Welcome to Drunk on Chips. I'm a potato lover whose potato-loving father always kept our snack cabinet stocked with a carefully curated collection of chips. Here, I give you an honest review of a specific bag.
At 11:56 a.m. on a Thursday, my hands are stark red all the way to the knuckle. Nine out of 10 digits are caked in that same red—a feeling I've become all too familiar with, as I type responses to colleagues using just my pinky finger. My nose is running, my brow is sweating, and to be honest, there's nothing not pulsating above the neck.
I need some water. Hell, I need a shower. And it's because Doritos just released its new Flamin' Hot Nacho flavor, and I'm already three quarters of the way through a bag.
The Flamin' Hot flavor's exclusivity in regard to Cheetos is long gone now. Not only because people started putting it on their Thanksgiving turkeys, but because Frito-Lay has rolled it out to Ruffles, Fritos, Funyuns, and even Rold Gold pretzels. With the arrival of Doritos' Flamin' Hot Nacho, the seasoning has finally arrived where it was presumably destined to land all along. But is the Flamin' Hot flavoring really any better on a Dorito than it is a Cheeto? The short answer is no. And the long answer, unfortunately, is no.
You may remember that Flamin' Hot has a pretty endearing origin story from my ode to Flamin' Hot Cheetos back in August. A janitor at Frito-Lay invented it at home, for fun, and the company ended up buying in. From said ode:
The Godfather of FHC is Richard Montañez, a former Frito-Lay janitor with an appreciation for spice that will go down in history. He is one of my heroes, and even if Russia planted him in that Frito-Lay factory many years ago, I would vote for him for president.
What makes Montañez a true god is that he created something that was destined to be sprinkled upon more than Cheetos. I've never had anything Flamin' Hot I didn't enjoy, and that sentiment is extended to these new Doritos. The reason they messed up my Thursday is directly related to how addicting they are. I hit a groove where I was completely blacked out to the world, no longer pinky typing, taking in three to four chips at a time. In a lucid moment, I realized what I was doing, paused, and the fire struck. And then the headache hit, and it didn't go away for a while.
The lesson with these, and any Flamin' Hot variety, really, is moderation. When consumed responsibly, like drugs and alcohol, they're a pure treat. Some have claimed they're better than Nacho Cheese and Cool Ranch combined. A flaming hot take, for sure, but for the same reason Nacho Cheese is better than Cool Ranch, it's an incorrect one.
Nacho Cheese reigns supreme because of its longevity. Eventually, you get sick of Cool Ranch. Eventually, you physically can't handle anymore Flamin' Hot Nacho. A whole bag of Nacho Cheese might make you sick, but you don't realize it 'til it's over. That's not to suggest you don't buy as many bags of these as you can—you should. They're more than a novelty, but less than a staple, which by Goldilocks' standards makes them just right.
When my headache subsides, I'm goin' back in.
