Get your chips ready: Chipotle is taking its queso out off the test track and into all restaurants next week.
Chipotle announced today that after years of customers asking for tubs of drippy cheese, the option will officially grace menus across the country starting Sept. 12.
The fast-casual Mexican restaurant began testing a queso offering at its NEXT kitchen in New York and then expanded to 350 restaurants in Southern California and Colorado this summer.
Those tests proved to be successful, obviously. Chipotle says it was able to gain customer feedback and tweak the recipe and ingredient proportions slightly.
Most Requested
The tests came after Chipotle and its executives continually denied cheese-lovers their dips, noting that the chain just couldn’t find a version that was up to its standards.
That is, until now.
“Although queso was the number one requested menu item, we never added it to our menu before now because we wouldn’t use the industrial additives used in most quesos,” Steve Ells, founder, chairman and CEO at Chipotle, said in a statement.
A Slightly Different Variation
Ells notes that the company’s new dip will vary from restaurant to restaurant as the chain won’t be using those previously mentioned additives.
“Our queso may vary slightly depending on the characteristics of the aged cheddar cheese used in each batch, but using only real ingredients is what makes our food so delicious,” he notes.
Starting Sept. 12, customers can order queso on their entrée, or on the side in two sizes with chips.
Prices vary slightly by city, but range from $1.25 to add it to an entrée to $5.25 for a large side order.
by Ashlee Kieler via Consumerist