Taco Bell’s Crunchwrap Supreme, an Unlikely Muse for Chefs, Turns 20

Food|The Fast-Food Gimmick That Became an Unlikely Muse for Chefs

In 2020, Fernando Strohmeyer was scrolling through Reddit in the back of Aunt Ginny’s, a dive bar in Ridgewood, Queens, when a video of someone making a homemade Crunchwrap Supreme caught his eye.

It didn’t matter that he had never tasted the Taco Bell original. Recipes for the fast-food staple have spread online like open-source code. Soon, he was making one, too.

From his small kitchen at Aunt Ginny’s, Mr. Strohmeyer serves six-sided wraps that are browned on both sides and filled with the 14-hour pernil he learned to make from his Puerto Rican mother. His version — “the Crispwrap Ultimate” — is considerably thicker than the source material, with a cross-section that looks more like your actual aunt’s seven-layer dip.

Introduced by Taco Bell as a special on June 22, 2005, the Crunchwrap Supreme wildly outperformed company expectations, becoming the fastest-selling menu item in the fast-food chain’s history. Twenty years later, it is as much a novelty food as a playful framework for chefs. They reinterpret its nostalgic layers — ground beef, nacho cheese, a tostada shell, lettuce, tomato and sour cream enrobed by a 12-inch flour tortilla — with ingredients that are deeply personal.