A side of nacho cheese sauce dip. An order of Nacho Fries. A Nacho Fries BellGrande. A medium Mountain Dew Baja Blast. Is this heaven? In this hell? No, this is Taco Bell, and this is day one of the limited release of Nacho Fries. I hope you’re ready to come on this trip with me.

Some may ask, “These aren’t nachos, why are you covering them?” WELL THEY’VE GOT NACHO RIGHT IN THE NAME, THAT’S WHY! And as a new item from Taco Bell, we kinda have to cover them to keep our mexican food cred. Plus it’s been awhile since we’ve been called left wing liberal Ivy League elites for daring to say that Taco Bell makes nachos that are kinda meh, so we wouldn’t want to let the Haters down. But Haters watch out, and prepare to become Lovers as today we have come here to praise Taco Bell, not to bury it. Today we declare that Nacho Fries are pretty good!

Yessir, for one single dollar bill (and applicable taxes) you can get all of this right here:

That is a side of nacho cheese sauce dip and a small container… containing... nine Nacho Fries. You might at first glance assume that I had eaten some of them from how few appear here, but no. I don’t think ol’ TB was intentionally trying to stiff me here, they just couldn’t cook the fries fast enough as illustrated by everyone in the dining area ordering them and having to wait 10 minutes just to get these, so presumably what they had ended up getting stretched a bit and some went out a little “light”. I used to be in servitude to the Burger King back in the days, and I know how things go down when you don’t have quite enough fries for two orders and need to fudge some things. But as they say, it is the quality, not the quantity that counts, so how were they?

There might be a few fry nubbins hidden in the box, but if we assume there is 10 cents of nacho cheese sauce dip in every order this about a dime a fry. I haven’t seen sauce this weak since I tried their “Mild” sauce.

THEY’RE PRETTY GOOD! Sure, you’re not going to get some beer battered deliciousness that you might at your local watering hole, but not bad for fast food. You might assume they’d be salty as shit too, but not in the least. The fries were if anything salt free with the only non-potato flavor coming from the nacho cheese dust that is sprinkled on top. Indeed it is the nacho cheese sauce dip from where it gets the salt so you’re not getting a double blast of sodium in your arteries, equaling a fry that is just right. Plus it’s a zesty french fry covered in cheese sauce for a buck, and nowhere else, fast food restaurant or no, is offering that.

Before we move on to the Nacho Fries BellGrande, there is one fry issue we need to address. The fries themselves are not inherently nachoey, it’s the magical nacho dust that is sprinkled over the top that does that trick versus something mixed into the potato... batter? I don’t know how they make fries. And as this magical nacho dust is sprinkled over the top of the fries not by Nachomancers or The Nacho Fairy but by fallible Taco Bell workers, there are some fries that are going to be more liberally covered than others resulting in a range in nacho flavor. In the below example, please notice that in the same Nacho Fries BellGrande Nacho Fry Example 1 is quite a bit less nachoey than Nacho Fry Example 2.

I suppose this does show the artisanal, handmade nature of the Nacho Fries.

As for the Nacho Fries BellGrande itself, firstly you’ll notice that they forgot my tomatoes. Secondly though, you’ll see that they are not messing around with the amount of toppings on what is basically chili cheese fries. With Burger King and Jack-in-the-Box apparently out of the CCF game, the only other contender in this field is Arby’s. While they may have the meats, all they have for toppings are the merest drizzles of cheese sauce and ranch dress, with a slight dusting of bacon. The Nacho Fries BellGrande however gives you dolops of everything (save tomatoes in my case) providing the perfect ratio of meat to cheese to fries. The fries even cut some of the Taco Bellness out of the ground beef, making it taste just like the regular ol’ mashed up beef you could cook at home. Whether that is or is not a selling point depends on you, but I was very impressed.

Arby, I think you and I have different definitions of the volume of toppings that need to be included to be called “Loaded”

Additionally, the Mountain Dew Baja Blast was of course as extreme and blasty as ever. I could have tried the new Mountain Dew Spiked, but I’m a MD BB fan through and through. BAJA BLAST FOR LIFE! (Chugs bottle, skateboards out of a helicopter down a dinosaurs’ back and jumps over an erupting volcano while playing an electric guitar and someone snowboarding nearby gives me a barbed wire tattoo around my bicep)

So should you try the new Nacho Fries at Taco Bell? Yeah, you should since I was kind of shocked at how good they were. I can’t in good conscience say that they’re nachos, but they’re close enough in the Poutine/Chili Cheese Fry/Irish Nacho zone that they’re practically family. They’re only a buck, but if you’re going to treat yourself, up that to the Nacho Fries Supreme, or REALLY treat yourself with that Nacho Fries BellGrande. Your doctor may not approve, but your tastebuds will.