Hey everyone! Hope you had a great Martin Luther King Day, and that you’re having an even better Inauguration Day! I’m starting the day off with a sad confession: I’ve been really bad about trying the hippest new bacon creations for your edification, particularly when they’re the product of a fast food chain. For example, I have yet to go to Wendy’s for the Baconator. I feel like such a fraud. However, after my recent Taco Bell experience, I might just go ahead and change my tune. Because first of all, it was a good excuse to get together for lunch with two great friends, Beth and Heather. And second of all…it wasn’t so bad.
I’ll admit we were total chickens and decided to split one Cheddar Bacon Gordita Crunch between the three of us. Honestly, what’s the point of wasting $7.50 if we don’t like it, right? And yes, the price was $2.49 on the Taco Bell menu, so you know they consider it a prize item. Our first question when it arrived was, “how much bacon?!” As you can see in this photo, the cheddar and bacon was not spread over the entire gordita, but it was real cheddar and real bacon so we didn’t complain. We noticed that the melted cheese did a great job of keeping all the ingredients together.
Next, we wondered about the orangey sauce inside the taco. Heather referred to it as some sort of “smoky sauce,” something she’d heard of in reference to another Taco Bell creation. That made me leery. I’m particular about my condiments, and absolutely detest “special sauce,” french dressing or any sauce with chunks or pickle relish in it. I don’t even like it when mayonaisse and ketchup get mixed together, and in some states that’s the standard in french fry dip. So anyway, we persevered and found that the sauce wasn’t so bad. We tasted a hint of vinegar which Heather likened to the warm bacon dressing you might find on a spinach salad. And actually, I liked the flavor of the bacon and sauce with the lettuce, seemed more like a sandwich than a taco. Between the normal taco, extra cheese, bacon and sauce, the CBGC had a lot of flavors and a lot of salt going on. And, like I said, it wasn’t so bad…in small doses.
So when it came down to it, the big question was: would you eat it again? And I don’t mean if it was forced on you or someone bought it for you without asking. Would you ever crave the Cheddar Bacon Gordita Crunch? My answer was no. The only thing that ever draws me to Taco Bell is a bean burrito. Beth and Heather agreed. Each of us visits Taco Bell infrequently enough that we’ll be sticking to our old favorites. However, if the plain Gordita Crunch happens to be your favorite, this may just be a big winner.
