How Nora Gray spun its spicy pepperoncini and focaccia into a Miss Vickie's chip

Nora Gray’s co-founder and co-owner, chef Emma Cardarelli, takes every July off and invariably returns to an unwieldy inbox. Last year was no different, except for an email from Miss Vickie’s, the chip company that started in rural Ontario in 1987.

Nora Gray has a reputation for some of the city’s best pasta. There have been accolades since it opened in 2011, from both Canada’s 100 Best and enRoute. But Cardarelli couldn’t believe that Miss Vickie’s knew about her intimate, wood-panelled Italian restaurant in Griffintown.

“I don’t even know how they got my email,” she said. “They said they wanted to partner to do a chip. I thought it was a hilarious idea.”

Sign on the dotted line

Though Cardarelli and co-founder and co-owner sommelier Ryan Gray were taken by surprise, Miss Vickie’s was serious. The company—acquired by Frito Lay (PepsiCo) in 1993—was to make a limited-edition flavour featuring menu items from neighbourhood Italian restaurants in Montreal, Toronto, and Vancouver that would evoke a dining experience, or at least a restaurant-quality taste. Hence the name: The 'Ristoranti Series'.

After some straightforward negotiations, they signed a contract and an NDA so the corporate machine could start rolling.

The tasters

One day in October 2024, two sets of visitors came to the restaurant: marketers in the morning and a team of four tasters in the afternoon. Cardarelli had ideas about what she thought would be good in a chip—nduja, or a ravioli flavour—and prepared dishes for the group.

Three tasters from Québec and Ontario and a head taster from Texas ate and filled out detailed questionnaire about the food, noting flavour minutiae to assess, quantify, and rate what they were tasting.

 “In the end, the focaccia and pepperoncini flavour made the most sense,” she says. “There was no explanation needed about what the ingredients were and what it is. That might have been their idea all along.”

Cardarelli was never asked for more samples, ingredients, or details on preparation. “I think that the questionnaire is detailed enough for them to know what they’ve tasted,” she says. “This is what they do for a living, right?”

Over the course of the year, Miss Vickie’s sent various versions of sample chips for the restaurant to taste and provide feedback on. Cardarelli was pleasantly surprised.

“They nailed that super well,” she says. ”We always use the cherry bomb peppers where the heat comes at the end; you get the sweetness, and the vinegar, (going from) mild to hot—it’s not a crazy, blow-your-head-off kind of heat. I’m really happy with how it turned out.”

Top secrets

Cardarelli was sworn to secrecy as part of the contract, and the company hadn’t promoted the chip series in advance. But news of the bags flying off Costco shelves in mid-September created a lot of enthusiasm that took Montreal (and Canada) by surprise.

“Canada’s gift to the chip world,” proclaimed Montreal’s ChipSpectator on Instagram. “Expectations were sky high, and I’m not disappointed…These chips have classic Miss Vickie’s crunch and just the right amount of zesty pepperoncino (sic) punch. Solid 9.2, can recommend.”

BC’s Foodologyca tastes it on camera and loves it:

In anticipation of a full release of the chips to a range of retailers on October 6, messages from the PR team assigned to promoting the Miss Vickie’s Ristoranti Series Spicy Pepperoncini & Focaccia chip alluded to the “deployment of a full press release,” with layers of approval required before anything could be shared via interview or in writing.

The information about this chip was held as closely as a state secret. The company was tight-lipped to reveal details about product development beyond generalities weeks after the release:

“Italian is one of Canada's most popular cuisines, and we saw an opportunity to bring its classic yet complex flavours to the potato chip aisle in a way that resonates with consumers. We chose restaurants known for their craft and artistry—culinary experts who bring real authenticity to iconic dishes Canadians love,” they said in a written interview with The Main. 

Canadian content

Cardarelli is pleased with the local feel of the project and the history of Miss Vickie’s. Between Miss Vickie’s being founded by a woman and the fact that chip production took place for years in Pointe Claire, there was a connection that she felt comfortable with, and she appreciated the sensitivity of the Miss Vickie’s team to Nora Gray’s boundaries and preferences.

“I’m no cheerleader for a multinational corporation, but it didn’t seem very much like that,” she says. “It felt like I was dealing with a small Canadian brand. It feels local, it feels Canadian,” she says.

And the taste? “I do find them very addictive,” Cardarelli says. “And if the chip can shed some light on Nora Gray, I’ll be happy.”