Gorditas in Delhi! Gorditas in Delhi!
The Caravan is a storied literary and political magazine based here in Delhi. I recently wrote an article for them previewing the joy, the wonder, the culinary ecstasy that India has in store when Taco Bell opens up. You should run out and buy the magazine (you can find it in Khan Market, among other places); but if you’re outside of Delhi, I’ve posted a PDF. Or you can read the article, which begins after the image below.
Taco Bell: The Arrival
Considering the epicurean dilemma of Mexican-American fast food in India
by Dave Prager | published February 2009 by The Caravan
“Remember what I told you, Dave?” My grandfather always cackles when we drive past a Taco Bell. Grandpops is ninety, wizened, but nevertheless sharp enough to mock me even as he drives his Buick down the interstate.
“Remember what I told you? ‘This one looks like the baby threw up! And that one looks like the baby went to the bathroom!’ Remember?”
“I remember, Grandpops,” I always frown, always slouching a little, always hurt that he could say such cruel things about the food I love so very much. Of course I remember: I was fourteen. Grandma and Grandpops were taking me out to dinner. Against their protestations, I’d chosen Taco Bell, eagerly ordering what I always ordered: a Bean Burrito without onions, a Crunchy Taco, and a Chili-Cheese Burrito. My grandparents had nothing to say about the taco, but they exploded in disgusted glee as I unwrapped and unrolled my two burritos to douse their gooey greenish innards with salsa.
I remember chewing in sullen silence as my grandfather quipped his now-eternal phrase; it’s hard to enjoy food that people are pointing at. But even then, I had to admit that they were right: as India is about to find out, aesthetics are not exactly Taco Bell’s strong point.
————
Taco Bell is one of the flagship properties of Yum Brands, the company that has perpetrated KFC and Pizza Hut upon India with so much success. In a few short months, they’ll open their first Taco Bell in Bangalore. For many Indians, this will be their first experience with Mexican food.
Taco Bell is to Mexican food, however, what Starbucks is to a Paris coffeehouse: a uniquely American derivative that has evolved to resemble its inspiration in name only. You can trace its pedigree back to Mexico, sure, but what Taco Bell serves today is a mutt: Mexican food crossbred with generations of focus groups, cost-cutting innovation, and manufacturing techniques to breed a beast far removed from the original. A Taco Bell taco, with its crispy corn shell containing ground beef, lettuce, tomato, and cheese, is a remarkable feat of American engineering: the product of decades of research that have squeezed every spare cent of material and every extra second of labor out of creating it.
Taco Bell has defined itself by its quest to lower costs. It introduced its K-minus program in the 1990s, “K” standing for kitchen and “minus” standing for subtracting as much of it from a restaurant as possible. After all, when your economy scales across 5,600 stores, 175,000 employees, and millions of tacos, a penny saved is millions earned. So cooking is a corporate-level concern: food is prepared at centralized processing facilities and delivered to restaurants in forms engineered to limit on-site labor to unpacking, heating, or assembling.
Take Taco Bell’s signature seasoned ground beef, which arrives at a store pre-cooked in an industrial-sized plastic bag. An employee heats the bag in a bed of hot water, empties it into a hopper, and then dispenses the beef using a specially-engineered trowel that scoops exactly 1.5 ounces of beef no matter how vigorously or casually the employee wields it. Taco Bell also has special portion-control devices for sour cream, guacamole, and other liquids, and strict guidelines for items that are applied manually, like cheese and lettuce.
Your meal is assembled with time and precision as benchmarks, not presentation. Which means that sometimes your burrito looks like the baby threw up or went to the bathroom; but even if the melted cheese gives a slightly mucousy sheen to your Chalupa Supreme, you’re still tasting a proportion of beef to sour cream to tomatoes to three kinds of cheese precisely calibrated for maximum flavor at minimum cost.
And it really does taste good.
———-
Fast food occupies a far different role in American culture than in Indian culture. In India, fast food is a symbol of aspiration, and is priced and patronized accordingly. In America, fast food is priced to the low end of the market and pitched to appeal to everyone. My Indian coworkers proudly tell me of taking their dates to McDonalds; my American friends would have been horrified.
Most Americans are connected with the fast food industry as both patrons and cogs in the machine: a job at a fast food restaurant is a rite of passage for the upper-middle class on down. My wife cooked Pizza Hut pizzas as a teen, and I manned the cash register at a Denver-area burger establishment until I was fired for unsanitary orthodontic practices. (Don’t ask.) Once you’re older, fast food is either a diet staple or a guilty pleasure, depending on your socio-economic status. It’s accessible to all palates and affordable by all classes.
Because of the ubiquity and uniformity of fast food restaurants, and especially because of the relentless global march of brands like McDonalds, fast food is a part of America that neatly symbolizes the whole. The phrase “mcjob” entered the Merriam-Webster dictionary in 2003 defined as “a low-paying job that requires little skill and provides little opportunity for advancement”. The prefix “mc” can be added to any word to evoke pejorative associations of cheapness, blandness, homogeneity, and lack of authenticity; critics deride people who live in McMansions and worship in McChurches (and vote for McCain).
But even within fast food culture, Taco Bell occupies a strange niche. While Subway is McDonalds for sandwiches, and KFC is McDonalds for chicken, Taco Bell is not McDonalds for Mexican food. Taco Bell skews its marketing towards an aspect of American culture that’s less spoken of then McDonald’s family image but certainly just as pervasive: drunk diners who enjoy gastrointestinal discomfort.
Taco Bell is at its best after eleven PM, when you’re on your way home from being out with your friends. And Taco Bell’s advertising embraces that, calling it “the Fourth Meal,” prodding you to “make your after-party sizzle” with a Crunchwrap Supreme. Combined with its reputation for spiciness, Taco Bell’s role in fast food culture is similar to curry vindaloo in the UK: you eat it when you’re in an abused state, literally gleeful in the knowledge that it’s going to burn coming out in the morning. (It’s a macho thing, I guess.)
“The one thing that comes to mind at three AM after a night of drinking,” says Craig Pullins, a Chicagoan currently living in Delhi (and as eagerly awaiting Taco Bell as I), “is a Chicken Grilled Stuft Burrito.”
“Goes right in, comes right out,” adds Jennifer Jordan Keeler, a 29-year-old illustrator from Denver.
“I love tacos,” says 30-year-old Christie Clifford, a video editor from New York City. “I love everything about them and Taco Bell has the cheapest tacos around. They may be dog meat, but they’re cheap.”
I relate these sentiments to highlight the odd relationship Americans have with Taco Bell: we say negative things, but we say it with fondness, nostalgia, and a faraway twinkle in our eyes. In spite of her opinion of the food quality, Christie and I and our other friends spent countless evenings happily patronizing a Brooklyn Taco Bell in our weekly pre-bowling ritual.
———-
In India, Taco Bell will join a rapidly crowding fast food market aimed at the middle class. Perhaps because of the competition the corporate group expects, their executives were suspicious and secretive with me, refusing to confirm even mundane when’s and where’s, much less engage in dialogue about the challenges of marketing ethnic food to an audience unfamiliar with that ethnicity. Aparna Chopra, Marketing Head of Taco Bell India, was audibly uncomfortable with me on the phone, finally agreeing to let me submit my queries in writing for clearance through her superiors.
Her response to my eight questions (“Do you think the average Indian is aware of what tacos or burritos are?” “Ground beef is a big part of Taco Bell in the US. How will you replace it in India?”) was coldly corporate. “Thanks for mailing your questions. We have discussed the same internally, and we don’t wish to respond to media queries with details at this stage.”
And so I’m limited to speculation about the status of Taco Bell India, as anticipation grows in my heart and my stomach rumbles nostalgically for a Baja Gordita. In some nondescript industrial area of Bangalore, I can only assume, a Taco Bell kitchen has been assembled in a stainless-steel clean room as big as an airplane hanger. A dozen men in white coats silently observe an eighteen-year-old trainee construct a Cheesy Double Lamb Burrito or a Paneer Enchirito, making notes on their clipboards, preparing for the glorious day when Indian teens will drag their grandparents into the restaurants in magnificent anticipation and chew in shamed silence as their grandparents laugh and point. But fret not, my young Indian brothers—it doesn’t matter what it looks like. Because it really does taste good. Especially after 11 PM.
(I love the illustration!)
Holy Cow!
Ahh, the only thing Dave forgot to mention is the ungodly size of the fountain beverage you receive with any combo meal purchase. I’m fairly certain it is in the range of 60 fl oz.
I look forward to the Delhi Branch opening. After all, it is the only restaurant I have visited barefoot in my lifetime.
Agreed with every line except
“Because it really does taste good”.
It tastes yuck.
I suppose it’s a taste you can acquire only if you grow up with it.
Gimme a Chipotle burrito any day. I hope that comes to India soon.
Awesome !! I think the Taco Bell folks ought to set up a few locations near Universities.. and try not to be upscale !
BTW doesn’t the word Chalupa have something to do with a rodent ??
Great story. As far as I’m concerned, the only real upside to the expansion of American FF chains in India are the clever veg options they’re forced to add to the menu – I would totally go to McDonalds in the US if I could order a McAloo Tikki.
Wow that was some write up! When Indians in US want to eat some fast food but need vegetarian, they can’t go to McDonalds coz all they have is fries, so they hop on to Taco bell and order all those things with no meat but beans and smother it with their fire sauce. The joys of living away from homeland, why the hell would anyone eat that in India where food choices are endless even for vegs! I wish I never have to at Taco bell again but I know i will have to.
I think these may be the most eloquent words ever written about Taco Bell. I had no idea fast food was considered upscale in India. That’s SO interesting.
I so agree about it being a fourth, post-drunken-evening meal. It’s sort of a gut bomb, but that’s the point I guess.
Can’t wait to hear how it all goes over! That cartoon is hilarious!
I love the illustration too! Inspite of the heterogeneity of cultural exposuare across the indian ‘masses’, the concept of a burger was something well understood by most urban indians when McDonalds came into the country. It hence managed to garner immediate sales through the aspiartional value. Mexican food on the other hand is still an alien cuisine to most indians, let alone the knowledge on how to pronounce it. eg (in phonetics) Baja v/s Baha, Jalapeno v/s Halapeno. I really wonder how Yum foods plans to build both a knowledge and sense of appreciation for Taco Bell. Will be interesting to watch.
Dave, I remember TB being a favorite of not only you (hmmm- who could I be talking about)when you were young and naive…not so anymore..great write-up.
My wife (from India) loves Taco Bell. her favorite is a Chalupa Supreme, minus any meat and substitute beans. She is not a die hard vegetarian, but she does not eat fast food meat. I’ll bet her sister in Bangalore will love Taco Bell too.
I don’t know why anyone would eat bad american fast food in india — a country known for it’s wonderful and diverse cuisine.
99% of the time, when i order out in american, it’s from an indian restaurant.
I can get a bowl of rice and a delicious curry for $9.95, which is what I’d pay for a pre-made, pre-frozen chicken parm sandwich from the nearby deli, that’s probably filled with saturated fat and cholesterol.
How you didn’t tell your grampa with glee that “Yes, grampa, it IS baby poop! You’ve found out my secret addiction!!!!” is beyond me.
You’re such a classy guy. I would have been opening my mouth so he could see me chewing.
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I’m with Hemanshu. I’ll take Chipotle over Taco Bell any day. Of course, for me, it is a moot point since neither exist within a 20 mile radius of where I live.
It’ll be very interesting to see how Taco Bell fairs given that beef is a nill market.
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I too (secretly) love Taco Bell and I’m usually disgusted with myself after I go in and thoroughly enjoy the Meximelt (the cilantro – coriander in India – is what gives it it’s distinctive flavor). But if anything looks like baby poop, this is it.
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mmm, ilove taco bell
Veg in America ? Been there, done that, and here’s how it’s done ! :
1) 7-layer Burrito from Taco bell, doused with Fire sauce. Believe me, we Indians can handle it !
2) Veggie sub on wheat bread from Subway (Good for everyone, not just for Jared !)
3) Veggie Pizza from Little Ceasars (Pizza ! Pizza ! )
4) Veg-Lovers Pizza from Pizza Hut.
5) Veggie Pizza from Papa John’s.
6) The veggie soup and salad all you can eat deal at the Olive Garden.
FastFood is highend in INdia. It’s not because Indians love that food. Because it’s costly (2$) compared to 75cents for some decent indian food.
Costly means – cool and good!!.Also one of the Indian concept.
Because teens and college students know about FastFood (just heard the name and think that it’s cool).
Even though they may or maynot like it, eat it to be cool (assumed).
Normal indians can’t eat this thing, It’s costly and they can’t just eat this as there’s no rice or dhal or wheat in it.
So teens and college students think it’s cool, they only can eat this.
IT guys want to be cool and americanized, want to be cool and be with the crowd.. so..
And there’s no idea that there is a really good burger that costs 10$ and it’s not from a restaurant that is as known as McD.
If there’s a really good burger joint (organic, grass fed chicken?, lamb? ) and tastes good, they will go for it. It’s just that there’s probably not much of a mkt for a high end burger outside of 5star hotel
you get the point.
Nathan,
I disagree. Even in India its considered “fast food” – a quick and relatively cheap bite. I think even teenagers and people in offices living close to a fast food place would rather go to a McD and pick up a quick cheap burger:
1) coz they dont have time to sit and eat
2) one burger in 50 INR better better than eating a Chicken Kathi Roll (Wrap) for 100 INR
3) sometimes you just crave it
4) sometimes you DONT feel like having the same rice-dal/roti-sabzi (indian bread/veges) everyday!
5) Fast food in India (McD, Subway, KFC) MUCCCHHHH better than the crap they serve in the US.
I actually threw away a chicken the size of a football coz it looked and tasted like crap. Though if you ask me or any other college student if they’d like a KFC chicken here – i can guarantee everyone will be salivating.
Its NOT about being cool. Its actually “finger-lickin” good if i may quote KFC adverts in India.
What you say is some form of generalization which you have “assumed” from ratter-tats of the media or uninformed projections of India and the teens or kids here.
In fact, I recently graduated – and if we ever wanted a “CHEAP” meal (easy on our pockets) outside the hostels – we would land up at a McD, Sub or KFC. Again – coz its cheap and good and not coz its cool.
Sorry – the keyboard was acting up and ate up half my words!
i meant people in offices working or living close to…and one burger in McD is 50 INR which is better than…
apologies..
.. again.
Nathan, you are right!!
lol
i can’t imagine a paneer taco, or chicken tikka taco like they did with subway…
can u give me the contact number of this frenchise….
please open it fast in india delhi
This is hilarious! Taco Bell and KFC and McD’s will always be posh in India though I saw Subways catching up on a recent visit.
Hie Aparna, I would like to know a lot about the Taco bell because myself and my friend has got a project to do in regards with Taco bell to be marketed in India. So i would like to request you to please help us get us the information regarding the taco bell`s marketing strategies used in India and accordingly we can get our aimed presentation to be made. We are students and we have been given a project on Taco bell`s marketing strategies to find out.
Kindly help us in this matter if possible taking a little bit of time from your daily schedule.
Thanking You,
Manali
Dear Manali,
I am working actually for my MBA degree on Taco Bell in India.
I would be more than happy if you can help me with the work that you have done on the marketing strategy.
Thanks to let me know.
BR
Maxime
The first Taco Bell has now opened in India. Its at Mantri Square Mall in Bangalore.
visit: http://www.tacobell.co.in for more info.
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Wonderful read – the Taco Bell concept seems to be working so far in India – here’s a review of their 1st outlet in b’lore – http://www.askarundhati.com/taco-bell-india/
I live in Hauz Khas. There used to be a Taco Bell in Hauz Khas market like 4 years ago but it soon shut shop. Good to hear they are back!
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Chicken Quesadillas!
cant wait! 
.. although i do prefer Chipotle and Quiznos to TB! but i dont see them coming to India anytime soon..
yay to cheaply available mexican food! Buh-bye freakishly expensive rubber like fajitas!
Wish someone would introduce a cheap sushi and peking duck version of TB in India too!
my keyboard apologizes again!
to TB and subs resp!
One clarification,
Taco Bell is not the first Mexican restaurant in India. There are quite a few but Taco Bell if successful in Bangalore could open a slew of outlets in other parts of India.
There are restaurants/joints like Newyorker, Bombay blues, Spoon, etc to name a few – A pure veg Italian and Mexican restaurant. It tastes much better than Taco Bell (I live in Bangalore and have been to Taco Bell). but Taco Bell is cheaper and this is what may make it click.
Newyorker is a pure veg Italian and Mexican restaurant and so is another place called Little Italy. Pure veg. can try this place.
I dunno. MacD does have an image of “cheap and rubbish” with a lot of people (at least in the big cities). They excel at providing you an average burger at an average price and making loads of cash from the real estate and franchise.
I never liked tacos too much anyway but yeah. Greater variety is always good. Taco Bell’s definitely a bit more upscale than the average MacD at a mall.