Sour Cream & Onion Doritos?!

Being the chip hog that I am, I often spend time on the internets searching to see if weird flavors of chips exist in vast corners of the US or other countries. One late night, a question that had somehow never entered my mind finally did- how come there are Sour Cream & Onion flavored chips for virtually every chip company, but Doritos don't have them? Granted, Fritos don't either, but Fritos hate trying new flavors. Doritos LOVES putting out every flavor imaginable. I looked into it, and apparently 20 years ago, such a thing existed. Who knew? 

According to the Wikipedias, Doritos started with Taco flavor in 1964, which recently returned and aren't very good in my opinion (although very accurate tasting).  They then launched the classic Nacho Cheese, then Sour Cream & Onion around 1970, to be discontinued later. They didn't launch Cool Ranch until 1986! It took them 18 years to create that flavor?! Crazy. 

So, I wondered if somehow, with the resurgence of some classic flavors, we may be granted the privilege to some day taste a flavor that hasn't been around in over 20 years. And then it happened. One fateful day while roaming the halls of a Market Basket I never go to, I saw something I didn't think I ever would. They had returned.   

After texting my friend who works there an angry, profanity-laden "HOW DID YOU NOT TELL ME!?" freakout, I bought them and went home to violently tear into the bag. 

Aaaaaaaand was immediately disappointed. 

They're pretty covered in flavor. The first reaction for all 3 of us fatguyfoodbloggers was that they just tasted like an odd version of Cool Ranch- they definitely have some of the same spice. I don't know if it's that the sour cream they use tastes a lot like ranch, or the spice that the Ranch have is very close to the spice that these have, but the flavors are oddly close. And what's with a Sour Cream & Onion chip having a spice? Isn't this supposed to be a smooth, creamy taste? They definitely went with a more sharp onion taste, and it's weird. 

The weirdest thing about these is that the chip itself felt cheap- like a Doritos imitation. Compared to other Doritos, these definitely feel thinner, cheaper, more corny, and just not as good. I don't know what's going on here, but I don't like it. 

So, to recap- cheap, thin imitation-esque chips, Cool Ranch-esque spicy flavor that doesn't really taste like Sour Cream & Onion, not to mention that corn chips and this flavor just doesn't seem to work. I think I pretty easily can see why these were discontinued. Too bad, it's something I've wanted to try for awhile, and there were probably a lot of old fat guys who were really excited about this. Oh well. I will forever applaud Doritos and their adventurous attitude in doing the one thing every chip company should- putting out new flavors. But this proves the sad truth that they just can't all be winners. Too bad.

If you're crazy for chips, you're gonna try them anyway (especially since they are limited edition), but you'll be disappointed like me. They're interesting, but they're just not very good. 

D.

They also had these, which I had never seen, and judging by the old school look of the bag, these are an older flavor, but I can't seem to find much info about that:

These were also pretty bad. The chips had the normal Doritos crunch and the flavor worked well with the corn chip flavor, but I just didn't like the flavor. There's a weird flavor that's suddenly showing up in chips- salsa mixed with lime. Lays and Ruffles put out their own version awhile ago (which I never reviewed because I didn't like them either):

If you like that flavor or are at least intrigued by it, then get these- the flavor is less limey and more subtle. It also worked better with the Doritos corn chip flavor than the others. But for this reviewer? Not interested. There's 90% of a bag about to go in the trash.  

F. 

I have no idea what people see in salsa combined with lime. It just tasted like salsa with soap spilled in it to me.

-mike