Happy Cheese Popcorn Day, friends. A made-up day that marks the momentous occasion when we decide once and for all who makes the best (widely available) cheese popcorn on the market. But we’re going to do one better, we’re also running three “category” rankings — in parentheticals — for white Cheddar, orange cheddar, and spicy varieties. Is it excessive? Indeed!

But we are completists if nothing else. Just look at all the colas we drank only to land on the fact that Coke is the best!

Trying thirty-seven popcorns not only takes time and gastrointestinal resolve but also a wide array of varieties to sample. To that end, supermarket chains, gas stations, Amazon marketplace, and many other snack purveyors were scoured for their most premium cheese popcorn options. Key factors considered in the ranking include:

1. Overall first impressions.
2. Taste/flavor.
3. Seasoning.
4. Texture.
5. Cheesiness.

You may agree or disagree with the views and occasionally snide humor represented herein, but please recall they are singular and should be considered as such. No arguing online. No twitter disputes. This is official and will stand for time immemorial.

37 – World Market White Cheddar – (#14 in White Cheddar) (not available online)

World Market’s White Cheddar Popcorn is produced by one of my favorite snack havens, World Market, where many a snack has been discovered anew and sampled. Especially in suburban snack and culture deserts, there is extra gratitude attributed to World Market’s mere existence and support of curating new snack offerings – particularly international and regional items one would rarely find at a local chain market. Tragically, World Market’s White Cheddar Popcorn has next to no flavor. The bag boldly claims “delicious fluffy popcorn flavored white cheddar cheese” and those are all true things, minus the delicious part.

On the sunny side, the packaging has a cool travel motif, and the actual popcorn kernels are a nice size. The flavor profile almost has a full butter note, and mixed with a very light seasoning on the popcorn, the combination is just not that cheesy. There’s a smidgen of cheesiness but a smattering could have gone a long way towards balancing out the buttery saltiness of this white cheddar flavor.

Bottom Line:

No lost love for good friend World Market but purchasing another bag of this white cheddar popcorn is unlikely to be in the cards. Admittedly, the output here is a little disappointing considering the high regard for their snack acumen – one would think as much pride and meticulousness would be applied to their in-house offerings. Instead, the impression left is that this was an outsourced afterthought.

36 – Lesser Evil “No Cheese” Cheesiness – $4.33

Our Last sample in the rankings extravaganza was the Lesser Evil brand and their “No-Cheese Cheeseiness popcorn — made with coconut oil and nutritional yeast instead of the normal cheesy powder or coating. Truly, this popcorn is not cheese flavored, but the intent of the flavor is “cheesy,” so let’s see how it stacks up to others boasting the real thing.

Off the bat, this is the type of popcorn you’d find at a hipster gathering and nowhere with people whose first priority for food is “it tastes good.”

The puffs are a nice size, let’s get that out of the way, so Lesser Evil delivers in texture, undoubtedly. Unfortunately, the seasoning on some of the pieces is a little bit aggressive, where it’s concentrated and a little bit overdoing it — like your short friend with the Napoleon complex. The pieces where there’s only a light sprinkle of seasoning are more palatable. Overall, the Lesser Evil, nutritional yeast-based seasoning is not a favorite flavor, though in less-saturated spots it’s an acceptable undertone.

The popcorn itself has enough flavor sans nutritional yeast to carry off the intent of creating a no-cheese cheesiness. Lesser Evil doing too much.

Bottom Line:

Lesser Evil is one of the lesser favorites, but for those who are vegans, they deliver on the forbidden cheese experience. The flavor profile present doesn’t necessarily have the creaminess of cheese but does display the tang and saltiness often in cheese. Lesser Evil did a nice job creating an alternative to the average cheese popcorn and can be found where you find intriguing alternatives to lots of average items – Whole Foods.

35 – Wholesome Pantry White Cheddar (#13 in White Cheddar) – $2.59

Wholesome Pantry is another regional chain supermarket entry from our friends at Shoprite in the greater Eastern US. Wholesome Pantry is Shoprite’s artisanal, organic food brand, with no artificial this that or a third or fourth. Wholesome Pantry is also Non-GMO and blaise blah, au francais oui oui mon amore. Unfortunately, their white cheddar popcorn is just not great. The dominant flavor is salty, which doesn’t necessarily scream healthier, but perhaps organic doesn’t imply healthy despite the likely inference.

Whole Pantry’s kernels are light and fluffy, you could call them “nice”, so well done on that. The cheese note comes via a powdery seasoning, but the aftertaste is more salty than cheesy, as I mentioned. In the front you taste the cheese, but nothing particularly distinct or delicious.

Bottom Line:

Wholesome Pantry’s White Cheddar popcorn is disappointingly mild and mid. Wholesome Pantry is on the lower rung of the spectrum in this cheesy championship. Nice try, Shop Rite.

34 – Pipcorn Spicy Cheddar (#9 in Spicy Cheese) – $3.79

Pipcorn products have been spotted on some of the artisanal/organic grocery aisles and Whole Foods of the world. The kernels are ½ the average size, which seems to be what Pipcorn is all about. Their heirloom corn is supposedly delicious, nutritious, and sustainable according to the packaging but truth is told in snacking experience. This is mini popcorn, so with that comes a smaller product and apparently Pipcorn gets the best seeds, so intuitively they make the best popcorn.

Right?

The Tabasco flavor is hot on the spice trail, with a hot lasting heat on the palate. It’s a nice burn though not particularly cheesy. The cheese element here is more of a tang than anything — it’s not too robust and the seasoning is pretty light. Overall, the Pipcorn Spicy Cheddar with Tabasco is somewhat mediocre. The seasoning is pretty dynamic because of the heat and the cheese, but the cheese aspect feels like a subtle undertone – mainly you taste the Tabasco spicy tang. Texture wise, the small kernels are really fun and would be great to sample in other flavors. But Pipcorn’s Spicy Cheddar flavor is not particularly beloved by this reviewer.

Not sure the real Pip, Scottie, would approve.

Bottom Line:

Pipcorn is a great product but Spicy Cheddar guest starring Tabasco is not the jam, jelly, preserves, or marmalade. It’s really not bad, but also not great. See above for where to find other Pipcorn products

33 – Copper Kettle Habanero Cheddar (#8 in Spicy Cheese) – $11.00

Copper Kettle was an Amazon discovery and to get better acquainted the Habanero Cheddar was only a click away. The brand is unfamiliar but the basic cylindrical tube is a classy way to package any snack and since the brand is from Indiana there’s the Midwest snack knowledge at work. Commonly, Habanero is renowned as a high-level hot pepper so you have to expect some pretty good heat and be ready to hydrate, that’s just simple mathematics.

Overall, the taste is unique if you’re new to the combo of cheesy, sweet, and spicy. In the past, Mexican and Persian snacks have been sampled that are fruity and canvassed in chilis, but then you add the cheese here, and it’s another layer of snack intrigue. The flavor is high-key funky, but also strangely tasty.

As far as the flavor itself, it’s a sweet tang because of the spice and caramel mixing together – yes there is a caramel coating underneath the spicy cheese seasoning. Most bizarrely, the dominant taste is almost a fruity flavor, but there’s no fruit involved. The cheesiness factor is just a little bit cheesy, and a faux orange cheddar flavor at that. The texture is nice and crunchy, the layer of caramel supplying a minefield of possibilities for your next dentist visit. The puffs are a nice size, not too many little pieces – lots of big ones, which is like getting the bag without the crumbs on the bottom.

As far as cheesiness, you can discern the cheese in the mix, but it’s not the dominant flavor.

Bottom Line:

Overall it’s Copper Kettle’s Habanero Cheddar is oddly intriguing, and has a palpable heat to it. You can eat a few pieces but not a lot at a time, surely not a handful. The flavor is a conversation piece, if you’re down at the VFW or WeWork, and there may not be too many other snacks in existence that taste identical. No one wants to say it out loud and be that guy, but the Habanero cheddar note is a little vomit-y on the aftertaste with the sweet spicy savory combo. Not in the best way but also… not in the worst way, if that makes sense.

32 – Popcorn Indiana White (#12 in White Cheddar) – $4.19

Popocorn Indiana is also one of those whole grain, real cheese, no artificial preservatives, non-GMO-corn type of brands of popcorn – trying to make all the right conscious snacking decisions so you don’t have to. Ironically, the brand is called Popcorn Indiana, but made in Ohio. Perhaps Indiana is seen through the Midwest as the more health-conscious snacking cousin to Ohio, supplying the explanation for the curious brand name of an Ohio-based company?

Rest assured, several research teams are currently seeking validation on these controversial snack queries.

The popcorn itself eats orange cheddar despite the light dusting of white powder. Decently seasoned, Popcorn Indiana’s white cheddar has a light tang of cheesiness though not super cheesy – you might call it medium cheesiness. Popcorn Indiana’s kernels are of moderate size, texture fluffy with a light crunch on the finish.

Bottom Line:

Overall decent, Popcorn Indiana’s white cheddar is not super flavorful — it hits pretty light. If you’re served this somewhere or pick it up from a CVS (there have been multiple sightings as of late), you may be bummed out that you can eat it and not have to wipe your hands somewhere for a while. You can eat quite a bit of Popcorn Indiana’s white cheddar popcorn and not feel bad about yourself, but it may also take that long to start developing a cheesy aftertaste and any sort of cheesy finger residue.

31 – Skinny Pop Aged White Cheddar (#11 in White Cheddar) – $3.79

Skinny Pop wasn’t an easily recognizable brand 10 years ago, but like Boom Chicka Pop it’s another one of those pesky brands good-for-you brands like Boom Chicka Pop rampant these days. Now you can find brands like Skinny Pop if you’re someone that lives near an artisanal market with fill-in-the-blank-free everything, a decently curated convenience store, or probably even a Walmart at this point. Skinny Pop uses real cheese which is not a guarantee in 2023 when it comes to healthy snack options. Not only that, Skinny Pop is also from popcorn-persnickety Chicago, so they can’t half-step on flavor — even though they’re catering to a more health-conscious crowd, right?

As expected, Skinny Pop trends a little light in the flavor department, there is cheese powder but very light white cheddar – not brimming with flavor. If you’re fiending for white cheddar Skinny Pop covers your base. Skinny Pop kernels themselves are prototypical, very fluffy and only moderately salty. The cheese element really runs the show here as the featured ingredients.

Bottom Line:

Skinny is not poor, not exceptional but upper middle of the road in a cul de sac of a hipster subdivision in the white cheddar part of town. The cheesiness is not assertive or creamy cheesiness – this is a case of cheesy powder — and because of that subtle lightness, one could inhale a lot of Skinny Pop in a single sitting or standing.

30 – Copper Kettle Cheese Corn (#11 in Orange Cheddar) – $23.00

Copper Kettle is a brand you can pick up and put in your Amazon cart and probably nowhere else nearby. It has no real label on the packaging, but we’ll be the guinea pigs anyway and take whatever potential Ls may follow. The cylindrical container is a nice shape when you’re grabbing a handful as well as a clean packaging presentation.

Copper Kettle’s Cheese Corn product is high on the cheesy scale and involves a really substantial coating of seasoning and a consequent moistness. Bite-wise Copper Kettle uses nice size kernels that have good crunchy texture, though there’s a little dampness to some of them because of the saturation of coating. Some of the bites you have to wince from the amount of cheese flavor. The flavor is a little sickening on the taste buds, like when you toss 80% of the noodles and make EXXXTRACheesy Mac & Cheese from a box.

Copper Kettle Cheese Corn’s general flavor is really just that one-note type of cheese without sharpness and tang (which is also a great name for a movie cop duo).

Bottom Line:

Despite being a high-quality product, Copper Kettle Cheese Corn is too cheesy for some people. Some people being the writer of this slog of quasi-encyclopedic cheese popcorn rankings. The main issue attributed to Copper Kettle’s somewhat low ranking is the most important flavor ingredient here – the cheese, which is very basic cheesiness – just salty and cheesy.

Copper Kettle is an interesting take that didn’t hit all the notes but still may pique the interest of snackers satiated by that pure cheese punch.

29 – 4700 BC – Hawaiian Barbecue Cheese – $5.50

4700 BC is one of a few unusual entries – completely an enigma as the first Hawaiian Barbecue Cheese popcorn ever sampled, it’s difficult to scrutinize and judge objectively, since it’s a completely new flavor profile. 4700 BC is a product of India, creating instant intrigue – and described as “mushroom corn, coated with signature hand-crafted cheddar cheese sprinkled with smoky bbq,” an immediate sampling is required. 4700 BC’s products have never been witnessed in real life, only in the realms of the interweb.

The flavor adventure starts off uber-sweet, then jabs with a bbq spice smoky note, and then finishes with some sort of pepperiness on the back end. The dynamic flavor is truly quite tasty, with pretty crunchy kernels, you be glad you brought some mints or gum in your pocket, after even just a handful of the bbq cheese corn. The spice and bbq flavor both eat oniony, but the sweetness is actually a nice counterpoint to balance out the oniony tang. The cheese is a bit of a bench player in this game, patiently chewing on bubblegum, waiting to go into the game, but mildly fading into the background.

Bottom Line:

Overall, 4700 BC’s Hawaiian BBQ cheese popcorn is actually not too cheesy at all, but the combination of flavors and novelty suffice to make it a must-try – if you can find it. If you want to impress people with your esoteric and elite snack taste, bringing some Indian Hawaiian BBQ Cheese popcorn is a light flex, but also something you can’t munch too crazy on, due to the spice and strongly flavor-forward seasoning.

If you can acquire the Hawaian BBQ cheese popcorn, see if you can acquire the taste for it too.

28 – Brim’s Cheese (#10 Orange Cheddar) – $3.99

Brim’s is from Tennesee, Bartlett in particular – which we’ll have to research further and see if there’s any relation to your favorite pear varietal or gin. The rust orange metallic bag comes with a bible verse, Isaiah 40:31, if you’re familiar already you will be pleased to see this on your cheddar popcorn bag. Brim’s is a brand that you may not find easily locally, but if you check Amazon and Google, it’s out there and ships like many interesting and unusual snacks do nowadays.

Brim’s has the straightforward salty cheesiness that’s a prerequisite for any self-respecting orange cheddar popcorn. The popcorn has a light orange hue with the Brim’s seasoning. The popcorn product itself has a good crunchy fluffy texture and nice pop. The kernels are pretty large, much like Brim’s market share in the snack game in Bartlett.

Bottom Line:

Overall definitely something that is easy to eat and not offensive in any way shape or form. If you’re near Stanky Creek (a real place in Bartlett, TN) be sure to pick up some fresh Brim’s before you head back home, now.

27 – Pop Art Cheddar Jalapeno (#7 Spicy Cheese) – $22.50 for 5

Pop Art’s Jalapeno Cheddar is the first Avocado oil-based entry and the bag looks like Roy Lichtenstein and Andy Warhol’s baby made the vibrant design, which is fun and unlike the usual. Pop Art is a newly discovered brand from Utah and Utah rarely appears on the snackdar and munchie monitor as a snack manufacturer, which makes Pop Art a novel try.

Off the jump, the flavor is very light cheesiness tones, but definitely cheesy. The seasoning integrates nutritional yeast, which is a bit funky. After eating a handful of these fluffy puffs you start to get some heat on the back end – the jalapeno here is more of a creeper heat, but not overpowering. Pop Art lets you live another day.

Bottom Line:

Pop Art’s Jalapeno Cheddar popcorn is nearly the least spicy in the spicy category, but the bright side is the popcorn is easy to eat. There’s not a lot of flavor here to complain about, one way or the other.

26 – Boom Chicka Pop White Cheddar (#10 White Cheddar) – $3.99

Boom Chicka Pop AKA Angie’s is one of those brands you see at the airports, at newsstands, or bodegas where they’re trying to do all the organic foods these days. Let’s call a spade a spade, you’re not aware of AKA Angie’s, but you do know Boom Chicka Pop. They probably even have Boom Chicka Pop at Wawa and Quick Chek now. Boom Chicka Pop is made in Minnesota, which is Midwest again, and you have to respect the snack culture of that geographic region considering the sheer volume of snack brands originating and distributing their tasties from the snack fertile crescent, as the Midwest is known in insider snack circles. Then consider, we’re talking about a white cheddar product, and obviously cheddar cheese’s best-case origin is Midwest ‘Merica.

Upon sampling, a cheesy flavor immediately hits but it’s less creamy than ideal. Boom Chicka’s seasoning is more of a spray-on situation and less of a fully encrusted coating. Their white cheddar popcorn still boasts cheesy umami flavor, but the cheese lacks tang or sharpness. Despite being pretty straightforward average cheese flavor, Boom Chicka Pop’s aftertaste is above par and invites repeat sampling.

Bottom Line:

Overall Boom Chicka Pop’s a respectable entry in the white cheddar competition and overall cheese popcorn pantheon of greatness. If you encounter it, don’t be shy, be confident that you won’t be disappointed even if it’s not the most dynamic and sophisticated cheese popcorn out.

25 – Utz White Cheddar (#9 White Cheddar) – $20.99 for 6

Utz story is tried and true blue American Dutch lore and a very familiar product for those growing up in Eastern Pennsylvania where Utz is known for its high-grade quality snacks, but not necessarily popcorn – Utz is more potato chip and pretzel royalty to the local masses. Utz’s slightly funky white cheddar flavor gets steadily better as your tastebuds adjust to the distinct notes.

Utz’s white cheddar popcorn has the well-rounded flavor that you look for from the white cheddar variety. The seasoning is a powdery white cheddar, which is fine, you expect to get your fingers a little grubby eating white cheddar popcorn. Bring napkins or wipes, or maybe take some hand-washing breaks, you animal. Texture-wise these are standard crunchy kernels of popcorn, though some of Utz’s are bit smaller than others in size, if that matters to you.

Bottom Line:

Utz delivers in a lot of ways, so there is no doubt that serving this at the latest kickback or bbq along with a varied spread of other delectable, cannot be a bad idea. Despite being a totally passable pickup at your local snack enabler, Utz’s white cheddar popcorn won’t be the ultimate white cheddar fave here though it’s still a worthy contender with whatever else is on shelves, wherever it’s sold.

24 – Simply Smartfood (#8 White Cheddar) – $4.69

Frito Lay’s Smart Food natural version is Simply and with no GMOs and no artificial nothings, simple is pretty accurate. Growing up and until this article, Smart Food was the barometer for white cheddar popcorn and there wasn’t really any competition besides maybe Wise. Wise is not Smart Food though, let it be known. The Simply version is similar to Smart food but much lighter and sadly, much less delicious.

The Simply Smart Food puffs are regular size and the cheesiness is half of the Smart Food crave and Smart food is usually coated in queso, while this is a light seasoning cheese sprinkle. Simply only has a fragment of the original Smart Food flavor but still has some decent flavor – Simply has a little more funky and pungent cheese flavor than creamy. The funk probably has to do with whatever healthier or lite white cheddar they select, it’s not the same batch as the original Smart Food.

Bottom Line:

Simply Smart Food is fine, nothing crazy. Is it a worthy pickup? Yes, if you’re trying to be healthy. Yes, if you don’t want the creaminess of the real deal Smart Food. Simply does not compete with the original though.

23 – Utz Cheddar Cheese (#9 Orange Cheddar) – $22.49 for 6

The next entry is another from friends at Utz, our favorite little Dutch girl snack brand. Utz’s second esteemed entry does have artificial flavors, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t taste good, or that there’s anything wrong with that. Our prestigious sampling panel has a long history with Utz, which is another Pennsylvania high-quality snack brand of several that attempt to be for the pretzel what the Midwest is for the potato chip and popcorn sets.

Utz’s cheddar corn offering is certainly cheesy and clearly has highly visible orange seasoning on it. The texture has a nice crunch and the puffs are big. The seasoning is a little overly salty, and has a soy-ish flavor. Overall the taste is not a bad take, just a little overly salty and a little faux cheesy. Utz performs decently in the texture and cheesiness categories, I’m just not infatuated with the flavor.

Bottom Line:

Utz’s run as a snack market share contender has steadily risen over the decades, becoming a chip behemoth of legendary proportions in the interim. Therein, Utz has concocted so many different varieties of chip, varying in success rate and deliciousness. Though Utz’s orange cheddar is worthy of a sample, and surely a safe bet when no other cheese popcorn options exist, there are also surely better options out there a trip, aisle, or click away.

22 – Jay’s O-Ke-Doke Cheese (#8 Orange Cheddar) – $3.49

Jay’s O-ke-doke, when it’s more than okay, it’s o-ke-doke. Jay’s is from Charlotte, NC, and somehow Snyder’s-Lance is involved in their production, who doesn’t love Lance? The Jay’s brand specifically was not in the snack periphery until the snack writing began so every Jay’s experience still carries a thrill. Regardless, tastewise Jay’s delivers on the token cheesiness and salt elements.

In its totality, Jay’s O-ke-doke is really a standard cheese popcorn. Which means Jay’s is fine, not great, but fine. The cheesiness doesn’t have much nuance to it if we’re going to dig deep into the rankings (and that’s why we’re here). Despite that, Jay’s is mid-range cheesy popcorn. Jay’s dashes on a thin layer of seasoning, the texture of the corns is crunchy with decent size puffs, though a little bit smaller than some of their compchedditors.

Bottom Line:

Overall Jay’s O-ke-doke cheese popcorn is a totally respectable pickup and really not terrible at all. If you’re somewhere random and they have Jay’s o-ke-doke cheddar pop, that’s a snack something you could consume with confidence, at a minimum. If you got Jay’s cheddar pop as a complimentary airplane nosh, you’d say “Wow, this is one of the best airplane snacks I’ve ever had…. in coach.”

21 – Whole Foods Spicy Cheddar (#6 Spicy Cheese) – $2.69

Whole Food’s spicy cheddar is a fun bag of red hot-looking popcorn on the front, which does make it the corn within appear to be legit spicy, despite the initial skepticism because Whole Foods doesn’t necessarily come with the heat typically. Their frozen samosas? Not super spicy. The chicken tikka masala on their in-store buffet’s hot bar? Only slightly spicy. Shoutout to Austin and Whole Foods on the spicy cheddar mission.

Out the gate, with Whole Foods Spicy Cheddar, you are getting cheesiness but more on the cheesy seasoning. The spice in the mix is a nice little reddish spice and medium heat level. Good job Whole Foods on getting the spice right here, on something, finally. Cheese-wise there is evidence of cheese there, but the spice outweighs the cheese on the backend. You can taste the cheese more purely on the front end, but the note kind of fades against the pepperiness of the spicy note.

Bottom Line:

Whole Foods Spicy Cheddar popcorn is good, not the best, not the worst. Probably sits somewhere in the middle of our rankings. Like a monkey. Whole Foods Spicy Cheddar is a snack you can’t eat a lot of at once unless you have a counter-snack to balance it out, and a mandatory cold refreshing beverage to tame the heat.

20 – Garrett’s CheeseCorn (#7 Orange Cheddar) – $17.94

Garrett’s is famous from Chicago and “batch to batch made from scratch” (whatever that means, open to interpretation). Garrett’s bag also says “Freshly melted cheddar cheese” so this is supposedly more of a cheese-coating exterior, but between the way it looks on the bag and the way it looks in real life, there is a clear and simple disparity. Unless maybe there was a defective bag, the popcorn product received from an Amazon purchase, was dusted in seasoning, no cheese melting to be deciphered. Garrett’s has a footprint at O’Hare and is locally popular in a town that knows snackin’, so you’d think Garrett’s would be next level.

Honestly, Garrett’s has a decent cheese flavor, nothing too aggressive, and nothing too rich either. Some bites are tangier than others, it has distinct Flavor – a little bit more flavor than some and less than others if we’re keeping tabs (we are). The corn itself is crunchy with good texture and some nice size puffs. The cheesiness factor is medium to high, not knock your udders off cheesy. Overall, Garrett’s orange cheddar popcorn is decent and has a good cheesy aftertaste, though also slightly muddled after a queue of many straight orange cheddar popcorns in a row.

Bottom Line:

Midwest makes the world takes when it comes to snacks and Garrett’s fits well within that recently minted munchie mantra. Garrett’s offers a regional favorite that can be acquired nationally, and worth a try just to see what all the windy city hype is about. In the orange cheddar popcorn arena, they present a worthy party participant though not necessarily the best in class.

19 – Oogie’s Wisconsin Cheddar 1848 (#7 White Cheddar) – $19.95 for 4

Another cheat code user in the cheese and cheddar clout chase is Oogie’s with their second entry touting the specific Wisconsin cheddar of 1848 as their core featured ingredient, and evidently is a white cheddar. Ooogie’s packaging has a cool shiny metallic patina and a portrait of the badass musician whose popcorn this is – you better believe it’s the one and only Oogie. The Wisconsin cheddar’s flavor is punctuated by a cheese that is a little sharper than the typical white cheddy with its aged tangy funk taste. Oogie’s seasoning isn’t egregiously powerful or overbearing, it lacks the full body richness that anyone with tastebuds desires from a white cheddar popcorn.

Bottom line:

Oogie’s creation is essentially a gourmet version of SmartFood, and in that, it’s decent enough. Especially with how they fumbled Simply Smart Food. Oogie’s brings something new to the table, even if it’s just aged white cheddar, something new or different is always something worth welcoming and sampling for your own judgment. Google Oogie’s or hit our hyperlinks if you can’t find their goods locally.

18 – Zesty Z’s Mediterranean Feta – $3.00

Zesty Z’s Mediterranean feta cheese popcorn is one of the biggest flavor curveballs in this cheese popcorn exploration next to the Jalapeno Blue cheese and Hawaiian bbq cheese varieties. All three are pretty ingenious flavor combos ultimately culminating in unique popcorn flavors. Zesty Z’s cheesy Mediterranean feta-flavored popcorn is different because it’s air-popped and after this research, the consensus is that air-popped is typically a good thing. Zesty Z’s is based in Brooklyn, and there is sesame oil cranberry, and vinegar in the ingredients so there’s a slim chance we can attribute this product to someone bespectacled that rides a vintage bike to their quirky popcorn operation.

Unlike all of our other cheese popcorn entries, Zesty Z’s has other non-cheese seasonings on the popcorn, like herbaceous-looking seasonings. Their Mediterranean feta cheese flavor is clearly a wild card and from a flavor profile perspective reminds you of Greek or Mediterranean food – grilled fish, chicken or salad. Zesty Z’s Mediterranean Feta popcorn is a great offering and the seasoning stick to your fingers, even if it’s not the typical white or orange cheddar residue. Z’s kernels are air-popped and the puffs Zesty Z’s produces are nice and fluffy with little pockets of seasoning in different kernel nooks and crannies. Zesty Z’s capture the rich feta flavor as well as the Mediterranean spices that pair well with it – just missing a wedge of lemon to squeeze on and a glass of vino or ouzo.

Bottom Line:

Zesty Z’s has zee nice little product on zee hands and zomething that probably pairz well with a lot of different foodz you may not typically zerve popcorn with. Even zee feta is a welcome departure from the tradition on zee air-popped popcorn. You can find Zesty Z’s in some big stores already and also on zee world wide webz.

17 – Nature’s Promise White Cheddar (#6 White Cheddar) – $3.89