As the holidays embrace us, it’s the perfect time to celebrate with all the traditional foods: figgy puddings, chestnuts roasting on an open fire and … Taco John’s Potato Olés.
I’m not kidding. Even in the season best known for holiday cookies and eggnog, I’ve been seriously jonesing (or maybe “Johnsing”) for the salty, greasy, perfectly piquant miracle that is the Potato Olé.
Let’s face it: You can get a fast-food taco anywhere, but you can only get an authentic Potato Olé from Taco John’s.
After Fargoans
received their “Dear John” letters from the local Taco John’s franchisee
earlier this year, it resulted in people storming remaining stores to gorge on TJ specialties before the area became a Potato Olés desert.
Fortunately, the Taco John’s chain is promising that TJ’s will be back. In the meantime, they continue to torment us with commercials.
So I decided to try making Potato Olés at home. The recipe,
most commonly attributed to The Food Hussy,
is all over the internet. When I read reviews that it was “missing something,” I turned to Reddit, which I usually reserve only for thoughtful fodder like the subreddit called
“Cats that Look Like Ron Perlman.”
Under
“r/TopSecretRecipes,”
I found a poster who suggested dosing the mix with a sprinkle of garlic and onion powder. I decided to try that.
Tammy Swift / The Forum
I made these Olés in an airfryer, as this appliance turns tater tots into nuggets of crispy perfection — without a need for a Lipitor chaser.
Then I lugged said airfryer to the newsroom, in order to record my colleague’s opinions.
Ultimately, I think the Olé stand-in was respectable and any shortcomings probably stemmed from user error. I filled the air-fry basket pretty full, which meant some didn’t crisp up like the originals.
I also didn’t apply the seasoning evenly enough, which means some were bland Norwegian Potato Oles vs. Olés. Colleague Helmut Schmidt says he did get one round with a little extra spice, “and that cleared out my sinuses pretty fast.”
Apparently, the feisty tot achieved what no cold medicine could.
Overall, however, Helmut liked the home-cooked alternative. “The air fryer treatment gave them enough crisp without leaving them soggy, and overall, the spices seemed very close to Taco John’s territory,” he said.
Colleague and fellow Shaun Cassidy superfan, Tracy Briggs, said she didn’t think they tasted exactly like the real thing, but were good in their own right.
“I think they’re a bit spicier, but I might have just chosen a few more highly seasoned pieces,” Tracy said. “Like I do with TJ’s Olé’s, I tend to pick out which piece to eat based on how dark it is and how much seasoning I can see.”
Our fearless leader Angie Wieck said, “The only thing that would have made the Olés better would have been a side of cheese, a Taco Bravo and a Dr. Pepper. I miss Taco John’s! But, honestly, I did think these were a good substitute. And likely healthier!”
Tammy Swift / The Forum
Dave Olson, another team member, went so far as to say my crispy counterfeits were a “contender for topping the Taco John’s Olé in flavor.”
But like Angie, Dave found the taste-test made him nostalgic for the whole Taco John’s experience: “It nonetheless sparks within the consumer a craving for original Olés and their attendant companions — the hardshell taco and medium Mountain Dew — that, sadly, cannot be quelled in our current fast-food landscape.”
I have to agree. The tots are a respectable proxy for the real thing, but they did seem more peppery while missing some of the original’s salty bite.
Like Dave and Angie, I missed the Taco John’s gestalt — down to the unsmiling employee who handed you a bag so deliciously mottled with hot grease that the brown paper threatened to dissolve before your very eyes. Or the fact that each Olé was so crisp it practically shattered when you bit into it. Or, like Angie said, that sweet nectar of the angels known as liquid dipping cheese.
Anyway, if the Taco John’s commercials are making you nostalgic for “Olé Lang Syne,” you might want to try this recipe anyway, which has been slightly modified by the cats who look like Ron Perlman. Or something like that.
4 teaspoons Lawry’s seasoning salt
2 teaspoons paprika
1 teaspoon cumin
1 teaspoon cayenne pepper
Dash of garlic salt or garlic powder
Dash of onion powder
Half-bag Crispy Crowns (the Napoleon of the tater-tot world)
Mix together. Place half-bag Crispy Crowns in shallow layer in air fryer basket and cook at 400 degrees for 5-6 minutes. (You may need to adjust based on your appliance.)
Shake basket or use pancake turner to flip tots. Sprinkle liberally with seasoning. Cook another six minutes. If you like a super-salty, ultra-crispy Olé , add more seasoning and cook another minute.
Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Spread tots in single layer on sheet pan. Brush with canola or light virgin cooking oil and sprinkle spice mix onto the tots. Bake for 15-17 minutes. Remove from pan and sprinkle with additional seasoning, if desired.
Tammy Swift hails from a family of storytellers. A graduate of North Dakota State University, she has worked as a Dickinson, N.D., bureau reporter; a Forum feature reporter, columnist and editor; a writer in university relations, and a marketing, social media and communications specialist.
