REVIEW: Taco Bell Boss Wraps (Fully Loaded Steak and Steak & Potato)

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Taco Bell Boss Wraps

Steak.

It’s what can make Taco Bell, which is usually coins under your car’s floor mats cheap, expensive. But if you want to splurge at the fast food chain because you have $6 in bills instead of $2.26 in loose change, might I suggest Taco Bell’s Boss Wraps.

The new menu item is available in two varieties: Fully Loaded Steak and Steak & Potato.

The Fully Loaded Steak comes with a double portion of steak, reduced fat sour cream, avocado ranch sauce, lettuce, pico de gallo, guacamole, a crunchy tostada shell, and a 3-cheese blend wrapped up in a tortilla. The Steak & Potato Boss Wrap features a double portion of steak, chopped bacon, chipotle sauce, a 3-cheese blend, reduced fat sour cream, a crunchy tostada shell, and crispy potatoes in a tortilla.

Taco Bell Boss Wraps 2

Because of its name, I felt as if it was necessary to start my order with either a “hey man,” “yo,” or a “whaddup” and then emphasize the word “boss.” My cashier didn’t care.

Taco Bell Steak & Potato Boss Wrap

If you have to choose one of the two varieties, go with the Steak & Potato. The potatoes weren’t crunchy when I bit into mine, but, to be fair, they were sitting in the tortilla while I took too many photos. But their flavor made up for their lack of crispiness. Their seasoning reminds me of curly fries and they go well with the chipotle sauce. If Taco Bell ever offers their crispy potatoes with a side of chipotle dipping sauce on their value menu, I’d buy that.

The bacon bits add a smokiness and saltiness, but when eaten alone, I didn’t immediately think of bacon. Instead, I thought of how Taco Bell’s sad bacon bits depress me. While the potatoes didn’t have any crispiness, the tostada shell still had a nice crunch, giving the menu item a different texture.

The double portion of steak, which seemed more like a single portion, was easy to bite through and lightly seasoned. But the steak’s flavor does take a back seat to the chipotle sauce and potatoes. I wish it stood out a bit more.

Taco Bell Fully Loaded Steak Boss Wrap

As for the Fully Loaded Steak Boss Wrap, I liked the avocado ranch sauce, there was a good amount of guacamole, the steak’s flavor was more noticeable, the pico de gallo wasn’t, and the tostada shell still had its crunch. It’s got a lot of nice flavors, but while eating it, I couldn’t help but think I was experiencing Taco Bell deja vu.

If you’re a fan of Taco Bell’s Crunchwrap Supreme, think of these Boss Wraps as upscaled versions with prices to match. The national advertised price is $4.99 and I paid $6.19 each for mine. The Fully Loaded Steak version tasted like something I’ve had before from Taco Bell, but I just can’t put my sour cream, avocado ranch sauce, and guacamole stained finger on it. But, yo, I think the Steak & Potato Boss Wrap is definitely boss.

Am I writing that right?

(Nutrition Facts – Fully Loaded Steak – 760 calories, 39 grams of fat, 11 grams of saturated fat, 0.5 grams of trans fat, 75 milligrams of cholesterol, 1610 milligrams of sodium, 69 grams of carbohydrates, 6 grams of fiber, 6 grams of sugar, and 32 grams of protein. Steak & Potato – 870 calories, 46 grams of fat, 13 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 100 milligrams of cholesterol, 1960 milligrams of sodium, 78 grams of carbohydrates, 6 grams of fiber, 5 grams of sugar, and 37 grams of protein.)

Item: Taco Bell Boss Wraps (Fully Loaded Steak and Steak & Potato)
Purchased Price: $6.19*
Size: N/A
Purchased at: Taco Bell
Rating: 6 out of 10 (Fully Loaded Steak)
Rating: 7 out of 10 (Steak & Potato)
Pros: Both taste fine, but the Steak & Potato tastes better. The chipotle sauce and potatoes in the Steak & Potato Boss Wrap. Tostada shell still crunchy.
Cons: Fully Loaded Steak tasted like something else on Taco Bell’s menu. Pricey. Double portion of steak seemed like a single portion. Steak’s flavor doesn’t really stand out. Taco Bell’s bacon needs an upgrade.

*Because I live on a rock in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, things are a bit pricier here. You’ll probably pay less than I did.

REVIEW: The WORKS Reese PBC Stuff’d Burger (Canada)

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The Works Reese PBC Burger

Do I have to write this review? Can I just type the word “nope” a few hundred times, include some photos, and call it a day? Because seriously: NOPE.

On the surface, the Reese PBC Stuff’d Burger seems like it should be an interesting novelty, cut from the same cloth as a doughnut burger, a McGriddle, or a Twinkie wiener sandwich (okay, I don’t think that last one exists outside of UHF, but it should). Sweet and salty novelty sandwiches aren’t exactly fine dining, but they can be tasty.

Stuffing (and topping) a burger with Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups seems, if nothing else, like it should be fun.

Again: NOPE.

Eating it is absolutely not fun, unless you consider eating disgusting food to be fun, in which case it’s a barrel of laughs.

The Works Reese PBC Burger 2

Aside from the peanut butter cups, the burger is also topped with a couple of strips of bacon, and a fairly generous pile of crispy onion strings.

I don’t think I can be emphatic enough: do not, under any circumstances, order this hamburger. It is a disgusting, piping hot slurry of sickly sweet Reese’s goo and shoddy, dry beef.

You shouldn’t underestimate how face-burningly hot this thing is. I cut it in half, spent several minutes taking photos, and still managed to burn the Dickens out of my tongue on the first bite.

I’m not going to say that’s because this is a malevolent, hell-spawned creation of pure, unrequited evil whose sole purpose is to inflict as much anguish as possible on the world, but… if the shoe fits.

The Works Reese PBC Burger 3

Aside from the mouth-searing temperature, the flavour is completely out of whack; it’s all cloying sweetness with no balance whatsoever. The crispy onions add some texture but are completely overwhelmed, and the bacon may as well not even be there.

The burger basically tastes like dessert, only with beef and onions. It’s just wrong in a very fundamental way.

It probably doesn’t help that the beef is awful — dry, tough, and studded with bits of sinew and gristle, it’s actually shockingly bad considering that burgers are this restaurant’s stock-in-trade.

The longer I ate it, the more oppressive it became; I finished it, but I’m not sure why.

It’s pretty clear that this was created entirely to get as much media attention as possible, with no regard at all for flavour. And on that level, I guess it’s a success? But ordering and eating it is essentially a metaphorical middle finger from The Works to you. They want that sweet, sweet free press; all the people who have to suffer through actually eating it are just collateral damage.

So for those keeping score, that’s The Works: 1, humanity: 0.

(Nutrition Facts – Not available on The Works website.)

Item: The WORKS Reese PBC Stuff’d Burger (Canada)
Purchased Price: $15.98 (CAN)
Size: N/A
Purchased at: The WORKS Gourmet Burger Bistro
Rating: 1 out of 10
Pros: It’s food, I guess?
Cons: An affront to humanity. Shoddy beef. Off-putting flavour. Cloyingly sweet. Face-meltingly hot. Literal hot garbage.

REVIEW: McDonald’s Kale & Feta More-Ning McWrap (Canada)

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McDonald's Kale & Feta More-Ning McWrap

Over the last few weeks, an overwhelming amount of attention has been paid to McDonald’s breakfast menu — specifically, to the Golden Arches finally ceding to popular demand and serving that menu all day.

Sadly, despite being bombarded with news articles and ads, we don’t get to partake in your newfangled “all day breakfast” up here in Canada. So I had to suffer the indignity of leaving the house before 10:00 AM. On a weekend. Like a farmer.

I think the first thing I have to note is that the name of these wraps just does not make sense at all. More-Ning? What does that even mean? What’s a Ning? Why would I want more of it? I guess it’s supposed to be a pun? Apparently someone at McDonald’s didn’t get the memo that puns are supposed to make sense.

Inscrutable wordplay aside, McDonald’s has introduced two breakfast wraps: Sausage & Hash Brown, and Kale & Feta.

I went with the Kale & Feta, which consists of scrambled eggs, feta cheese, baby kale, and a few slices of tomato, all wrapped up in a whole wheat tortilla. That’s it. No sauce, no seasoning — it’s literally just those four ingredients (mostly kale) crammed into a dry tortilla.

This was especially off-putting in the first few bites, which consisted entirely of plain kale and tortilla; it was surprisingly horrifying. There are some vegetables that can be eaten on their own without any dressing or accompaniment; kale is not one of them.

Things improved somewhat once I got to the other three ingredients at the centre of the wrap… but not by much.

There’s something missing here; it doesn’t taste good. It’s not the quality of the ingredients, which were fine. The scrambled eggs were a little dry and way underseasoned, but they were decent enough. And they were downright gourmet when you compare them to the rubbery yellow slabs of sadness that they pass off as eggs at some other fast food joints (Tim Hortons, I’m looking squarely in your direction).

The kale and tomatoes were both reasonably fresh, and the crumbled feta gives the wrap a bit of a salty kick, trying valiantly bring some flavour and personality — an uphill battle that it just can’t win.

McDonald's Kale & Feta More-Ning McWrap 2

It’s odd; though the ingredients are all okay, they don’t taste particularly good in this configuration. I’m gonna be blunt: this thing tastes like you went dumpster diving at a health food store and then crammed a few ingredients at random into a tortilla.

What this wrap really needs is something — anything — to lubricate things and provide some flavour. Maybe if the kale had been tossed in a vinaigrette, or if it had been cooked, then this wrap could have been half-way edible. But here — raw, undressed, and abundant — it was a bit of an endurance test.

I actually really enjoyed McDonald’s last foray into the world of kale, the I’m Greek-ing Out salad (which also had the benefit of being named with a pun that actually made sense), so I’m not inherently biased against kale at McDonald’s.

But though that salad was ostensibly healthy, it had enough dressing and other tasty bits to remind you that you were at McDonald’s, and not the cafeteria at your local gym. The Kale & Feta McWrap, on the other hand, tastes like health food through-and-through. It’s tastes like the type of health food that gives health food a bad name.

It might just be the worst thing I’ve ever had from McDonald’s — and I tried the McOnion Bits.

(Nutrition Facts – 400 calories, 19 grams of fat, 7 grams of saturated fat, 0.4 grams of trans fat, 420 milligrams of cholesterol, 840 milligrams of sodium, 37 grams of carbohydrates, 7 grams of fibre, 3 grams of sugar, 21 grams of protein.)

Item: McDonald’s Kale & Feta More-Ning McWrap (Canada)
Purchased Price: $3.99 CAN
Size: N/A
Purchased at: McDonald’s
Rating: 3 out of 10
Pros: Decent eggs. Fresh veggies.
Cons: Tastes like a health food store dumpster. Ingredients don’t work well together. Dry. Raw kale overload. Desperately needs some kind of dressing. McOnion Bits flashbacks.

REVIEW: Burger King A.1. Halloween Whopper

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Burger King A.1. Halloween Whopper

I know what everyone is going talk about regarding Burger King’s A.1. Halloween Whopper. They’re going to discuss how one particular ingredient perfectly fits the Halloween theme of the burger. Some people will think it looks disgusting. Others will be fine with it.

Yes, as you have probably guessed, I’m talking about Burger King’s iceberg lettuce. That ghostly white lettuce with a green tint is disgusting, scary, and reminds me of the skin color of many Scooby Doo villains. But those make it an appropriate addition to this Halloween-themed Whopper.

Besides that spooky lettuce, this limited time only item has a 1/4 lb flame-grilled beef patty, a slice of American cheese, tomato, mayonnaise, pickles, onions, and A.1. Thick and Hearty Sauce on a black sesame seed bun.

The bun is not only black, it also has A.1. Sauce flavor baked into it. But it doesn’t get its color completely from the sauce. So what gives it its color? It’s not squid ink, Sharpie pens, charcoal, mold, or Hot Topic. Looking through the bun’s ingredient list and pulling out possibilities, it could be a combination of FD&C Red #40, FD&C Blue #1, raisin juice concentrate, Worcerstershire sauce, caramel color, and FD&C Yellow #6. Mmmm…FD&C Yellow #6.

Burger King A.1. Halloween Whopper Top

At times the bun does have a slightly sweet and smokey flavor to it, but it’s faint and it disappears quickly. Maybe my tongue is imagining things or maybe the flavor is a ghost. But while eating the burger, the question I asked myself was, “Why include A.1. Sauce in the bun, if there’s A.1. Sauce in the burger?” Because the bun doesn’t make the burger taste A.1.-ier.

If you’re reading this in the middle of December and want to know what this Whopper tastes like, get into your car, tune your car’s FM radio dial to 101.5 to designate October 2015, and then drive 88 miles per hour…to the nearest Burger King location (or one that’s farther away because you’ll get there quickly if you’re going 88 miles per hour). When you get there, order a Whopper your way with American cheese and A.1. Thick and Hearty Sauce because that’s what this burger tastes like.

Burger King A.1. Halloween Whopper Wrapper

The A.1. Thick and Hearty Sauce wasn’t very thick. If it was, much of it wouldn’t have ended up on my hands and the Whopper’s festive mummy wrapper. It tastes exactly like regular thin and light A.1. Steak Sauce, which I’ve enjoyed on overcooked steaks from chain restaurants. Unfortunately, because it kept plopping out of the burger, I didn’t taste the sauce in every bite. Also, I think the mayonnaise diluted its flavor.

Burger King A.1. Halloween Whopper Half

The beef patty has that unique Burger King flavor that’s the chain’s fingerprint. It’s a flavor I enjoy. But the tomato, onions, pickles, and white lettuce did a wonderful job of bringing down the overall temperature of the burger, making it slightly unpleasant to eat. As for the cheese, let’s face it, it really doesn’t do anything flavor-wise on a regular Whopper. But it does something color-wise with this burger by matching nicely with the black bun.

Overall, I enjoyed the look of the A.1. Halloween Whopper more than its flavor. The burger is full of Halloween colors, and I have to admit the black bun was cool to experience with my own eyes. But the burger’s flavor wasn’t anything special since it can easily be recreated after the promotion is over. And, of course, that ghost lettuce freaks me out.

Update: There’s one bit of information I need to add. The dyes in the bun might turn your poop green. I’ve experienced this. Others in my household have experienced this. Commenters have experienced it. I apologize for the grossness of this, but I needed to mention it in case someone out there is on a toilet and freaking out because their poop is green. But you have to admit, green poop does fit with the Halloween theme.

(Nutrition Facts – 710 calories, 390 calories from fat, 43 grams of fat, 15 grams of saturated fat, 1.5 grams of trans fat, 105 milligrams of cholesterol, 1530 milligrams of sodium, 52 grams of carbohydrates, 2 grams of fiber, 13 grams of sugar, and 31 grams of protein.)

Item: Burger King A.1. Halloween Whopper
Purchased Price: $6.39*
Size: N/A
Purchased at: Burger King
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: Tastes like a Whopper with A.1. Sauce. Black bun is something cool you should see with your own eyes. Very festive; lots of Halloween colors. Mummy wrapper is neat.
Cons: Tastes like a Whopper with A.1. Sauce. Ghost lettuce freaks me out. Black bun baked with A.1. flavor doesn’t have a lot of flavor. A.1. Sauce everywhere. Produce does a great job of bringing down the temperature of the burger. Bun may make your poop turn green.

*Because I live on a rock in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, things are a bit pricier here. You’ll probably pay less than I did.

REVIEW: Starbucks Toasted Graham Latte

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Starbucks Toasted Graham Latte

As dawn breaks over the picturesque landscape, a farmer, with cup in hand, approaches the docile, grazing Teddy Graham that he has been raising since it was a wee cub. The Graham eyes him indifferently as he fills his cup with milk from the giant, bear-shaped cracker. He pats it on the back lovingly and carries the cup towards a counter in the distance.

“One Toasted Graham Latte for Dan?”

That’s is how I like to imagine the folks at Starbucks make their new Toasted Graham Latte, and if I hadn’t seen them mixing it together with my own eyes, I would have believed it, too.

This latest concoction from the ‘Bucks blends graham, steamed milk, cream, and espresso with a topping of cinnamon graham crumbles. It’s available in both hot and iced forms, but I chose the former, since the oxymoronic idea of having a drink be “iced and toasted” makes my brain freeze and fry.

Starbucks Toasted Graham Latte 2

Prying away the lid of my cup, I marvel at the InstaGraham worthy cinnamon and graham cracker dust that looks like it was gently scattered by some hypocritical, tooth-rotting Tooth Fairy.

After sipping this top layer, I suddenly realize why the Toasted Graham Latte was released so close to Halloween time: it’s just like that infamously NSFW hot tub face-melting scene from Halloween 2, but with Michael Meyers murdering a Cinnamon Teddy Graham in a steamed milk Jacuzzi instead.

The faint spice of cinnamon and the earthier, honey graham sweetness of the crispy crumbles pleasantly balance the hyper sugary vanilla onslaught of the whipped cream.

But once the crumbs are all slurped up, things get a little…crummier. Without the complexity of the graham pieces to counteract the cream, the middle third of my TGL simply became an uncomfortable, cloying mess of melted cream and milk.

Starbucks Toasted Graham Latte 3

After begrudgingly sucking this part down, I realized there was hope in the final third of the drink. Like a caffeinated Atlantis, all the espresso and graham syrup flavor had sunk down into the bottom. After many milliliters of hardship, my submarine tongue was happy to discover it.

When making my drink, the Starbucks barista excitedly exclaimed how it “smelled just like a s’more!” I half expected her to verbally add a *heart eyes emoji* to the end of her sentence.

But now I see that she was right. The bitter darkness of the espresso imparts woodsy notes on the sticky, leftover cream, making it quite like a toasted marshmallow.

This, along with the artificial and rich graham syrup, left me with a tasty, liquid s’more facsimile, albeit one where someone swapped the Hershey’s chocolate with coffee beans (I don’t care what kind of pranks they pulled in the ‘20s, Grandpa: it’s not funny!)

So like the Earth, a well made taco salad, and Shrek, the new Toasted Graham Latte from Starbucks has layers. From the blended cinnamon and sugar top, to the disturbing primordial soup in the middle, all the way to the liquefied campfire classic on the bottom, your enjoyment of this drink will likely hinge on how deep into it you’re willing to go.

Since exactly two-thirds of the latte is good, I should technically give it an infinitely repeating 6.66 out of 10. But since I’m an Internet food reviewer and not a mathematician, I guess I’ll have to round up.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I think I have a box of Teddy Grahams that need a good melting. *bear emoji* *fire emoji* *skull emoji*

(Nutrition Facts – 12 oz with 2% milk – 230 calories, 60 calories from fat, 7 grams of fat, 4.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 30 milligrams of cholesterol, 160 milligrams of sodium, 32 grams of carbohydrates, 0 grams of dietary fiber, 31 grams of sugar, and 10 grams of protein.)

Item: Starbucks Toasted Graham Latte
Purchased Price: $4.51
Size: 12 oz.
Purchased at: Starbucks
Rating: 7 out of 10
Pros: Teddy Graham giblets on top. Caffeinated s’more cocktail on bottom. Imaginary snack cookie dairy farms. Filing a patent for “Milk Jacuzzis.”
Cons: Overly sweet nastiness in the middle. Speaking in emojis. Trying to milk a real bear. Not being able to give Halloween snacks a 666/10.

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