My colleague Lauren has this thing for Chili’s. She hasn’t been in the restaurant for 15 years, the hangout spot of her youth, and now she longs to return.
Good co-worker that I was, I reunited Lauren with Chili’s one afternoon. “It’s safe and predictable,” she said.
“It’s like the Old Navy of chain food. You can always go in there and find something that you might need — like a pair of flip-flops — even if you know you can do much better.”
We were on a mission for Awesome Blossom, Chili’s trademark appetizer of breaded and deep-fried onion bloom. It’s amazing how much surface area you can fry with one onion. The breading bore an arid brown color, like some tumbleweed in the desert landscape.
It was accompanied by an adobe-colored dipping sauce, implicitly spicy but never particularly so. It was popular for the reasons Lauren pointed out: You don’t particularly need it, you know there are healthier options, but in that moment it just happens to be the most convenient way to trigger pleasure receptors in your brain.
Lauren and I scanned the menu, but Awesome Blossoms were nowhere to be found. This could not be. Chili’s sans Awesome Blossom was like The Golden Girls minus Estelle Getty; the two are inextricably linked. When I asked the server, he looked around and said it was taken off the menu some time ago.
I called the company, which offered this official line: “Chili’s constantly evaluates and evolves our menu to keep our offerings aligned with our guests’ tastes and preferences.
In accordance with those preferences, the Awesome Blossom was taken off the Chili’s menu in June 2008.” (Around the same time, Men’s Health published a report calling it one of the worst foods in America: 2,710 calories, 203 g fat and 6,360 mg sodium on one plate.)
In its place, the waiter suggested, was the Crispy Onion String & Jalapeno Stack, which, according to Chili’s nutritional info site, has one-third of the calories and sodium (the basket also looks half the size of an Awesome Blossom).
The innovation is the new dish is Awesome Blossom: Deconstructed. Now fried onion slivers are tossed into a basket with jalapeno wheels in the same breading.
The dish is virtually the same as before — a light, flaky breading, hints of seasoned salt, sweetness from the onions and a ranch dressing dip. It’s impossible to mess up. There’s nothing not to like.
As we ate, conscious, rational thought faded, and the primordial reflex of hand-to-mouth took over. We lost all control. Lauren and I actually uttered, “OK, we have to stop,” and, “Seriously, one last bite,” suggesting there was a tinge of shame beneath the momentary pleasures. Then regret set in.
But before you can hate yourself for ingesting the oil bomb, baby back ribs arrive, and your brain’s already halfway to barbecue sauce.
Nutritional facts:
Crispy Onion String & Jalapeno Stack
with ranch dressing has 1,050 calories, 81 g fat and 2,230 mg sodium.
McGrade:
B
