The Untold Truth Of Taco Bell

Taco Bell may be known for its meaty items like the Chipotle Chicken Loaded Griller and budget-friendly Beefy Fritos Burrito, but like a lot of other fast food restaurants, it's making expanding their vegan and vegetarian options a priority. 

While Taco Bell has always been a good option for those who eat meat-free (you can sub any of the meat products in their menu items for beans, rice, or potatoes, all of which are vegan, and their guacamole can be subbed for sour cream), in 2019 it made a corporate commitment to making their menu even more friendly to vegetarians and vegans. 

There are already 8 million vegetarian combinations diners can choose from at Taco Bell, and the chain is also testing their first official vegetarian menu. They even have a guide to eating vegan at Taco Bell on their website that was created in partnership with the American Vegetarian Association, which shows diners how to make some of their most classic menu items, like the Crunchwrap Supreme and soft taco, both meat and dairy free. 

The chain is also testing some new vegetarian items for 2019, so meat-free diners should keep their eyes peeled for these menu additions.

There have been a lot of rumors about Taco Bell's beef over the years, with skeptics claiming that it was made with everything from mealworms to Grade D beef — which, spoiler alert, doesn't even exist. 

While Taco Bell's beef does come pre-cooked and in bags, the rest of the truth is a lot less scandalous than claims that the chain's meat is only 36% beef.

It's actually 88% beef, and the other ingredients rounding out the recipe are pretty common. 

Yes, they do use some fillers derived from oats, and the meat is blended with soy lecithin, which is used to make sure the ingredients in their beef don't separate, but overall the ingredient list isn't anything more shocking than what you'd find at any fast food restaurant. 

These days the chain is doing even more to make sure their beef is up to standard. Taco Bell is focusing on sourcing more of their beef from sustainable suppliers, and they're also prioritizing suppliers that are reducing the use of antibiotics with their cattle. Who knows, maybe they'll keep inching closer to having meat that's 100% ... well, meat. 

If you grew up thinking that all tacos came in a crunchy yellow shell and could be made effortlessly from a boxed kit of Old El Paso, you're not alone. But that version of the taco is a relatively new arrival on the scene — in fact, the crunchy pre-formed taco shell was actually invented by Taco Bell founder Glen Bell in the early '60s. 

Bell was trying to figure out the best way to sell large amounts of tacos quickly, and that's when he came up with the pre-formed crunchy taco shell. Unlike tacos dorados, a type of pan-fried crispy taco, these pre-formed crispy taco shells could be made ahead of time and kept at room temperature until needed. 

This was essential, because Bell was trying to compete with McDonald's, another booming chain that was taking off in San Bernardino, California. Pre-formed taco shells made it so employees didn't have to cook every single taco to order — they could just stuff the shell and sell, helping to boost their output and keep up with their hungry customers' demands.

Glen Bell's first restaurant didn't sell tacos at all — it sold hot dogs and hamburgers. This was at Bell's Drive-In, which was Bell's first restaurant, incidentally operating out of San Bernardino, which is also the birthplace of McDonald's. 

Glenn eventually expanded his business, opening Taco Tia, where he sold hot dogs, hamburgers, and tacos (his chili dog recipe was the inspiration for Taco Bell's original taco sauce). He originally decided to open his restaurant in a Mexican neighborhood so that if sales of tacos took off, his competitors would write it off as being a regional success, rather than one that could be replicated elsewhere. Eventually Bell realized that tacos were the key to the success of his business and should be his focus, especially after he invented pre-formed taco shells and figured out how to quickly serve tacos to the masses instead of cooking tacos to order. He opened a restaurant called El Taco, then eventually sold his shares in that and his Taco Tia locations in order to open the first Taco Bell in 1962 in Downey, California.

At the original Taco Bell, tacos and other Mexican-American favorites were the star and were sold for just 19 cents a piece. However, the restaurant did keep serving burgers for awhile, in the form of chiliburgers, but the last burger-esque item on the menu, the Bell Beefer, was discontinued in the '90s. 

When Taco Bell first introduced their now-famous Doritos Locos Tacos, they had no idea it would be a hit, but after selling 100 million nacho cheese Doritos Locos Tacos in the first 70 days that it was on the menu, it was clear that all of their testing and prototyping had paid off. 

Making the cheesy Doritos Locos shell took a lot of hard work. 40 different versions were tested before they settled on the final product. The company wanted to make sure that the shell had the signature cheesiness of a regular Dorito chip, but the taco shell needed to maintain its original texture, as the texture of a regular Dorito is too brittle and would break when stuffed with taco ingredients. 

Another hurdle to the invention was worker safety. Initially, blasting the taco shells with cheesy powder proved to be a hazard to the workers, who would inhale it, so the company had to create a totally new machine for seasoning the shells safely. 

Taco Bell's hard work paid off, and with more than a billion Doritos Locos Tacos sold in the year of their introduction. There's no denying that they're now a fast food legend.

It wasn't until 2018, when the chain introduced Nacho Fries, that the Doritos Locos Tacos were dethroned as the most popular new Taco Bell menu item of all time. 

You've heard of a bed & breakfast, so why not have a Taco Bell Hotel? Apparently the chain thought the idea wasn't too crazy to try out, and in August of 2019, they opened up The Bell: A Taco Bell Hotel and Resort in Palm Springs, California, for the weekend of August 8-12 only.

Guests age 18 and over who successfully nabbed a room got to enjoy a Taco Bell-themed room, and the hotel itself (which usually operates as the V Palm Springs Resort) was decked out with Taco Bell memorabilia, a Taco Bell gift shop, a Taco Bell nail salon, and got to enjoy a "happier hour" that included Taco Bell snacks and cocktails for those 21 and older. There was also a Mountain Dew Baja Blast "Freeze Lounge" to hang out in, "dive-in" movies in the pool, and Taco Bell on call when ordering room service. 

There were only 70 rooms available at the resort, and when Taco Bell opened up their reservations, they booked fast — in fact, every room was reserved within two minutes. Basically, in the time it takes the average person to wolf down a Crunchwrap, the rooms were already sold. Here's hoping this is one weird stunt they revisit — every Taco Bell fan deserves a chance to stay at The Bell.

In 2001, the Russian space program made the world aware that 20 tons of mass from its Mir space station orbiting the planet was due to fall to Earth. According to the BBC, the plummeting mass looked to hit in an area in the southern Pacific Ocean in a 200-mile-by-3,700-mile targeted location, at about 2:30 p.m., Eastern standard time, on March 23, 2001.

As a quirky publicity stunt to keep the attention on itself as millions of eyes potentially fixated on the sky on that date, Taco Bell announced that if the core of the falling Mir struck a floating target it had built in the sea, every American would receive a free regular taco. It was highly unlikely that Mir would land on the Taco Bell target, a 40-foot-by-40-foot vinyl sheet adorned with the company's logo and the words "Free Taco Here!" Nevertheless, in case it did have to deliver on the free tacos, Taco Bell took out an insurance policy in the amount of $10 million, the cost of handing out about $280 million in free merchandise, according to Chief Marketer. When Mir did fall, it didn't hit anywhere near the Taco Bell target, anchored 10 miles off Australia, but much closer to Chile. Taco Bell instead offered a consolation prize of two tacos for 99 cents.

Some people get married in a church, others get hitched in a beautiful and idyllic outdoor setting — and a relatively small handful of people choose to pledge to love and honor one another 'till death do them part in the friendly and comfortable environs of a Taco Bell. The restaurant chain's upscale flagship Cantina offshoot location in Las Vegas can be booked for weddings. Taco Bell even offers a Wedding Package, a prearranged deal that takes care of virtually every element of a couple's special day. Both spouses-to-be receive custom-made Taco Bell "Wedding Swag," including a garter and bow tie made out of sauce packet fabric, matching "Just Married" T-shirts, champagne glasses, a multiple-taco Party Pack, and a wedding cake made out of the chain's Cinnabon Delights dessert.

Potential newlyweds can book the Taco Bell chapel in as little as four hours notice, and the price includes a half-hour ceremony with an officiant, as well as a reception area for up to 25 guests. For an additional fee, anyone walking down the aisle can purchase an optional wedding bouquet made from Taco Bell sauce packets. The complete Wedding Package costs $750.

According to Statista, nearly 7,800 Taco Bells are up and running worldwide as of 2021. Most are virtual clones of one another, with the same layout and menu, but they're not all identical. According to CNBC, parent company Yum! Brands started opening a series of high-end restaurants around the U.S., called Taco Bell Cantinas. The idea was to appeal to expand Taco Bell's reach from a customer base looking for bargains into the higher-priced, slightly more upmarket restaurant segment of fast-casual establishments (such as Chipotle), as well as areas where real estate costs more. By 2020, more than 30 Taco Bell Cantinas were up and running in the U.S., including one in Las Vegas, the busiest Taco Bell of any kind in the world. Presented like trendy, chef-driven restaurants, the Cantinas employ an open kitchen and ordering kiosks, and even serve alcohol alongside tacos, burritos, and quesadillas.

In 2016, Taco Bell tested out another outgrowth in the form of the Taco Bell VR Arcade. According to AdWeek, the company created a pop-up Taco Bell and virtual reality video game arcade in New York, where curious customers could play high-tech, futuristic, and immersive games while snacking on the familiar fare of Mexican-inspired fast food.

Fast food drive-through runs and calling cars via  ride-sharing service are tried-and-true late-night pastimes, and so in the summer of 2017, Taco Bell attempted a cooperative publicity campaign with Lyft. According to Fortune, Taco Bell tried to popularize a concept it called "ride-thru," in which Lyft customers could easily and cheaply add in a stop at a Taco Bell drive-through between their point of pickup and programmed destination.

According to the companies involved, customers were thrilled about getting to add a food run in their Lyft trip, but many of the actual drivers who'd have to perform the service voiced their displeasure on social media. Many Lyft drivers try to ensure as pleasant a trip as possible with spotless, odor-free cars, which requires that a lot of time and money goes into cleaning their cars. Taco Bell stops, also known as "Taco Mode," they argued, would make their cars more susceptible to spilled food and drinks and tough-to-eliminate smells. It also stood to lose drivers money. Stopping at Taco Bell, and then waiting in a potentially crowded late-night drive-through lineup, used up time that drivers could otherwise use for seeking out other fares.

In response to the negative response, Taco Bell announced that Taco Mode would be optional on a driver-by-driver basis, and that it would only be test-marketed in Orange County, California.

In 2020, according to CNN, Taco Bell eliminated nearly 20 menu items, seeking to make restaurants run more efficiently amidst challenges created by the COVID-19 pandemic and lockdown. The most controversial discontinuation: that of the Mexican Pizza, which mimicked a personal-size version of its Italian inspiration, with tostada shells, enchilada sauce, beef, beans, tomatoes, and a cheese blend. It required a moderately sized cardboard box for packaging and transport, and as part of a pledge to be more environmentally friendly, cutting the Mexican Pizza from the menu meant Taco Bell would no longer use seven million pounds of paperboard.

Pop musician Doja Cat openly missed the Mexican Pizza, and twice tweeted at Taco Bell, imploring it to restore the menu item. Instead, Taco Bell approached Doja Cat to star in their 2022 Super Bowl commercial, and she made a TikTok video singing the praises of the Mexican Pizza. In April 2022, per Billboard, during her Coachella set, Doja Cat, acting as a brand ambassador, announced that the Mexican Pizza would return to Taco Bell. "I brought back the Mexican Pizza, by the way," she yelled, taking full credit.

The item became available once more in May 2022 nationwide according to USA Today. However, Taco Bell had to temporarily take the Mexican Pizza off its menu again. Pent-up demand for the long-unavailable item was so intense that many locations sold out of it within two weeks after the relaunch.

In 2008, Taco Bell launched a value menu called "Why Pay More?" Offerings all cost less than a dollar, and at three different price points of 79 cents, 89 cents, and 99 cents, according to Billboard. As a publicity stunt related to the "Why Pay More?" campaign, Taco Bell sent a joke letter to news media outlets, asking Curtis Jackson, aka rapper 50 Cent, requesting that he change his name from his familiar money-based moniker into something more reflective of Taco Bell's cheap menu: either 79 Cent, 89 Cent, or 99 Cent.

Taco Bell used the letter in promotions and advertising. One thing it didn't do was get the permission of the subject of the joke, 50 Cent himself. According to the musician's lawyer, Peter D. Raymond, 50 Cent didn't know about the letter or the stunt until he glimpsed a news report about it. He filed a lawsuit against Taco Bell for $4 million, alleging that the company was using his name without his consent. In response, Taco Bell's spokesperson Rob Poetsch issued a statement: "We made a good faith, charitable offer to 50 Cent to change his name to either 79, 89 or 99 Cent for one day by rapping his order at a Taco Bell, and we would have been very pleased to make the $10,000 donation to the charity of his choice," Poetsch wrote. 

According to the New York Post, the suit was settled (with confidential terms) in November 2009.