When Is A Potato Chip Not A Potato Chip?  Well, according to the UK High Court, when it’s a Pringle. On Friday, Justice Warren ruled that Pringles are not potato chips- or crisps, in the British vernacular- thus keeping them exempt from VAT. Apparently, they just don’t contain enough potato, and certainly don’t behave in the right way.

Under UK law, most foodstuffs are exempt from VAT, except for food products made from potato, potato flour, or potato starch. This would include “potato crisps, potato sticks, and potato puffs.” The Inland Revenue had argued that Pringles- as they have a potato content of around 42% , and were originally marketed in the US as Pringle’s Newfangled Potato Chips and still are on their US website, fell within this exemption from VAT exemption.

Barristers for Proctor & Gamble, makers of Pringles, begged to differ. With UK sales of around £100 million, you can see why. VAT in the UK is set at 17.5%, which would have meant an annual subtraction of around £18 million from gross sales. No small change.

Now while I’m usually pleased whenever anyone legetimately beats the taxman, and have always been a fan of Pringles, I must admit that the arguments of Richard Cordara QC (appearing for P&G) may have put me off them for life. The case, you see, rested on the “potatoness” of a Pringle, and Mr Cordara’s arguments against this point were, whilst factually impressive, really rather un-appetizing.

He began by stating that potato crisps are made from slicing and frying a potato, while Pringles are made from a mix with potato content. He went on to state that the colouring and texture of your average Pringle “betrays its doughy origins.” He added that “The appearance and taste of a Pringle is not that of a potato crisp….It has a shape not found in nature, being designed and manufactured for stacking.”

It gets weirder. “A Pringle does not taste like a crisp, or otherwise behave like one. It is totally different. A Pringle is designed to melt down on the tongue. It is not designed to present the kind of jagged sensations associated with a crisp or similar product.”

All which leaves me a tad concerned about just how the Pringles in my cupboard behave when I’m not looking. Do they stack themselves out of the cannister and mock the potato crisps for their jagged sensations? Do the crisps then mock them right back for being doughy and yet with a shape not found in nature? Will Pringles now be considered the Mudbloods of the snack world?

Should I have both Pringles and potato crisps in my cupboard? Will that make me doughy to the extent that I will resort to having a shape not found in nature? Do I prefer being bagged or stacked?

And where will all this VAT hoo-ha for foodstuffs end? Hopefully with grape-derivative products being exempted from VAT. Then I can drown myself in wine whilst eating Pringles, secure that they will melt on my tongue long before they could possibly choke me to death in my alcohol-induced coma.