Mountain Dew Flavored Doritos: Not for the Squeamish

Mountain Dew-flavored Doritos. The very idea sounds like lunacy. And don't get me wrong; I am a bona fide Mountain Dew fanatic. I have been imbibing my favorite soft drink since I was a kid back in the 1960s when it came in a green glass with a hillbilly on it. Long before the folks at Pepsi decided to transform Mountain Dew from its redneck origins into the official soft drink of the skateboard and extreme sports crowd, Mountain Dew was a natural part of life deep in the heart of Dixie. I have followed Mountain Dew through Code Red and I was even one of the apparently few who delighted in Mountain Dew's sour grape flavor two Halloweens in a row. Mountain Dew's foray into orange flavored soda was okay, but nothing exceptional. I recently tasted Mountain Dew flavored Doritos and I can safely say that I have never tasted a chip quite so offensive to my taste buds.

Doritos has a new marketing gimmick called The Quest in which you guess the flavor of the chips inside the bag. Some of these flavors are fairly easy to guess based on the ingredient label: Hamburger flavor, for instance. But when I bought two bags for my kids at the Winn Dixie the other day there was nothing on the ingredient label to give any indication as to what the surprise might be. It was actually rather difficult; guessing was impossible. It was only when my kids visited the Doritos Quest web site that they learned that one of the flavors available was Mountain Dew. As soon as I stuck my nose into the bag I realized that was exactly what we had gotten ourselves into. The aroma was noxious, but that was nothing to compare to the taste. I'll be honest about something: I don't like mixing sweet with spice. That's why I rarely find Asian spicy sauces particularly enjoyable. I like my heat hot and my sweet by itself. There are the rare occasions, but generally speaking that's the case. There is something else I must admit to: unless we're talking about something like a churro, I don't really think corn chips should be sweet. Salty, oh yeah. But salty and sweet? No.