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Tacos are a simple thing. While fast food joints like Taco Bell have worked worked in conjunction with corn chip conglomerates to make advances in taco shell technology, the basic formula remains virtually the same. Meat, cheese and hard or soft shell. Green Burrito offers "street tacos" but that just means onions and cilantro in lieu of cheese. Mind you, this is a tried-and-true formula, but what about those of us who occasionally crave the over-stuffed fancy tacos sold at places like the late Corazon downtown? Well, Qdoba has us covered with the new Knockout Tacos.
While most fast casual burrito dispensaries treat tacos as the option for people trying to avoid beans and rice of a burrito, the Knockout Tacos are a refreshing change. These aren't anything like the delicious street tacos you can pick up in a hole in the wall for $1.50 a pop. These aren't trying to be. With six different offerings like the Drunken Yardbird (chicken, salsa verde and guacamole) and the Gladiator (steak, bacon, pico de gallo and "Mexican Caesar Dressing"), these tacos are more like complete sandwiches than the tacos we used to pick up from the cart that mysteriously pops up across the street from the bar at 2 am…you know the one.
Thinking of the Knockout Tacos as small sandwiches might make it easier to stomach paying $3.50 per taco. When I first saw that price, I thought this is exactly the kind of thinking that killed Corazon. You can get three for a slightly more palatable $9. When you think about it, $9 for three 220+ calorie tacos isn't that much worse than $7 for a burrito of equal caloric value. And this way you get a much wider range of flavors to go with your meal.
As a helpful guide for you, the readers, I ate all six in one sitting.
The Drunken Yardbird (220 Calories)
Between the healthy dollop of guac, cilantro and salsa verde this taco is a pile of green with speckles of red onions and white cotija floating on top. It gets its name from the Tequila Lime Chicken, but you'd be hard pressed to taste any of that. It mostly tastes like guacamole, which isn't a bad thing at all. A middling entry.
The Mad Rancher (230 Calories)
This is a salad wrapped in a soft corn tortilla. Chicken, bacon, lettuce and ranch—allegedly picante ranch here—is a fairly played out combo in the fast food world. The guacamole and pico add a hint of flavor from south of the border, but this is very much an uninspired taco.
Two Timer (290 Calories)
Now we're talking. The Two Timer is essentially the Cheesy Gordita Crunch as presented by Qdoba. It combines a crispy taco shell with a soft corn tortilla glued to it by the house queso—listed by many as the only reason to go to Qdoba instead of Chipotle. Inside the taco is pulled pork doused in Salsa Roja, the spicy and best salsa at the establishment. (The Qdoba near the University of Oregon campus gave me ample opportunity to taste the joint's salsa offerings, and I can confirm that this one is the best.) Every bite leaves you with some crunchy, cheesy, spicy goodness. This is both the best of the Knockout Tacos and the best thing I've ever eaten at Qdoba.
Triple Threat (250 Calories)
The fajita veggies here provide a nice crunch and change of pace from the rest of these mostly meat and creamy paste dominated tacos. It wasn't bad, but I can't help but think of how much more I would have enjoyed it if the queso had sat this round out. Steak, bacon, fajita veggies, pico and cotija are really all this taco needed.
The Gladiator (280 Calories)
Caesar dressing is what gives this taco its Roman name. Caesar owns ranch so hard that this is the better salad taco option than the Mad Rancher. The trouble is that this "Mexican Caesar" dressing is too muted to stand out amidst the steak and bacon. It's still good, though.
Bohemian Veg (230 Cal)
And here is something for the vegetarians who read this column for some reason. The servers place a large handful of shredded cheese where the meat would normally be in a taco. Whole black beans and corn salsa are then dumped onto the rapidly gooifying cheese. It has the most distinctive flavor compared to its queso and guac-covered compatriots. It's not bad. I'd prefer it with meat—perhaps the house pulled pork—but it warms the cockles of my heart that vegetarians can pay $3.50 for a taco, too.
Willamette Week