy drinks and beer.
炭酸やビールに合うお菓子。
mentioned in 7 of 84 reviews we readfrom monolog
- What they like
The moment I took a bite I understood why it's popular. Strongly flavoured, just how I like it.
一口食べた瞬間にこれは人気なわけだと納得。味濃いめで私好み。
from mognavi
- What they grumble about
It's unmistakably delicious, but the aftertaste and the breath bother me, so I have to eat it with my later schedule in mind.
間違いない美味しさですが、後味と口臭が気になる為、後のスケジュールを考えながら食べないと。
mentioned in 3 of 84 reviews we readfrom mognavi
- What they like
It's that sinful flavour you occasionally crave.
たまに食べたくなる背徳感の味です。。
from monolog
- What they like
Reliably tasty! I couldn't stop my hand and finished it in no time.
安定の旨さ！手が止まらなくてあっという間に食べきった。
from mognavi
- What they grumble about
A lot of them were broken, which was a shame.
割れている物が多くて残念でした。
mentioned in 3 of 84 reviews we readfrom monolog
- What they like
Actually it's my first time with Pizza Potato. The ridged crisps are properly crunchy.
実はピザポテトって初めて。ギザギザポテチはざくざく。
from mognavi
- What they like
I've been buying it for over 15 years, since high school.
高校の頃から15年以上買ってます。
from monolog
- What they like
When I want something junky — something strongly flavoured — this is often what I pick.
ジャンクなもの(味が濃い物)が食べたい時によくこちらをセレクトします。
from mognavi
- What they grumble about
There's less spice and cheese than there used to be, and a lot of hard flavourless chips, so it's underwhelming.
昔よりスパイスとチーズの量が減って味のない硬いポテトが多いのでいまいち
mentioned in 5 of 84 reviews we readfrom monolog
- What they like
With its nicely judged thickness and satisfying bite, this Pizza Potato goes well with drinks and you can taste the rich depth of the cheese.
こちらの程良い厚みで食べ応えがあるピザポテトはお酒にもよく合い、チーズの濃厚なコクも感じられます。
from best-oishi
Real quotes from Japanese review sites (mognavi, monolog, best-oishi), translated by us. We show no star rating from those sites.
The maker
Where it comes from
- Calbee
Pizza Potato exists because Japan discovered home-delivery pizza. In the early 1990s Calbee's R&D director, Eisaburo Endo, followed the success of the company's okonomiyaki chips, okonomiyaki being Japan's savoury pancake, with an Italian one: a convenience-store trial in 1990, a first attempt in 1991, and then Pizza Potato nationwide in September 1992.
The cheese was the hard part. Calbee's answer was to drop the flakes onto the chips the instant they came out of the fryer, hot enough that the cheese melts into the surface but not so hot that it sticks to the conveyor instead. Demand outran the line, so Endo stood at the Ibaraki plant scooping cheese onto chips by hand, seven or eight hours a day, and went home smelling so strongly of pizza spice that people noticed on the train.
It has been on sale ever since, through fifteen recipes: the current one since November 2024.
Product facts here are checked against the maker's own page: calbee.co.jp (opens in a new tab)
Often bought together
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Calbee Pizza Potato — Japanese Cheese-Topped Chips, 60g
$4.75
You are on this one
