I Tried 5 Frozen Onion Ring Brands and The Best One Puts Restaurants To Shame

Crunchy, dippable, and technically a vegetable: Onion rings are one of my favorite foods. So, I set out to find the best frozen onion ring brand. Whenever I go out for happy hour with friends or loved ones, onion rings are a must-order. I think of onion rings as French fries for special occasions—and going out with good company is definitely a special occasion.

Now, if you're wondering, like I have, where the onion ring originated, I'll admit that the history of my favorite bar snack is somewhat unclear. It seems many nations want the bragging rights of having first discovered this tasty treat. And who can blame them? The act of taking sliced onions, battering them in flour, cream, and seasonings, and then frying them until they're golden brown—seems simple, but it's also so delicious. Add some ketchup, ranch dressing, or perhaps a fancy sauce from a hip restaurant, and you've got a crunchy, crumbly, and addictive treat.

But with my love for onion rings so strong, lately, I started wondering why I only ever eat them when out at a bar or restaurant. If I consider onion rings an alternative to French fries—and I've been cooking and enjoying frozen fries at home for decades—couldn't I do the same with onion rings? Is it possible to find a convenient, oven-ready onion ring that's restaurant-quality?

So, I set out to find the best frozen onion ring brand. For fun, I brought my favorite happy hour buddy, my mom, along for the experience: taste-testing every kind of onion ring I could find at my local grocery store. It was a fun and tasty experience that ended up being a special occasion in itself. Here are the five onion rings my mom and I tried, rated from worst to best.

Here are the five onion rings my mom and I tried, rated from worst to best

Happy Belly Onion Rings

Amazon's Happy Belly brand seems to manufacture everything you could ever need or want from a grocery store. It offers coffee, nuts, cookies, and of course, onion rings.

However, the mega brand isn't exactly known for its frozen onion snacks—and I wondered if this was for good reason. When I tried to look these rings up on Happy Belly's Amazon page, only the brand's frozen chopped onions came up. When I looked up Amazon's "best sellers" in the "Frozen Potatoes & Onion Rings" category, these were rated a disapointing 51st (out of 79). That's all to say: I had low expectations for these panko-breaded onion rings.

The packaging is, like other Happy Belly products, simple and clean—though perhaps unexciting. I bought a 16-ounce bag of onion rings for $3.39.

The look:

With a nice texture and light gold color, these rings are undeniably attractive. When I took them out of the oven, I thought they looked like they could have been placed in front of me at a restaurant. However, as I transferred them from pan to plate, I was unpleasantly surprised to find the larger ones dropped and bent, tell-tale signs of a too-flimsy ring.

The taste:

The rings' panko breading provides a good texture to the exterior, but as I suspected, these rings are simply too flimsy. They have minimal crunch and, as I bit into each ring, the onion quickly separated from the breading, often leaving me with too much onion on one bite and an empty shell of crust for the next.

Still, my mom and I agreed that the flavor of the onion and breading was good and the rings were certainly edible. Overall, they were fine… but were they the best onion rings we've ever had? No way.

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Market Pantry Crispy Onion Rings

Like Amazon's Happy Belly brand, Target has its own grocery brand: Market Pantry. While the brand has impressed me before, I was discouraged to find these onion rings had unexciting reviews on the Target website, earning a 4.2 out of 5 stars from just over 20 customers. Market Pantry is a big brand and I found myself feeling underwhelmed with the lack of interest.

Still, I like the packaging. The brand's signature red color is eye-catching and the bag's photo of the onion rings looks delicious—and is displayed prominently on about half the bag. This 16-ounce bag cost me $3.69.

The look:

These onion rings came out of the oven looking restaurant-quality. They have a nice golden color and lots of noticeable breading crumbles (typically a good sign, in my book). I appreciated that, while the rings came in a variety of diameters, they all looked substantial, each with a thick, healthy breading.

The taste:

Biting into these rings, I thought the breading had a great amount of crunch, a nice amount of crumble, and a good flavor. However, the exterior was quite thick and my mom and I decided that it was simply too much of a good thing.

We agreed that the thick exterior left these rings with an unsatisfying lack of onion flavor, with my mom even joking that some rings must have forgotten their onions back at the factory. And while I didn't think these were totally devoid of onion flavor, I agreed that the breading overpowered the too-thin vegetable hidden inside.

It's also worth noting that this brand has the highest amount of calories per ring. At 210 calories per serving of three, that's 70 calories per ring. To my mom and I, this seemed unnecessarily high, which didn't help Happy Belly's ranking.

Alexia Crispy Onion Rings

Alexia is known for being a more health-conscious frozen vegetable brand brand that boasts non-GMO and organic ingredients. So while these onion rings are not organic, they are non-GMO.

With a green stripe down the middle, I thought this packaging looked bright and fresh. The bag boasts that the rings inside feature sea salt, and like the Happy Belly brand rings, these have panko breading.

This bag contained the smallest volume of any on this list with just 11oz of rings. It was also the most expensive, costing $5.89.

The look:

These onion rings are relatively thin so they cook fast. In fact, I took them out of the oven within the recommended time, but I wondered if I should have grabbed them earlier, as they came out a little darker than I expected.

Still, as I put them on a plate, I thought they looked good. The breading had a nice crumbly texture and the rings were firm, not flimsy, to the touch.

The Taste:

I enjoy a good, crunchy onion ring, so these crispy rings were especially satisfying for me. I got a distinct crunch in every bite and liked how these rings held up even when dipped them in ranch (my favorite onion ring paring).

As for flavor, my mom said it best when she delared: "These are really good… but not phenomenal." We liked the seasoning on the breading but we both noticed a slight aftertaste.

Still, these were good, and with such a good, hearty crunch, Alexia earned a spot in my top three.

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McCain Craft Beer Battered Onion Rings

McCain offers a wide variety of French fries and potato products, and this beer-battered product stands alone as the only onion ring in the company's repertoire.

While I hadn't had a McCain product before,I was excited to try these rings as I found the packaging to be quite eye-catching. The bag features a fryer basket full of onion rings in front of out-of-focus lights, giving the suggestion that these onions have just been delivered to a bar table. I liked the look and the "restaurant quality" suggestion.

These stand out as the only beer-battered rings on this list, made with "craft-brewed American Pale Ale." At 14 ounces, this bag was smaller than some of the others on this list and cost me $4.99.

The look:

Right out of the oven, I noticed a difference between these and the other onion rings my mom and I sampled. These beer-battered rings had the lightest color of all the rings we tried: Even though they seemed well-cooked, they came out with a light blonde hue.

Otherwise, these looked how one would expecs onion rings to look. They weren't too thick or too thin, and overall, seemed appetizing.

The taste:

After first bites, my mom and I agreed that this ring's batter was delicious. It had a good flavor and nice amount of crispiness without being too crunchy.

In fact, my mom dubbed McCain's rings as having the best breading of all five rings we tried. However, we were both a little disappointed in the lack of onion flavor. Perhaps the onions were too thin or maybe they were just were too forgettable under the batter, but I wished I'd gotten more onion out of this onion ring.

And while calorie content isn't everything, it's worth noting that these contain just 190 calories for 6 rings. That's the biggest serving for the least amount of calories on this list, which is great, because I could see myself eating through a whole bag of these.

Nathan's Famous Thick Sliced Battered Onion Rings

When you hear the name Nathan's, you think hot dogs, right? Me too. So I was surprised to find this famous brand makes onion rings. In fact, it's such a well-kept secret that the onion rings weren't even listed among other grocery products on the company's website.

Still, I was excited to try these. The rings on the package, arranged in a yellow paper food boat, looked delectable. The 16-ounce bag cost me $6.69.

The look:

I was glad to find that these onion rings looked just as they do in the picture on the package. While other brands I tried had lots of texture and crumbs, these were actually pretty smooth, not unlike the McCain product.

The taste:

When I started sampling these five onion ring brands, I thought I was on a quest to find the frozen onion rings that were most reminiscent of my favorite restaurants' rings. I was looking for something crispy, crunchy, that would taste like it just came out of the fryer.

But these took me by surprise. They don't taste like the rings I've come to love when out at happy hour, they were smoother, with a sweeter onion than I'm used to, but boy, were they delicious. My mom and I both complimented the batter while the sweet onions seemed to round off the flavor. Nathan's really stood out amongst the rest, in the best possible way. We agreed we'll definitely be snacking on these soon—happy hour or not.

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