Doritos Fajita Flavored

           Yes, you guessed it; it’s that special time of the month where I review yet another seasoning that’s riffing off of the stuff they served in your school cafeteria, (“stuff” being the absolutely most polite of the words I considered inserting into that sentence.)  And, as in previous reviews, despite the dubious food items being imitated, I can’t help but enjoy the obvious effort that went into painstakingly recreating the nuances of cafeteria/Taco Bell style Tex-Mex, and the nostalgia captured therein.

Real fajitas...

            That’s not to say Fajitas aren’t a fully legitimate food item in and of themselves.  Properly done, they are an extra fun cross between a burrito and taco, with long slices of grilled meat stuffed into a pita alongside with the sweet and sour flavors of salsa, sour cream, grilled peppers, tomatos, and onions.  But we are not talking about those sort of fajitas.

...and Taco Bell. Which looks tastier?
I was dismayed to see these happily
devoured by my old 4th Grade class for their
'nutritionally balanced'  school lunches.  Some
things haven't changed too much  since I was a
 kid, as Supersize Me  (at 7:06) atests.

            No, these are the fajitas I used to get in my elementary school cafeteria, and that I can still get today in just about any Taco Bell, stuffed full of ground beef and refried beans dripping with salty oil and smothered in cheese (because America is the place where everything is done BIG, our approach to incorporating melted cheese owes more to the mass artillery barrages of World War I than the swift surgical strikes of the modern era.) A little packet of ‘salsa’ is usually provided on the side, and maybe some onions or lettuce is thrown in the ground-up mix, hapless conscripts drawn from more gentile cuisine, but basically your mouth is in for an oil and salt bath.  To dress up the flavor, a generic Mexican seasoning is thrown in, giving the ground beef a modicum of flavor, though unfortunately adding to the already bursting salt quota. 

            Now, I will guiltily admit that didn’t sound entirely bad to me, and when I was kid it seemed pretty decent (if not exactly great.)  Plenty of people still enjoy their Taco Bell today, and whom am I in my Chipotle-catered ivory tower to look down upon them?  Even the dedicated snob occasionally feels the allure of lower tastes, even when they have a superior alternative ready at hand.

This is where I want to live when I grow up.

            So,  for those school cafeteria and Taco Bell lovers out there, these chips nail the flavor of those greasy quasi-fajitas.  The flavorist went well beyond tossing on some generic south western spices, going to the trouble of painstakingly recreating the aroma of the refried beans, the smothering cheese, and above all the pungency of those salty Old El Paso-style Mexican seasonings to the T.  Instead of treating a lowly subject with the contempt it deserved, they approached it as if it were a true art and thereby elevated beyond its station, just as Tarantino would seek to find Truth and Beauty in a film about Nazi werewolf dominatrixes.

"Werewolf Women of the SS evokes the
deeper themes of self-alienation and the
creation of the 'other' by juxtaposing its
eroticized lupine protagonists with the
tyrannical socio-political order their
howling orgies of violence help unleash."

            Did I even bother mentioning these were Doritos?  Purely incidental information, as Flavoring is God. The crisps are visibly salted with more seasoning than the standard Dorito, including decent-sized chunks of black pepper.  Predominating are salty south-western spices (composed of cumin, paprika, garlic, black pepper), which are for once suitably spicy; underneath is the flavor of refried beans, close behind is a mild hint of melted cheddar cheese, and far in the distance, a faint taste of those forlorn tomatoes tossed in for authenticity’s sake, just like the diced vegfgies contemptuously chucked into a Taco Bell Chalupa.

            So, Fajita Doritos are surprisingly tasty and evocative, even if what they evoke is incredibly greasy and salty and lacks the elements of grilled meat, vegetables, and sophisticated sauces we look to from genuine Mexican cuisine.  The moderate spicy piquancy and the uncanny flavor emulation with the spices combine to make these Doritos an enjoyable experience, although I should reiterate that the salt averse should probably stay away.  Though the subject matter may not really be worth imitating, when it’s done this well, it can still excite the interest of nostalgic taste buds.

Stars: 2½ /4

Spiciness: Moderate

Pros:

- Clever flavor emulation brings to life the flavor of greasy cafeteria cooking and drive-through Taco Bell

- Diverse mixture of spices and elements

Cons:

- Very salty

- Leaves one yearning for seasonings with higher aspirations

Monoprix Tortillas Enroulées

          The first chips I bought in France were Tomato-Basil chips, but since then it’s been a long dry haul in the category of Italian-inspired seasoning, until the other day my favorite half-elf snagged a small bag of them for a picnic out on the Buttes de Chaumont.

            Those familiar with my earlier review of the Tortillas Enroulee Fromage should recognize the format; basically a Nacho corn tortilla round wrapped into a cylinder evocative of those cute little cookies you get with your coffee.  (Incidentally, in addition to being known as pirouettes, these cookies are also apparently called ‘cigarettes’, which I guess would sound sweet and delicious only to a Parisian- the air is fresh indoors here, I swear.)  The rolled tortilla chip format might sound gimmicky, but it’s actually crunches very pleasingly in the mouth, and is still usable with thicker dips like guacamole or cheese dip.  They seemed like exactly the sort of thing that would go well with tomato-basil flavoring.

Cigarette smoke from philosophy students
and fashion models makes up 20% of Paris's
atmosphere. Unfortunately, all the coffee
does not also contribute to the odor.

            Unfortunately, I must report with a heavy heart that if this is a tomato flavoring, it is a very sad and watery tomato.  Or maybe canned tomatoes, tasting more of tin and iron than juicy vegetable.  The rods are sweet, kind of like a sun-dried tomato, but it is a sickly half-hearted kind of sweet lacking in panache or self-confidence, and there’s a weird sort of celery-salt like flavor that I imagine is supposed to be like basil, but I assure you, rarely anything good can come of celery salt.  It’s a kind of generic vegetably mashup with a sweet element on top, a sort of feebler V8.

            I wouldn’t say they were inedible, because you still have the basic sweet and salty to carry you through, but the vegetable flavor tastes just a little off, like blood in your mouth (maybe it’s the iron from that canned tomato flavor!).  They certainly don’t taste like tomato, (though to be fair, ‘tomato powder’ is listed on the ingredients list right after sugar and salt), but worse is that it just doesn’t taste good.  Still, the fundamentally satisfying crunchiness of the underlying rolled-up-tortilla chips save these from being a total waste, but anyone looking for a good tomato flavored chip should look elsewhere, and anyone intrigued by tortilla cigarettes/pirouettes/whatevers should probably buy the cheese-flavored variety.

Blood flavored tomato chips?  And I
they don't even need to be stalked and
seduced?

Stars: 1½/4

Spiciness Rating: None

Pros:

- Basic rolled-over corn tortilla round format is fun to crunch in your mouth

- Flavoring at least manages to offer a semi-adequate salty-sweet balance

Cons:

- Flavoring is still awful in most respects, failing to taste like actual tomato-basil, sun dried tomatoes, or good in any respect

Monoprix Tortillas Enroulé aux Fromage

Pirouette Cookkies: The tunnel
of chocolatey love beckons to thee.

            My lovely lady lum- um, friend that happens to be my partner sought to lure me out of the dark catacombs of my office/bedroom one evening into the painfully bright sunshine of spring in Paris, and promised me a surprise I would appreciate.  And lo did my cave-addled eyes perceive a small bag of snacks, possibly salty and newly acquired, which I could only help but consume and analyze at exhaustive length.

            So, what Monoprix did here was take a round nacho/tortilla corn chip and roll it around into a scroll shape, till it looks just like a Pirouette cookie.  You’ve probably already had one served with your fancy coffee, ice cream, or desert, and they’re pretty tasty, though often hollow on the inside (long empty shafts like that scream for filling with cream or chocolate, or possibly, the tossing down of emotionally troubled Jedi.)

In a world full of blasters and laser swords,
death by falling is disturbingly frequent.

            Are the Monoprix Tortilla’s Enroulé tasty as well?  Well, yes, because they are covered with an orange cheese flavoring that tastes almost exactly like your typical Doritos!  Now, I’m willing to go on record and say that I have long enjoyed old fashion Doritos, though I normally wouldn’t go out of my way to buy them when there are more exotic options available.  Still, I hadn’t had any since coming to France, and it’s nice to see the tradition upheld.

               As they are wrapped up like little Pirouette cookies, the eating experience is somewhat different, in a good way- the little Dorito-scrolls crunch very satisfyingly, though the intensity of the flavoring may be slightly less as a result of the lower amount of surface area.  If you ever felt some bizarre need to dip your Doritos in salsa, the scroll shaped bodies would of course be less than ideal, but I’m willing to bet they work just as well when dunked into hot cheese dip. (Erin of course tried them with hummus, which she reports as being ‘effing awesome’.)  So all in all, an amusing French variant on a familiar American staple worth checking out by anybody with craving for more Doritos on distant shores.

Trivia: How many of these photos do
not actually show death by falling?

Stars: 2½/4

Spiciness Rating: None

Pros:

- Flavoring nostalgically reminiscent of Doritos

- Rolled-over tortillas are fun to crunch

Cons:

- Flavoring not quite as intense as Doritos, and otherwise undistinguished

- Not highly convenient for dipping, (though why would you dip Doritos anyway?)

Monoprix Tortillas Gout Chili

Inevitably, when crossing cultural barriers, one comes across words that don’t have the same exact meaning in one language than the other.  Sometimes there might be two, more specific, terms in one language for that which is specified with one word in another.  In this case, when the product says ‘Chili’, they don’t meant a tasty-South-Western-beef-and-peppers stew (otherwise known as ‘chili con carne’, which does not originate from Mexico), but merely hot red pepper powder.

Chips to be found underneath the
pile.

I had purchased this bag hoping that the flavoring was something bolder, but these turned out to be another store-brand rendition of Nacho chips with ‘Western’ seasoning.  The Leader Price variant of these I had earlier tried had been attacked by maniac with shaker full of Cumin powder (giving it a distinctly Indian sub-continent flair), and while the cumin element is still present, there is overall a much saner (if a little more boring) approach to balancing the spices in this iteration.

In contrast to their competitor, these chips look almost exactly like Doritos, complete with the small puffy air bubbles, but with a flavoring that serves a more supporting role.  That is a blend of ‘South Western' spices featuring onion and garlic powder, cumin, and red pepper powder, slathered on the chips to a generally acceptable consistency, leaving you with something that is both salty and mildly spicy, just like your mom.

Compared to the Leader Price version, the price-for-quantity ratio is about the same, and the chips are essentially similar in flavor, but less likely to offend with their more balanced quantities of cumin and saltiness.  So, nothing to write home about, but a reasonable solution for your salsa and guacamole dipping needs (when in Europe).

Stars: 2/4

Spiciness Rating: Very Mild

Pros:

- Interesting cumin and red pepper spices applied in a more balanced fashion than other products on the market

- the Doritos-style shape and texture is a little less dry than the Leader Price version

- good balance of flavoring for use as dipping chips

Cons:

- Doritos style texture is still light years away from that of a genuine, high quality, authentic Tortilla chip

- the more measured approach to the spices is a little less characterful for the lack of crazy

Leader Price Tortilla Chips Epicées

No matter where I ago, I am occasionally going to want to make or buy salsa and guacamole, and on those occasions the humble tortilla chip must be summoned forth to perform it’s unglamorous duty as a platform or delivering spicy sauces to your mouth.  In France, these occasions lead me to acquire some of Leader Price’s Tortilla Chips Epicées (spiced) from the grocery store, because not all tortilla chips are created equal, and if they have additional entertainment value when not laden with some form of dip, so much the better.

Lucky Luke, one of the most
famous French cartoon characters,
and important cultural reference
point for French citizens trying to
understand America.

Now, ‘Mexican’ food has a very small but reasonably stable niche market in France, so you won’t see a tremendous variety of offerings, but any decently sized store will at least hold a few of the staple El Paso brand products.  That is to say, ‘Mexican’ food in Europe is probably about where Mexican food in the United States Mid West was about 40 years ago; progressive that I am, I still feel that there has been real improvement since my childhood! 

The idea of the Wild West and the cowboy captivates the French imagination in particular, as evidenced by “Lucky Luke” cartoons, perhaps even more than it does Americans, and most French people assume based on Dubya’s foreign policy that a majority of our political class wears Stetson hats while crowing out ‘Yee-haw’ from the back of a mustang.  Naturally, the package boasts the image of cowboy riding horse in front of the setting sun, surrounded by mesas and cactus.  It takes remarkable skill to pack that many clichés in such a small space.

It seems there was some confusion
between the American South West
and South West Asia.

            Unfortunately, it seems that the flavorists for LeaderPrice confused the American Southwest with the Indian sub-continent. Yes, while present in many Mexican spice mixes, the overriding flavor of cumin will have you think of Dhaka before Deadwood, and leave you reaching for your Mango Lassis and a spoon full of Matter Paneer and Chicken Vindaloo rather than a taco.  (No, I am not giving you a link to a taco.) 
            So, decidedly peculiar.  That said, cumin and garlic isn’t a bad flavor at all, and how many cumin-flavored chips do you come across?  While it’s not really ‘Western’ themed flavoring as an American would recognize it, these cumin tortilla chips are still fun in their own right.

A more appropriate image for the packaging.
(Note: You can actually buy these stamps!)

            The seasoning is perhaps a little too strong and salty, but still enjoyable and reasonably entertaining when eaten solo.  The chips are relatively small triangular corn nachos, unremarkable in texture, but work acceptably as salsa delivery platforms.  In fact, these are one of the few flavored tortilla chips where the flavoring is actually strong enough to be tasted alongside any salsa on the chip.  This can be a plus or a minus, but if you brought the spiced chips over the plain ones in the first place, you probably don’t mind something a little stronger, and it's a pleasant surprise when the crisp' flavoring is strong enough not to be drowned out by the dip!

            In summary, these chips are an example of a product that fails to meet the expectations or exhibit much polish (the flavoring is just a little too salty), but which I rate leniently (and with fondness) because they offer a unique and amusing experience at a bargain price

Stars: 2½/4

Spiciness Rating: Very Mild

Pros:

- Cumin flavored chips offer something amusing and unusual
- Good for eating alone as well as with dip
- Good quantity for price

Cons:

- Flavoring is a little too salty
- Chips are unremarkable in texture
- Not South Western flavored (wrong continent, dudes!)

Fritos Flavor Twists Honey BBQ

            Some things in life are a tease, or allumeuse as the French would say.  They reveal just a little a bit of what’s inside, just a hint of the enticing delights floating beyond your grasp, oh so slowly and subtly.  Much as you may yearn to pry out the beautiful goods within, the tease delays, withholds, drives you mad with anticipation of the moment that they will yield their bounty to your slavering appetite.  A good tease will gloriously avail itself at the end of an opera of escalating desirous tension, a bad tease will leave one frustrated and without satisfaction.

Rotini pastsa, the obvious inspiration
for the Flavor Twists.  Though it may
look like a pile of chitinous beatles,
the little coils are wonderful for
abosrbing tomato sauce and cheese.

            Fritos Honey Barbecue Flavor Twists are good teases.  There are not a few bad teases, when it comes to chips; subtle flavorings that hint at great things to come, but never pay off because of inadequate seasoning or missing flavor notes.  But the tease-iness of the Honey Barbecue Twists is in fact rather clever; these are basically your standard Frito corn chips elongated into a twisted coiled shape very much like rotini pasta and then slathered with a sweet barbecue flavoring with notes of molasses, garlic, and tomato. 

Good tease or bad tease? In
the end, Cylon #6 will likely give
you all that you were hoping for,
but leaving you regretting it for
a long, long time.

Because the coils of the ‘twists’ are too small for the tongue to fit fully inside, you can only taste a judicious but incomplete portion (say 50 to 70%) of the tasty flavoring on the chip, and are left lusting to probe your tongue deeper to ravish all of the yummy seasoning.  An impossible task, I must confess, but the amount of flavoring already there is adequate, and by withholding a bit, I find myself always wanting more, whereas if all the flavoring had been easily accessible my taste buds would likely saturate and it would wear out its welcome.  (A similar theory applies to ‘saving yourself’ while dating, but I don’t know if I really want to encourage this line of reasoning.)

Obviously, these are not the most sophisticated fair as chips go, but they remain a tasty tease for the tongue which I like to return to when nothing more exotic (or discounted) draws my eye.  Some may raise any eyebrow at the high score, but for what they are, (a variety of Frito Corn Chip) they are nothing less than perfect.

Uninteresting Bit of Trivia: I can say with precision that the first time I tried these chips was at the recommendation of my partner while waiting next to a CVS to pick up my sister at the Columbia Heights Metro station in Washington DC in September of 2006.  How’s that for epic?

Stars: 4/4

Spiciness Rating: none

Pros:

- Excellent sweet barbecue flavoring

- Coiled shape of the chips tantalizes the tongue by holding a bit of the flavoring just out of reach…

- Frito’s corn chips are extra crunchy and satisfying in this format

Cons:

- None really, except that some will always prefer more refined chips

Chili Cheese Fritos

         Many bizarre contrivances have crawled out from the moist dens of college cafeterias, conceived in an effort to feed the masses of impressionable young students only recently weaned off mom’s home cooking with whatever combination of cheap ingredients were at hand.  One that I recall fairly vividly as both hilarious but reasonably edible was Frito casserole, a mixture of ground beef, refried beens, and cheddar cheese, a sprinkling of lettuce and tomatoes on top, and soggy Fritos.  Yes, you heard that correctly.  I can only imagine how some cafeteria quartermaster decided “Yes, let’s buy Fritos in bulk and make casserole with it!”

A Texas BBQ joint apparently had a
similar idea, offering up Frito Pie.
However, this version seems consider-
ably tastier, as it includes beef brisket
and barbecue sauce.  Still, Fritos and
bean casserole, together again!

            I actually recall it with faint nostalgia; not something I’d go out of my way to make myself, but it wasn’t bad (in a greasy American-style taco sort of way) and it was a unique product of our academic community- oh yeah, that and educated young minds brimming with promise, ready to die ashamed they had not already won a victory for humanity.  Look it where that got us.  

      Anyway, the Chili Cheese Fritos I happened upon in my mother-in-law's cupboard (how much like a creepy old fairy-tale does that sound?) very pleasantly evoked that old cafeteria special- as well as it should remind anyone else who has had chili with cheddar on top.  Overtop a nice cheesy flavor made (according to the package) with romano and cheddar, there are ‘taco’ spices, one of which I can say with certainty is cumin, not something I expect to find on any ordinary chip!  The reddish-brown flavoring is spread with a pleasing consistency and I found it to be well balanced with the natural flavor of the corn chips, unlike another Fritos product which will I shall leave unnamed.

This website featuring 'college cooking'
actually features a recipe for Frito Pie.

     So overall, I was pleasantly surprised that the Chili-Cheese Fritos delivered a unique flavor effectively, were competently executed, and brought me back over five years to the days I was flunking chemistry and getting hit on by my wife.  Admittedly, I probably won’t buy them in quantity because spicy-chili Fritos are not the sort of itch I frequently need to scratch, but it’s there if you want it, and it’s well done for what it is.

Stars: 2½/4

Spiciness Rating: Very Mild

Pros:

- If you harbor nostalgic sentiments American style tacos and ‘Mexican’ casserole from the school cafeteria, this will hit your spot.

- Taco spice flavoring, with its hints of cumin, is more sophisticated than you would expect and is well coated on the Fritos

Cons:

- How often do you think to yourself, “Mmmm, I really feel like going out for some school cafeteria food tonight.”

Fritos Bar B Q Flavored Corn Chips

Note: This product is not to be confused with Frito Honey Barbecue Twists, which are angelic emissaries from Golden City of the Maker, whereas the following product could only be the darkspawn of the Fade.

           There is a special place in hell reserved for various chip brands that claim to have a certain flavor they are lacking in practice.  But, just as even hell has some rejects, some flavorings are too lowly to even a occupy their own corner of damnation, and are left to wander the real world a hollow shell of their potential selves.

            To clarify: perhaps the designers of the BBQ Frito corn chips thought a minimal salting of barbecue flavoring would somehow be enough, or were worried that if the flavor was too strong the taster would lose out on the underlying Fritos flavor.  But whatever the case, they utterly failed in making Fritos that have an actual barbecue flavor.

Note: They didn't mention
corn chips, did they?

            Now, I will admit that I think I may have tasted some faint whiff of a barbecue flavor hidden somewhere within the overpowering salty corn oil taste of regular Fritos.  However, the flavor is so faint that I can’t honestly be sure that it is really there and not a phantom barbecue-flavored placebo I’m swallowing with all the pretty maroon-colored flavoring dust.  But even though ectoplasmic barbecue flavor would be a pretty cunning conspiracy on the part of Frito-Lay, it does not make for a tasting experience in any substantial way different from chomping on regular Fritos.  

That’s not the worst thing ever, regular Fritos are okay if unspectacular in my opinion (perhaps a little oversalted), but the fact that I specifically bought BBQ flavored Fritos that have almost no actual barbecue flavor is a serious problem as far as I’m concerned.  Furthermore, the calorie count on those things at 300 for a small bag is ridiculous even by the standards of oily flavored chips.

 The difference is you realize
zombies aren't your friends when
they try to eat you, and you realize
the BBQ Fritos are bad when you
try to eat them.

            Now, for the record, this was my second sampling of BBQ Fritos, having decided to try them again after the last disappointing occasion on the theory that perhaps I simply received a poorly mixed batch.  But this bag was just as disappointing as the previous one, and the little purple dust on the chips was definitely visible, so I am reasonably assured that we are talking about a kind of barbecue-zombie, rather than barbecue-ghost.  That is, the physical flavoring is there, but it has no soul.

Stars: 1/4

Spiciness Rating: none

Pros:
- If you like Fritos already, these taste exactly the same and probably have the same cost.

Cons:
- What barbecue flavoring?  I can see it, why can't I taste it?  Leprosy?
- The product doesn't deliver what it advertises.  Try Honey Barbecue Flavor Twists instead.
- Ridiculous calorie count for a small bag, as if they wanted to put you in the grave.
- Zombies!

Late Night Cheeseburger Doritos

           Every now and then I come across something that is a remarkable feat of flavor-engineering, and I must confess that it is clear that the flavorists at Doritos HQ have really outdone themselves with the Late Night Cheeseburger Doritos.  I will be the first to admit that I have never particularly craved to eat cheeseburger-flavored chips before, but with the very first Nacho I was stunned with how startlingly well they had emulated the flavor in all of its complexity, and these chips are fun to eat simply for both their novelty and for distinguishing the various discrete flavors which have been cunningly blended together.

            Now, just so we’re all on the same page, these are your standard triangular Dorito chips with the crunchy texture and the orange-flavoring powder.  But oh, the flavors!  The strongest flavors you will get off the bat are the pickles and yellow mustard, just like you would get on a typical McDonald’s hamburger.  Now, I have never been a McDonald’s burger fan, honestly, and normally favor ketchup over mustard with no pickles as topping, but these two flavors alone brought back a rich vein of childhood Happy Meal memories. 

Second, there is a more subtle but very satisfying grilled beef flavor, which blends perfectly in with the presumed toppings of mustard and pickles.  (The package lists ‘natural beef flavoring’ as one of its ingredients, for what it’s worth.)  There is also a hint of onion in there, although the flavor is mixed in a bit with that of the mustard. 

Finally, there is your typical Doritos ‘cheddar’ flavoring present as well, which although prominent, is so ordinary compared to the other elements that it does not stand out as much.  (Ironically, while the ordinary Doritos cheddar flavor is quite tasty on its own right, I’ve never really thought of it as tasting like actual cheddar cheese, which perhaps detracts from its effectiveness in this particular case.)

            So in summary, you not only get five excellent distinct flavors in one chip, but they combine together in a manner which is remarkably effective in evoking the flavor of an actual cheeseburger, (or hamburger, at least, as the ‘cheesy’ portion is more like a typical Dorito.)  I can happily recommend these as a very pleasing novelty, my only reservation being that they emulate such a specific and peculiar concept that you may not wish to eat them on a regular basis.

Stars: 3/4

Spiciness Rating: None

Pros:

-Brilliantly innovative and powerfully evocative of actual Cheesebergers

-Five interesting flavors that are fun to discover and tease apart from the rest

Cons:

-Peculiar flavor combination may not be something you want to experience every day