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Get a Taste of This Week's Weirdest LTOs
From sought-after classics to unlikely mashups, restaurants never stop creating when it comes to new LTOs.
In the fast-food world, the “limited-time offer” is a remarkably powerful thing. The scarcity alone sparks an insatiable desire to consume every Shamrock Shake and McRib in sight. But there’s a certain ingenuity to these LTOs that piques our curiosity, too.
These days, restaurants seem to really enjoy pushing the envelope when it comes to whipping up strange—and strangely good—LTOs. This week is no exception—a handful of fast-food and fast-casual restaurants have unveiled their newest menu additions, and a lot of them have left us shocked, awed and downright hungry. Here are a few meals to put on your radar.
On Tuesday, Burger King introduced “the Angriest Whopper:” a flame-grilled beef patty piled high with thick-cut bacon, American cheese, iceberg lettuce, tomatoes, crispy onion petals, jalapenos, creamy mayonnaise and spicy angry sauce all layered between a red, fiery bun that has hot sauce baked in.
This isn’t the first colorful bun for Burger King. During Halloween 2015, the chain launched its A1 Steak Sauce burger with a pitch-black bun, leading to some pretty interesting body reactions from customers (we won’t delve any further into that one, but you can read more here). Suffice it to say, we’ll go ahead and throw caution to the wind. Bring on the heat.
Remember those blocks of dehydrated ramen noodles that you probably lived off of in college? Red Robin has decided to use them in lieu of hamburger buns. Their new burger tops a beef patty with teriyaki and aioli, and also features a chili-infused slaw and some fresh basil—all between two crispy noodle slabs.
This hybrid sandwich mashup isn’t a first. The originator of the Ramen Burger is Keizo Shimamoto, a former computer programmer who quit his job in 2009 to become a full-time ramen enthusiast and blogger. When he first began offering his Ramen Burger at Brooklyn’s Smorgasburg food market, he sold out within a few hours.
Stuffed with Flamin’ Hot Fritos and ground beef, the elusive Beefy Crunch Burrito (or BCB if you’re hip) has been absent from Taco Bell’s menu for about five years. But this time, as the cult item makes its way back to the chain’s menus, they’re not only promoting its return, but the rabid fan behind it: Richard Axton, whom the company described as the fearless leader of the Beefy Crunch Movement.
When the BCB made its debut in 2011 and disappeared shortly thereafter, Axton started a support community of more than 39,000 people who all fought to hold that beloved burrito in their hands one last time. They Tweeted. They started petitions. They developed internal conspiracy theories. And they even got tattoos. The result was the triumphant return of the BCB—for a limited-time only, of course.
