We all know and love Taco Bell, but the items there aren’t created equal. Some are just better than others. For the sake of organization, I will be grouping these items by similarity in shape. In this installment, I will be covering the tacos and taco adjacent items.
Basic Tacos
All of the items listed below are normal tacos with slight modifications.
Soft Taco/Soft Taco Supreme
The basic soft taco is a staple food of the Taco Bell franchise. It’s cheap, quick to eat, and if you add the right things to it, it can only get better. The supreme variety adds sour cream and tomatoes which makes the item slightly healthier, if that is what you are looking for. This will be the baseline for the rest of the items on this list at a 5/10 rating.
Crunchy Taco/Crunchy Taco Supreme
The crunchy variety of the taco is another popular item on the menu. It’s essentially the same as the soft taco, but with a hard, corn tortilla shell. In my opinion, the hard shell makes this item worse than it’s alternate. The brittleness of the shell makes it difficult to eat once it’s broken, and it breaks often unless you eat it a specific way. That doesn’t stop most people, though. I give this taco a 3/10.
Doritos Locos Taco/Doritos Locos Taco Supreme
A unique twist on the crunchy taco, having a partnership with Doritos to bring us an interesting item. It has the same issue as the normal crunchy taco, but redeems itself with it’s seasoned shell instead of the plain shell crunchy tacos usually sport. The shortcomings of it’s crunchy shell are only slightly outweighed by the seasoning, so I give it a 4/10.
Spicy Potato Soft Taco
This is an average soft taco, but instead of a protein, it has potatoes and a spicy sauce to make it vegetarian friendly. In the case of this item, its quality can depend on the batch of potatoes used, similar to how one might expect fries to vary in quality throughout the day. Even when it is good quality, however, it is still not as good as a regular taco with protein. I would still place this above the hard taco variants, but not as high as the original soft taco. For these reasons, I give the spicy potato soft taco a 4.5/10
Specialty Tacos
All the tacos listed below are tacos with more major modifications.
Gordita Supreme
Coming back to Taco Bell for a limited time, the gordita supreme is a part of the decades menu, bringing back items from the past. This item specifically is essentially a soft taco with a thicker and softer tortilla. From a personal standpoint, I love the thickness of the gordita tortilla, putting it higher on my list at 6/10.
Double Stacked Taco
The double stacked taco is a combination of the crunchy and soft tacos, with a layer of nacho cheese between the two shells and added fiesta strips. if you are looking for a taco with a good crunch, but still holds together, this is the taco for you. This taco has the best of both worlds and it has an added bonus, giving it a rating of 6/10.
Cheesy Gordita Crunch
Similar to the double stacked taco, but this item replaces the regular soft taco tortilla with a thicker gordita tortilla. It also substitutes the fiesta strips with sour cream. The softer texture of this item is something that I appreciate, and, unlike the double stacked taco, it doesn’t have too many crunchy elements. This lands it just above the double stacked taco with a 7/10.
Chalupa Supreme
Similar to a gordita, but with a fried shell to make it more sturdy. Honestly, the fried aspect doesn’t add or take away too much from it. I will say that it is a novel item, which I give it points for. One thing it does have going for it is the increased capacity for ingredients. You can add more toppings to this compared to other items. The finals score for this item is a 7/10.
Cantina Chicken Crunchy Taco
The cantina chicken crispy taco is a special crispy taco, having a unique shell and slow roasted chicken. This specific chicken they use for the cantina products is so mouthwateringly good. One point of contention I have with it is the crunchy shell. While it is held together with a layer of grilled cheese on the outside, the shell on the inside isn’t my style. With all that said, it’s final score is a 7.5/10
Cantina Chicken Soft Taco
If you like vegetables, this is your type of taco. It has a variety of vegetables, along with the slow roasted cantina chicken and spicy sauce. The combination of flavors in this item are truly transformative. Personally, this is my favorite out of all the tacos in this list. No matter how good this item is, though, it still needs modification for it to be perfect, and, for that reason, I give it an 8.5/10.
Not Tacos
The items listed below aren’t listed as tacos in any way, but are close enough to be put on this list.
Meximelt
This item from the decades menu is essentially a soft taco, but instead of lettuce, they add pico de gallo, and they substitute the three cheese blend for nacho cheese. They also steam the item to make the cheese even gooier. There’s not much here, but the ingredient choice agrees with me more, so I give it a 6/10.
3 Cheese Chicken Flatbread Melt
All this item is, is a chicken quesadilla in a gordita tortilla. It’s quick, simple, and enjoyable. My only complaint is that there isn’t much there. It’s much smaller than a chicken quesadilla, leaving less room for ingredients, and the steamed tortilla doesn’t do it much favors. I’d put this around the same tier as the original soft taco at a 5.5/10.
Conclusion
Out of every taco I examined, I found that most of them are better than the original in some way. The crunchy variety of tacos were only lower in the list because of the fragility of the item. If eaten properly, they have a capacity to be mess free. Also, let’s not forget that every rating I gave was purely motivated by my opinion, so if any of your favorite items were given a less than favorable rating, I have no doubt that it may taste better or worse to you. That’s all for now. next week I will be reviewing all the burrito items on the menu.
