British court answers an eternal question: how much potato is in a potato chip?

No profit grows, Shakespeare once wrote, where no pleasure is had. And so, in life's tedious journey, we find joy in little things: the rising of the sun. A good glass of wine. The greasy taste of a well-dressed potato chip.

But soft! Not so fast. Life offers no simple pleasures, and even that delicious crunch comes with a heavy debate: how much potato does a real potato chip contain – chip, for the Americans?

This and a number of other probing questions of the chip lover – was immortalized last week by a British tax court, which ruled that Walkers Sensations Poppadoms, the fluffy, not crispy-looking potato medallions, are in fact the same as potato chips.

In doing so, we add to the hallowed list of existential food debates, the moral implications of which far exceed the consumable utility of their topics. Among them: Is a Jaffa cake a cake or a cookie? Does a Chicago-style pie count as pizza? Is a hot dog a sandwich? Do you prefer Wawa to Sheetz, or are you wrong?

The ruling means Walkers, the company that makes poppadoms and dozens of other snacks, will have to pay the same value added tax on its poppadoms as it does on its various crisps. More importantly, a judge of first instance has laid down for all human and sharp-loving species the kind of diktat that is sure to disproportionately irritate the masses.

“Food is probably one of the most deeply rooted, powerful ways to express cultural identity,” says Dr. Ty Matejowsky, professor of anthropology at the University of Central Florida. As such, he said, the court's ruling was unlikely to change anyone's sharp mind.

The Walkers crisps label bears clear similarities to the American Lays crisps brand, and it also distributes Doritos in Britain. That's because they are all owned by Pepsico, which retained the Walkers brand name in Britain and Ireland. The label is different, but it is essentially the same chip.

A poppadom, an Anglicized version of the Indian 'papadum', is a flat, crispy, round flatbread usually made with gram flour. Traditionally they are about the size of a tortilla. However, Walkers converted the design into a smaller form, closer to the size of a potato chip, which they introduced using a Sikh Elvis impersonator late eighties.

The Walkers dispute bears an uncanny resemblance to the major Pringles decision of 2008, when a UK Supreme Court judge ruled that the ubiquitous canned snacks also counted as chips, despite tax-related arguments to the contrary.

At its informal core, the debate centers on whether poppadoms are food or a snack. For the purposes of the law, “food” requires preparation and is intended to be eaten as part of something larger. “Snacks” are efficient packages that can be enjoyed on their own. Like a bag of chips, for example.

It may sound like a trivial distinction, but when it comes to UK tax law it is no small claim. While most food products are tax exempt, the current VAT rate on snacks such as chips is 20 percent, putting the potential stakes from Walkers' poppadom game in the millions.

“It's a lot of money for the government,” says Dr. Catherine Clarke, senior lecturer in law at the University of Exeter. “It's all very stupid. But that's where we are.”

The ruling is the latest in a years-long journey for Walkers, which has claimed since 2021 that its Sensations Poppadoms not the same as their potato chip cousins, and should therefore be exempt from tax like most other foods.

There are plenty of reasons, say Walkers' lawyers, that a poppadom is not a potato chip. For starters, they're meant to be eaten with other things like chutney or dips – or, you might say, prepared. And any “ordinary person on the street” would know that they were not the same. Perhaps most critically, Walkers argued, the types of potato starches and grains used to make the poppadom should not count as potato ingredients by purist standards.

Unfortunately for Walkers, the tribunal was not impressed with the company's case. The poppadoms may not contain as much potato as a traditional crisp, the judge said, but the correct ratio of potato, poppadom and chip depends on the eye of the beholder.

“The products,” the judge wrote, “obviously contain potatoes.”

It's a limited statement – ​​no thanks to Walkers, whose lawyers almost brought the proverbial poppadoms ship with them. According to the company, many non-potato poppadoms were exempt from VAT in Britain

But the case, like so many others, fell through the cracks.

“The fact that a poppadom made according to a traditional recipe of gram flour without potato is zero-rated for VAT purposes does not mean that a poppadom made according to a traditional recipe containing potato should also be zero-rated,” the judge said. “The first is not excluded because it is a 'poppadom', but because it does not contain potatoes.”

Walkers, who did not respond to a request for comment on the verdict, has eight weeks to appeal. Until then, the law has spoken. Spiritually it could be a poppadom. But legally – at least for now – it is a chip.