The Mexican Pizza is making its triumphant return to Taco Bell’s menu after being gone for nearly two years.
After an extended period of longing, fans of the Mexican Pizza from ‘The Bell’ can rest assured that once it returns on May 19th, it won’t leave again, the chain confirmed on Monday. The Pizza was removed from Taco Bell’s selection abruptly back in November of 2020 as part of a large culling of its menu items during the peak of the pandemic, as many fast-food chains looked to shed complexities and costs to better synergize and make more cost-effective their menus.
Introduced back in 1985 and originally called the “Pizzazz Pizza,” Taco Bell’s Mexican Pizza consists of a tortilla shell topped with either beans or ground beef with some pizza sauce, with another tortilla shell laid on top, which is then smothered with more sauce, cheese and chopped tomatoes.
Taco Bell fans were outraged when the item was removed, provoking an online petition asking for the return of the beloved Mexican Pizza and garnering nearly 200,000 signatures. Many vegetarian customers were particularly outraged, as this was one of the few vegetarian-friendly options. The petition’s creator, Krish Jagirdar, was enlisted by Taco Bell to celebrate the pizza’s return.
“Like many Indian-Americans who grew up vegetarian, we had limited access to the ‘fun’ fast food, so Taco Bell became a bridge to belonging in American culture for many kids like me who grew up in immigrant households,” said Jagirdar in a press release.
The packaging for the Mexican Pizza is new and improved, as Taco Bell has “worked to improve operations and ingredient sourcing and leave a lighter footprint at the same time.” The previous packaging amounted to more than 7 million pounds of paperboard per year.
Members of Taco Bell’s loyalty program will get a special two-day early access opportunity to order the $4.49 Mexican Pizza beginning on May 17th.