Is a Chicken Sandwich Taco Still a Chicken Sandwich?

Taco Bell is wading into the chain competitive cash grab known as the “chicken sandwich wars” with its own take on the item: a chicken sandwich taco.

Made up of crispy chicken and chipotle sauce cradled in a folded flatbread, the so-called “taco” will be tested at select locations in Nashville, Tennessee, and Charlotte, North Carolina, starting March 11. A nationwide rollout is planned for later this year.

This isn’t the first time Taco Bell has served fried chicken. In 2019, the chain briefly introduced an item called crispy tortilla chicken, and before that, there was the stuntiest of stunt food, the naked chicken chalupa with a fried-chicken shell instead of a tortilla. But the chain’s current reentry into the arena signals a willingness to get down and dirty in the fast-food fight for customers’ souls — by which I mean their appetite for fried chicken sandwiches, best exemplified by the Popeyes chicken sandwich craze of summer 2019.

Other chains that have recently added new chicken sandwiches to their menus include KFC, Wendy’s, and Shake Shack. McDonald’s announced a slate of three new chicken sandwiches that will be available starting February 24. Burger King also announced that it will replace its current crispy chicken sandwich offering with a new version later this year.

• Taco Bell enters chicken sandwich wars with its own spin: A taco version [CNBC]
• Taco Bell joins the chicken wars with a new taco [CNN]