REVIEW: Taco Bell Mountain Dew Baja Blast Pie

Fast food really isn’t about food. Really, it’s more like an edible form of pop culture. And nothing demonstrates that more than the existence of the co-branded Taco Bell Mountain Dew Baja Blast Pie.

It’s a 2,500-calorie-plus novelty dessert that nearly tips the scales at two pounds when it’s still in the box. It’s not really marketed as something you eat as much as it is an experience. That’s doubly reinforced by its steep $20 asking price; there may not be a vast market for something like this, but there’s definitely some kind of consumer demand for it. (Just so you know, I could still hear my local TB representative through the drive-thru speaker after I placed my order: “Hey, some [expletive deleted] is actually buying one of these things!”)

I’ve got a feeling people are going to pick these up just for the packaging alone. And to be fair, it is pretty cool looking. I can easily see the boxes fetching a pretty penny on eBay in about ten years.

But what about the pie itself? Well, all in all … it isn’t bad.

Probably the first thing you’ll notice about the pie is its rich teal color. It’s not quite the same color as the beverage it’s named after, but it’s pretty close to it. The instructions on the box suggest leaving the pie out to thaw for about four hours, with the explicit recommendation that you don’t microwave it. I can’t think of a reason why you physically couldn’t put it in an oven and bake it, though — but just to play it safe, I took Taco Bell’s advice and patiently waited for my pie to unfreeze itself.

The aroma of the pie is unmistakable. It’s Baja Blast scented, alright, with just a little sherbet ice cream smell in there. Even if you had no idea what the product was supposed to be, if you get a big whiff of it, you should automatically deduce that it’s a Mountain Dew derivative.

The pie has a nice, sturdy Graham cracker crust, with a couple of flourishes of whipped topping encircling it like a halo. It’s obviously not a rush job either, as somebody definitely took their time making the creamy border look as pretty as possible. Aesthetically, it’s a lot nicer than I anticipated.

Now, the moment of truth: the taste test.

It’s a fairly unusual product, but I guess we all knew that heading into it. With the first couple of bites, all I got was a super tart, key lime pie flavor. But the more I chewed, the more the Baja Blast flavor made itself apparent. Granted, it’s not a perfect one-to-one replication of the Baja Blast taste, but it’s an impressive recreation all the same. The texture and mouthfeel of the pie filling kinda reminded me of a thick sorbet, or maybe an extra chewy gelato. And it syncs up shockingly well with the aforementioned crust and whipped topping. The co-branding gimmick aside, it actually IS a real pie, and a surprisingly pleasant one at that.

Objectively, you can’t tout the pie too much. It’s way too pricey even for a novelty product, and I probably wouldn’t want to eat one of these every week. But overall, I’d consider it an unexpectedly decent fast food dessert item — even if it does open the floodgates for an inevitable wave of cola-flavored comestible imitators.

Purchased Price: $19.99
Size: 30.4 ounces
Rating: 7 out of 10
Nutrition Facts: One serving (eight servings per container) — 320 calories, 13 grams of total fat, 8 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans far, 15 mg of cholesterol, 200 mg of sodium, 46 grams of total carbohydrates, 2 grams of dietary fiber, 32 grams of sugar (including 26 grams of added sugar), and 5 grams of protein.