‘ALLO ‘ALLO ‘ALLO, WHOT’S ALL THIS THEN? WHERE’S ME FISH AN CHIPS? WHERE’S ME BANGERS AN MASH? WHERE’S ME BUBBLE AN SQUEEK? WHERE’S ME (INSERT COMICAL NAME OF A FOOD) AN (INSERT COMICAL NAME OF ANOTHER FOOD)? WHERE’S THE OTHER STEREOTYPICAL BRITISH FOOD IN THIS STEREOTYPICAL BRITISH PUB? Oh, they do have Fish and Chips? And Bangers and Mash? And Pies and Pasties? Well, perhaps they meet the Britishness required of a The British Beer Company, but do they meet the NACHONESS?
Despite having had many fine British nachos of one sort or another I would have assumed in order for The British Beer Company to cash in on it’s Britishness it would have gone with something stereotypically British for it’s nacho flavor. A kind of fish and french fry Irish nachos, a shepherd's pie poured over a pile of tortilla chips, some sort of full English breakfast nachos that you then deep fry, you know, all the tastiest stereotypes. Instead the only thing British about it is the Newcastle Chili on top, which, I have to say BBC, that is really showing some restraint and I applaud you. You know Guy Fieri’s British Kitchen and Bar would have a Liverpool Double Decker Bus Winston Churchill Queen Elizabeth Fish and Chip Nachos or something equally over the top.
On the side you have your three silver gravy boats of non-solid toppings; salsa, sour cream, and guacamole. Pure class. After that everything else is just standard meh pub style nachos, namely a super dense mound of chips and cheese and toppings, all pretty standard fare. Let us however circle back for a second and talk a moment about the chili, and not just on these Stout Macho Nachos, but the very act of tortilla bowl chili on nachos itself.
When you make a regular order of nachos with chili, you make your pile of chips and toppings and then add the appropriate amount of chili to the top to complete the dish. Simple, and your proportions are all about equal. Nachos that come with a secondary bowl made of tortilla chips filled with chili is pretty much the definition of proportions out of whack. The addition of a tortilla bowl on top of an order of nachos adds way too much tortilla to your dish, and doubly troubling so adds it right to the top of the meal where it blocks your access to the rest of the toppings. Basically what it leaves you with is a secondary order of meh nachos made up of just chili and tortilla (and the kind of tortilla they make a tortilla bowl out of is much less tasty than your regular nacho chips) on top of the nachos you really want to eat, maybe gussied up with your salsa, sour cream, and guac should you choose to add them all at this time. It’s like an appetizer you didn’t want on top of the one you did. Madness.
I honestly don’t know why you’d go to a fake British Pub to get nachos when you could get actual Britishesque food that would be much better. These aren’t bad, but they’re not great, just a perfectly “meh” pub style dense mound of nachos. Maybe if I had dumped the chili on top and just thrown out that tortilla bowl it would have been better, but I would have much rather have had a fish and chips or pasty even so. I mean, if everything was jellied eels and blood pudding that would be one thing, but there’s a lot of good British food out there and you should be getting that rather than these nachos. God Save the Queen.
