Taco Bell is a worldwide food franchise with over 8,000 restaurants across 30 countries around the world. Taco Bell is Mexican-inspired food, however, some people say it should not be considered Mexican food. They also have vegan and vegetarian options. Just a few are the veggie bowl, the veggie meal for 2 people, multiple tacos and burritos, and some sides. The first location was in Downey, California in the year 1962.
Taco Bell was created by a man named Glen Bell. He was inspired by friends, family, and neighbors to create his own crunchy taco in 1951, by 1954 he had started Taco Tia with a drive-thru. But before he decided to sell tacos he had a burger place called Bell’s hamburgers. By 1970 Glen had a total of 325 restaurants. In 1978 he sold over 800 Taco Bells to Pepsi and they became a shareholder. In 1984, Glen decided to switch up the menu and introduced taco salads and the bell grande, a nacho containing seasoned beef, sour cream, nacho cheese, black beans, and tomatoes. In 1995, Taco Bell started sponsoring, the first sponsor was ESPN games. In the year 2002, the donations hit $10 million. In 2004, Glen launched the new Baja Blast Mountain Dew which today is one of the best sellers at Taco Bell. In 2005, the crunch wrap became very very popular and they decided to make it a permanent item in January 2006.
The chalupa has evolved a lot over the years. The first chalupa is the original and it was made in 1999. After the original, they came up with many others. Some include the baja chalupa, XXL chalupa, quesalupa, breakfast, double, and many more.
Many things have changed about Taco Bell, one of the things being the price. They used to be 19 cents for one taco, the value for them now however is $2.00. They also added many new items people love even today; such as the crunch wrap (2005), Baja Blast (2004), and Nacho fries (2018). There are also items like the quesadillas (specifically chicken), beefy 5-layer burrito, Chalupa, the build your own craving box (online only), Nacho bell grande, and more recently added to the menu the cheez-it crunch wrap.
This year alone, Taco Bell has released over a dozen new items including Cheesy Chicken Crispanada, Cheesy Street Chalupas, Baja Blast Gelato, and Cheez-It Crunchwrap. They also released Tajin items including Tajín Crunchy Taco, Tajín Twists, and Tajín Strawberry Freeze. They also released a loaded nacho fry which had seasoned fries topped with seasoned beef, nacho cheese sauce, cheddar cheese, lettuce, spicy ranch sauce, and crunchy red strips. This item can be made vegetarian by substituting black beans for beef. Unfortunately, it was not permanent and only lasted about a month. Nacho fries are one of the best sellers at Taco Bell and they have created many different nacho fries over the years however they were mostly only limited time items. Taco Bell now is super known around the world and everyone loves their food.
