REVIEW: Qdoba Mexican Gumbo

I wanted to start off by saying that G&GG has surpassed my wildest expectations. We officially have 36 unique hits on the web site, far superior to my goal of 10. So for all of you that have made this possible, it is well appreciated.

I created this site for fun, I love gimmicks, goodies, food, and so do my friends. I like writing and I love to make people laugh. I just hope some of this is funny. Also, if you guys like what you see, let us know by leaving comments at the end of the posts. Alright, on to the review.

First and foremost, I wanted to thank G&GG Associates as well as Louisiana Style Cuisine Enthusiasts Jade and Emily for their discovery and subsequent help with this review.

In my eyes, Qdoba is a Mexican Subway. They make your food right in front of you, and its Mexican in nature. For as long as I can remember I went there for their Chicken Queso Burritos. This is basically a pouch of carbs and fats that will leave you full and stagnant for days. But recently, there i have been a witness to a minor uproar from Jade and Emily about Qdoba's Mexican Gumbo.

Gumbo, you say, what's that? Usually when I hear the word gumbo, I shudder. I don't actually know what it usually consists of or where it originates but it has always sounded like a con-fuddled mess to me. So I had some doubts when I heard them raving of its delights. But one day, I decided that it was time to take a step on the wild side and try something off the wall.





The funny thing about the Mexican Gumbo is that I had never even noticed it on the menu. I had either been too lazy to see it, or had just unconsciously written it off. Anyway, I've come to find that the Mexican Gumbo is what I call an inventory gouger. It is simply a whole mess of random ingredients, all of which Qdoba has plenty of (perhaps too much lying around in the back) thrown into a bowl. Here's the rundown, we have a bowl with rice, your choice of black or pinto beans, tortilla soup, tortilla strips, your choice of meat (or the no meat vegetarian style), salsa, sour cream, and cheese. Sounds like something the Wicked Witch of the Northwest would be toiling around in her cauldron eh? But anyway, I got all of the above, with black beans and chicken as my choices.



So when it comes down to it, the Mexican gumbo is kind of like a chunky soup. Its thick, its hearty, and it reminds me of something an NFL player's mother might serve. So I mixed it up a little, just so that the salsa and cheese could be submerged with the rest of the ingredients and then I took my first dramatic spoonful.



Lets just say, I was pleasantly surprised in an all new way. The conglomerate of flavors mixes to an astounding matter. I literally took another spoonful immediately to see whether or not I had just day dreamed the first bight. But no, it just got better. It gave me a warm confronting feeling, was spicy yet not too tangy, and gave me an overall sense of delight.


I have found that the best way to eat the gumbo is to accompany it with tortilla chips and use it as a pseudo dip. Never in the history of GG&G, have I gotten a standard menu item and have enjoyed it so much that I had to review it.



A few notes to relay: First off, your body does not come ready for Mexican Gumbo. The first time you eat this, it will go right through you. As Jade said, "The first time you eat it, you're stomach is like 'What the hell is this'. Your body has to build up a tolerance". The second time around though, you'll be good to go. And also, you should eat this stuff as quickly as possible, because it has a tendency to get cold relatively fast. It is best experienced piping hot, so eat up.

I have to give Qdoba's Mexican Gumbo a 4.5/5 (the highest rating so far), on the basis that it is here to stay, tastes amazing, and I was really caught off guard by it. I can't give it a five though because, like all foods, it is not perfect and does get cold quickly and digestibility can be called into question.

So go out and try yourself some Mexican Gumbo, I promise you that it will be a good decision.

Thanks again to Jade and Emily for making this review possible.

Mexican Gumbo: 4.5/5

Until the next sauce,

Andrew

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First Test Blog

With the exception of Taco Bell, no other fast food eatery relies so heavily on gimmicks, goodies, and other nonsensical items as Arby’s. Arby’s is a little different from most fast food joints because their staple item is a roast beef sandwich and not a burger. Supposedly sliced in the back on a Seinfeld quality Kramer slicer, the roast beef is extremely tasty and most likely extremely bad for you. But besides this, Arby’s has added on to their menu with countless wraps, chicken sandwiches, Market Fresh deli esque sandwiches, specialty sandwiches such as Reuben’s, toasted subs, and my personal favorites: taking normal food items and then frying them into triangles.

So it was only a matter of time before g and double g took a trip to the local Arby’s food stand and enjoyed a gimmick meal. On a side note, I originally wanted to review Arby’s Mac and Cheesers because they screamed for this site. Frying mac and cheese? Yeah, Arby’s has been there and done that. The product life cycle consisted of about a month though, and I was deeply saddened to hear that they were no longer available. I remember, a few weeks back (pre g&gg days) my colleague Mike and I ate these just to be able to say that we did. They were surprisingly good and quite possibly gave me some sort of brain damage. But I can’t review something that I don’t have photographic evidence of, it wouldn’t be fair to you readers. It’s hard to imagine a meeting in the Arby’s board room where real managers actually sat down, discussed and approved the creation of the Mac and Cheesers, but on to current products.




As you can see, Arby’s has a sufficiently large menu, containing a wide variety of products. It always seemed weird to me that you can get a deli sandwich in the same place where you can get the three products I purchased. But with a wide variety of products, the more people you will be able to attract. Speaking of which, Arby’s was packed. The local Arby’s is quite literally a dump, complete with a 70’s style décor, and a terrible design this place isn’t exactly craving customers, but for my visit the place was thriving. And I counted at least four remotely attractive females there too. When I think of the average female Arby’s customer the words snaggle tooth and Mitch come to mind, but its good to see that Arby’s can bring society together to clog our arteries as one.

So I bought three items, all of which I consider to be classic Arby’s gimmick food. First off, in an effort to compete with the dollar double cheeseburgers of the world, Arby’s had reduced the price of their Arby’s Melt by a staggering twenty cents.





Now for 99 cents, anyone can enjoy this simple sandwich for a limited time only. The sandwich consists of a bun, roast beef, and cheddar cheese sauce. One may ask, what the difference between this and the normal Beef and Cheddar is, and the answer is size.



The Arby’s Melt is quite puny in fact, coming with a smaller bun, smaller amount of roast beef, and a smaller amount of cheese sauce.I couldn’t even see the customary Arby’s overflowage of cheese when I first unwrapped this guy. The sandwich tasted good but because of its weak stature I have to give it a 2.5.

Next we have the Popcorn Chicken Shakers. What we have here is popcorn chicken, in a small tub with a closed Slurpee like dome on top.




The trick here is that you’re given a choice of either buffalo or barbeque sauce to dump on your chicken.




Then you close up your lid and shake.



This leaves you with saturated and saucy pop corn chicken bites.



Nothing like making the customers do some manual work before they get to eat. What an obvious gimmick. I felt kind of weird shaking my satchel of breaded chicken but it was all in good fun. These were actually quite good and the sauce was pretty tangy. Word on the street is that the barbeque is good as well, so I will give the Popcorn Chicken Shakers a 3.

Lastly we head over to the normal food fried triangle department. While mac and cheese is out, Arby’s has stuck with their Loaded Potato Bites with Bacon.



Let’s take what everyone loves about a loaded baked potato and fry it. We have potato morsels, cheese, sour cream and ranch sauce, and hunks of bacon (or so I thought). The sour cream and ranch sauce seems like a daring combination to me, but why not I guess.





These potato bites were another surprise hit. Everything hit on all cylinders except for the fact that there was no bacon present at all.



As you can clearly see there is no hint of red anywhere in there, despite the subtle bacon flavor. I’ll have to give the Loaded Potato Bites a 3.5/5 just because of the false bacon advertising scam.

So as the gimmick meal came to an end, I found myself quite satisfied. Three gimmick foods each with their own particular ploy: be it price, pre eating activity, or fried nature, all of these were tasty. So when you get the chance, head over to your local Arby’s and try a cluster bomb of food products from their vast menu, it won’t be too hard.


Arby's Melt: 2.5/5
Popcorn Chicken Shakers: 3/5
Loaded Potato Bites with Bacon: 3.5/5

Until the next sauce,

Andrew

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