Taco Bell figures if the pizza guys can stuff cheese into pizza crust, it, too, can stuff cheese into a crispy shell.
The Mexican fast-food giant is testing that out right now in 36 Toledo, Ohio, locations, with a product it's dubbed the Quesalupa.
Quesalupa is for serious cheese-heads. Not only is melted pepper jack cheese stuffed inside the flaky chalupa shell, but it's also layered with cheddar cheese, not to mention beef, lettuce, reduced-fat sour cream and diced tomatoes. Test price: $2.99.
Executives at Taco Bell are hoping that lightening can strike twice. It was Toledo where the chain first-tested the Doritos Locos Taco back in 2011. That taco has since emerged as one of the fast-food industry's most successful new product introductions.
These is no national roll-out date for the Quesalupa. At least, not yet. "If Toledo doesn't love it first, the rest of the country can't have it," spokesman Rob Poetsch said in an e-mail,
During the four-week test, Taco Bell is nudging fans of the Quesalupa to tweet #Quesalupa. Some of those tweets will be selected to be featured on two electronic billboards in Toledo of Interstate 475.
New products are the lifeblood of fast-food chains like Taco Bell. Millennials, in particular, keep demanding unusual new products with more flavor and unconventional ingredients. That leaves Millennial-worshiping chains like Taco Bell rolling out products like this cheese-stuffed shell.
This is the same chain that introduced the breakfast world to the Waffle Taco — a warm waffle wrapped around sausage or bacon, scrambled eggs, cheese and syrup.
