Category Archives: Taco Bell

Carnitas Taco sneak peek

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Note: This is the first-ever TedQuarters post that’s not by me. I’m out of town until Thursday, but I’ve enlisted the help of some friends and interesting Internet people to keep the content flowing here while I’m gone. Because this is TedQuarters, they will all be honorary Teds for the sake of their posts. I figured I’d start you out with a Taco Bell post so you didn’t get disoriented. Seth is a reader with access to a Taco Bell test market. He also recently kept a blog about his adventures south of the equator and co-authored an  epic JonahKeri.com post. – Ted

I’m settling into my new home in Berkeley, Calif., and I noticed today that a nearby Taco Bell is selling Cantina Tacos.  Seizing the opportunity to test them out, I swung into the drive through to pick up a carnitas taco and see how they did on this whole pork thing.  I also got two taco supremes (or is it tacos supreme?) with fire sauce, because I wanted to hedge my bets.

Unfortunately, the carnitas didn’t really do it for me.  The taco has a very strong porky flavor, but it seems much more like what a focus group thinks pork is supposed to taste like, as opposed to a real pork flavor.  Nor is it, like Taco Bell beef, its own real thing.  If you can imagine the shredded pork equivalent of bacos, that comes close.  The tortillas were the right level of softness, though a bit thin, and it was served with a lime, which is nice.

I appreciate the risk they took and they effort they made, but it just didn’t do it for me.  While there is a clear distinction between a beef taco and a Taco Bell beef taco — each with its own appropriate circumstances — to me this just tasted like a bad pork taco, as opposed to the Taco Bell styled alternative.  It’s hard to see this replacing a craving for a real pork taco, or anything else for that matter.  Granted, I’m in California, where tacos grow on trees.

Whoa nelly

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We ran shrimp in March and are introducing new, slow-roasted pork carnitas. We’re doing more innovation around new premium proteins, not just chicken and steak. We’re also working on day parts: For late night, we’ve developed a “fourth meal” concept around music called Feed the Beat. For breakfast we’re in test in Tucson, Bakersfield, Dayton and Baton Rouge with a traditional breakfast at Taco Bell value prices. In Southern California, we have concept stores looking at beverages and snacking. We’re also trying out three premium-style beverages, [including] a Frappuccino blended drink.

– Taco Bell CMO David Owens.

There it is: In the midst of an otherwise uninteresting interview filled with business-speak, Owens spills the beans about a number of items of crucial import to Taco Bell enthusiasts like myself.

First of all: Pork! Outside of the brief shrimp experiment, it’s been a long, long time since Taco Bell added a protein of any sort, and it seems like pork is way overdue.

I’m not saying I’m sure I’ll enjoy it — to me, Taco Bell’s excellence is inextricably linked with its ground-beef products — but I’m excited to give it a try. Looks like the Bell is taking cues from Chipotle and other more upscale “Mexican” fast-food chains, and that’s fine by me.

They’re “also working on day parts.” That’s a hilarious marketing-guy thing to say. But hey, if it eventually means the glorious return of Taco Bell breakfast, I welcome it.

Speaking of: Now we know the closest breakfast test market to New York is Dayton. That’s about a 10-hour drive, so I guess I’ll have to leave in the evening and drive through the night to get there in time.

Owens mentions nothing about “Authentic Tacos,” “Cantina Tacos,” or any of the series of products detailed here. Looks like I’m going to have to move to Tustin, Calif., as that’s where all the interesting Taco Bell stuff seems to happen.

Papelbon fails and we all get tacos

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Huge hat tip to Ted Burke for pointing me to this clip. When the Rockies score seven or more runs, Denver-area Taco Bells sell four tacos for $1 with the purchase of a small drink.

So in this video, Jason Giambi not only wins the game in walk-off fashion for the Rockies, he also defeats the intolerable Jonathan Papelbon and secures discounted tacos for everyone in the Denver area. Straight heroism.

Plus, look at the score box graphic around the 22-second mark. Dancing tacos. That’s awesome.

More reasons Heath Bell is awesome

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If you didn’t think Heath Bell was awesome after this interview with Yahoo! Sports in March, check out this clip from Ephraim Fischbein’s interview with the man for New York Baseball Digest:

Nickname – Heater or Taco

That’s right: Heath “Taco” Bell.

What a stud.

I interviewed Bell for the very first of our “On the Road” segments for what used to be called New York Baseball Today and is now The Baseball Show. I’m pretty sure it was my first on-camera interview with a player, and Bell seized the opportunity to mess with me. Even at the time I thought it was hilarious.

When two people are talking on-camera, they usually have to be standing uncomfortably close to each other. We’re accustomed to seeing it so it doesn’t look strange, but pay attention next time you see that setup and consider the distance you’d normally stand to have a conversation with someone at a bar or in your kitchen or wherever. Get into this business and you’re going to do a lot of awkward mantouching with professional athletes. Heath Bell appreciates that, apparently. I’m pretty sure he leaned in to kiss me at one point but it didn’t make the final cut:


With Mets’ front office making reasonable decisions, Taco Bell turns to baffling ones

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A couple days ago Catsmeat tipped me off to the Cheesy Nachos at Taco Bell. Last night I went to investigate. Here’s what they look like:

Yup, as Catsmeat suggested, they’re just the regular old Taco Bell Nachos dumped out on a plate and with the cheese poured over them. They’re 10 cents cheaper than the old Nachos, so that’s cool, but the obvious downside is that you can’t make any efforts to ration the cheese. Even with the traditional Nachos, Taco Bell has never provided nearly enough nacho cheese per chip, so you end up with a bunch of dry chips that you haphazardly cover in Fire Sauce or something.

That problem has not been alleviated with the new Cheesy Nachos. It appears that there’s precisely the same amount of nacho cheese and chips, but now you can’t carefully dip each chip into the cheese, so to get the most life out of that cheese you’re going to have to pick up a dry chip off one side of the plate and use it to scoop cheese off one of the chips that are swimming in it, an expert-level Nacho-eating technique.

It’s annoying. And to make matters worse, it appears that the regular old Nachos are no longer on the menu at my local Taco Bell, so I’m concerned they’re being phased out and replaced by Cheesy Nachos. I’m willing to pay the extra dime to maintain more control over my nacho cheese, but I’m worried– and I haven’t tried yet — my local Taco Bell won’t let me. Maybe if you live near a good Taco Bell they will. But once something’s off the menu at my Taco Bell, good luck convincing them to hand it to you, even if they’ve got all the components right there.

The strange thing here is trying to figure out Taco Bell’s motivation for the move. The new dish requires one of the little black plates familiar to fans of the Nachos Supreme, but that’s actually a lot more packaging than the traditional form, which were just chips in a bag and a little plastic container of cheese.

This might be an effort to streamline packaging costs, but obviously little bags will be an important part of Taco Bell’s packaging repertoire as long as the delicious Cinnamon Twists are still around, and those aren’t going anywhere. This seems like a big push just to eventually get rid of the little plastic container that holds the nacho cheese, especially since those are nearly identical to the ones given out just about everywhere for ketchup transportation.

Former roommate Ted suggests it could have something to do with the Doritos that are now distributed at Taco Bell as part of the $2 Meal Deals, but I have a little more faith in Taco Bell consumers to distinguish between Nachos and Nacho Cheese Doritos even if they’re both served in little bags.

So this is a head-scratcher. Taco Bell probably has a good reason for the decision and I know I should never doubt Taco Bell. But it would be comforting to know I can at least get the O.G. Nachos when I want them and not have to worry about the pathetic inefficiencies of the new Cheesy Nachos.

Marky Mark asks you to help his bunch get funkier

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Rapper/Actor Mark Wahlberg has partnered with Taco Bell in support of the Taco Bell Foundation For Teens, a “multi-year initiative to raise awareness of the United States’ high-school graduation crisis and fund real-world experiences that are proven to help teens graduate.”

In a video posted to the foundation’s website, Wahlberg says that just $1 can make a difference in a teen’s life, and that makes sense. A dollar can buy a taco, and teens love tacos. Everyone does. I’m not sure exactly the mechanics of it, but I imagine an effective strategy for the foundation would be to have high-school graduates hand out tacos to at-risk teens and be like, “Hey, I bought you this taco, but I could only afford this taco because I graduated high school, so, you know, heads up. You want to keep eating good, you’re gonna need to hit the books.”

In all seriousness, I had no idea this country was enduring a dropout epidemic, and I worked in a high school for two years. And education is, ahh, what’s that word… good.

And what better way to reach at-risk youth than Taco Bell? Plenty, actually: Any other fast-food restaurant would be a good start, since kids discerning enough to eat at Taco Bell probably already recognize the value of education.

Still, if anyone needs proof, check this out. I’m about to break you off a few ideas:

Magma Gordita Crunch: Warm, pillowy flatbread layered with melted three-cheese blend and stuffed with crunchy red taco shell filled with seasoned ground beef, crisp shredded lettuce, real cheddar cheese and topped off with cheesy molten hot lava sauce.

Bacon Cheeseburger Burrito: A warm, soft flour tortilla loaded seasoned ground beef, warm nacho cheese sauce, crispy flavorful bacon, tangy red sauce and crunchy red strips.

TexiMelt: A warm, soft, flour tortilla wrapped around seasoned ground beef, three melted cheeses — cheddar, pepper jack and mozzarella — and creamy pepper jack sauce, then melted to perfection.

You know how I got those ideas? I JUST MADE THEM UP! You know how I have the capacity for that type of creativity? Education, baby. I’m a damn master of the arts, and because of that I can think up new Taco Bell menu items off the top of my head. Stay in school, kids and maybe one day you’ll ascend to America’s ultimate occupation: Taco Bell Executive Chef.

To donate to the Taco Bell Foundation For Teens, click here or donate at participating Taco Bell restaurants through June 15. No word on why some Taco Bell restaurants wouldn’t participate, or why they’ll stop taking donations on June 16.

Aww, two thousand dollars? I wanted a taco.

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A young woman in her 20s, driving a silver SUV got more than burritos when she went through the drive through at the Taco Bell on Brown Street, near the University of Dayton campus and Miami Valley Hospital.

Instead of a bag containing her order, she got a bag containing the restaurant’s morning bank deposit — about $2,000.

Police were called to the restaurant around 10:30 a.m. Tuesday morning, May 11. An employee said she was working the drive-through window and mistakenly gave the customer the bank deposit. The restaurant manager explained it was store policy to put the bank bag containing the deposit in a Taco Bell bag. The manager would then drive up to the drive-through window, and an employee would hand him the bag.

– Doug Page, Dayton Daily News.

Congratulations, young SUV-driving woman. You’ve won the Taco Bell lottery. Except you kind of lost because you don’t get any delicious Taco Bell, and if you want to keep that cash and use it on some Taco Bell, you’ll have to drive the 2.8 miles to the Taco Bell on South Smithville Road in Belmont. And for all we know that’s not nearly as good a Taco Bell, and now you’re doomed to get a Volcano Taco in a regular yellow shell, like always happens to me at the crappy Taco Bell near my house.

Also, if the Dayton Police are serious about recovering that money, a good strategy might be simply waiting at area Taco Bells for an SUV to pull up to the drive through and order $2,000 worth of Taco Bell. Glorious Taco Bell.

Furthermore: 10:30 a.m.? That must mean Dayton, Ohio is a test market for Taco Bell breakfast, and the closest one to New York I’ve heard of so far. Who’s down for a road trip?

Finally, what kind of shady operation is this Taco Bell franchise running? They put the cash in a Taco Bell bag and the manager drives through the drive-thru to pick it up? That sounds more like a drug deal than a bank deposit. Also, it sure seems like if you’re regularly loading cash into Taco Bell bags and leaving them right near where the other, regular Taco Bell bags are distributed, you’re bound to lose one eventually.

In a related story, now I really want $2,000 worth of Taco Bell. I’ll take 300 Baja Beef Gorditas, 400 Crunchy Tacos, 500 MexiMelts with no tomatoes and an order of Volcano Nachos to go, please.