Taco Bell Nacho Fries are deliciously seasoned with Mexican spices and served with creamy cheese sauce. So if you love the crispy texture of the fries, bold seasoning, and warm nacho cheese sauce, you must make this copycat recipe.
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Best Fusion of Fries and Nachos
Were you ever forced to choose between ordering french fries or nachos? No one should have to make such a heart-wrenching decision. But don’t worry. Taco Bell has your back with their one-of-a-kind Nacho Fries.
If you are a Taco Bell fan, you know how the Taco Bell menu has many items that are shared only for a limited time. Warmed with this copycat recipe, you can make your own beloved nacho fries box anytime!
Get the Right Fries and the Rest Will Follow
Sorry. This is one recipe where your gourmet, hand-cut, homemade fries won’t work. So save them for another time and get a big bag of Ore-Ida Extra Crispy FAST FOOD FRIES®. If you can’t find them in your local supermarket, look for another brand of “extra crispy” frozen fries. Whatever you do, don’t settle for regular frozen fries. They won’t have the crunchy exterior needed to stand up to the cheesy sauce.
Once you get the french fries home, use it if you are lucky enough to have a deep fryer. Really. It is so worth any extra fat and calories. However, if you don’t have a deep fryer, then sure, you can use the oven, but know you’ll lose a lot of the texture that makes the recipe unique.
As a lower-fat alternative to deep-frying, you can use an air fryer if you have one. You can even try “double frying” the french fries. First, cook the frozen french fries in a preheated air fryer for 10 minutes at 360 degrees. Let the fries cool for at least 30 minutes, then cook them in a preheated air fryer at 400 degrees for 6 minutes.
The Secret Taco Bell Cheese Sauce
This spicy nacho sauce beats any cheese sauce in a can. Don’t try to save a few minutes by using ready-made nacho sauce when making it fresh is simple and much better!
While the recipe calls for using slices of American cheese, buying a block of processed mild-tasting cheese costs less and works just as well if you cut it into small pieces before melting. Whether you choose the original Taco Bell nacho cheese sauce route and use orange cheese is up to you.
Taco Bell Nacho Fries Recipe Ingredients
Here’s a list of what you need:
- Frozen Ore-Ida Extra Crispy Fast Food Fries
- Salted butter
- Salt
- Whole milk
- Deli American cheese or Kraft American Cheese Deluxe slices
- Tabasco Jalapeno Green Sauce or liquid from jarred pickled jalapeno slices
- Paprika
- Chili powder
- Garlic powder
- Onion powder
How to Make Taco Bell Nacho Fries
- If you have a spice grinder or a mini food processor, process salt, paprika, chili powder, garlic powder, and onion powder to finely grind them.
- If not, combine the seasonings in a bowl.
- Place butter, salt, milk, American cheese, and jalapeno sauce in a saucepan.
- Heat on low, occasionally stirring, until the cheese melts.
- Deep fry the fries according to the package instructions.
- Liberally season the fries with the spice blend as soon as you remove them from the oil.
- Serve nacho fries with cheese sauce.
Tips for Making and Serving Taco Bell Nacho Fries
- Add a few toppings. Plain nachos are good, but loaded nachos are great. Dress those fries with sliced jalapenos, diced onions, a dollop of sour cream, and guacamole.
- Toast those spices. Heat a dry skillet over medium-high heat. Pour in the spice mixture and stir slowly with a wooden spatula until you can smell them. Put the spices directly into a spice grinder and grind them into the consistency of talcum powder.
- They were tossing hot fries with the fry seasoning. Toss one portion of hot fries in a large metal bowl with a tablespoon of the fry seasoning mixture. Grab the fries and shake them over the bowl to remove excess seasoning before serving.
- Take this recipe to the next level by turning this into a 7-Layer nacho fries by adding extra toppings like hot sauce, black beans, low-fat sour cream, cheddar cheese, seasoned ground beef, and other toppings.
Check out our other french fry recipes on YouTube!
Frequently asked questions
No, they are not vegan; they are vegetarian. You can use vegan queso and make them at home.
Taco Bell has not discontinued its famous nacho fries, but they do appear for limited limes only. So be patient; just the McRib will make a return appearance.
Yes, nacho fries are made from potatoes. They are made from French fried potatoes.
Love Taco Bell? Try these copycat recipes!
Popular Mexican Recipes
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- Chile Relleno Casserole
- Chili Verde
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Check out more of my easy Mexican food recipes and the best Taco Bell recipes here on CopyKat!
Taco Bell Nacho Fries
Ingredients
Taco Bell Nacho Cheese
- 1 tablespoon salted butter
- 1/2 cup whole milk
- 8 ounces American cheese
- 1 tablespoon Tobasco Jalapeno sauce or juice from a jar of jalapeno slices for nachos
French Fry Seasoning
- 2 teaspoons paprika
- 2 teaspoons salt
- 1 teaspoon chili powder like McCormick's
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder do not use garlic salt
- 1 teaspoon onion powder do not use onion salt
French Fries
- 1 pound Ore-Ida Extra Crispy Frozen Fast Food Fries
- vegetable oil for frying
Instructions
Seasoning blend instructions
- If you have a spice grinder or a mini food processor, process spices to grind them more finely, if not, skip this step. Store spice blend in a salt shaker or another shaker. You will have some left over, you can use this for tacos, or another batch of fries.
Taco Bell Nacho Cheese Sauce
- Combine all ingredients in a small pot, heat on low until the cheese melts, stir to combine.
French Fries Instructions
- Fill a large pot with enough vegetable oil to fill the pot 4 inches deep. Heat the oil to 350 degrees.
- Cook the fries for 6 to 8 minutes or until crispy. Remove fries from the oil and place on a wire rack that is resting on a baking sheet, and sprinkle liberally with the seasoning blend.
How to assemble and serve
- Place some of the fries onto an individual serving plate, and then serve with a small bowl of cheese sauce.
Jess
Delicious! I cheated and used store bought queso but the seasoning on the fries are spot on.
Nacho fry lover
The tacobell nacho fries have a hint of sweetness to them, almost like the Zaxby’s seasoning. People always swear its purely seasoning salt, but the restaurants doing it right always have that hint of sweet/tang at the end of the salt. Its why I enjoy taco bells nacho fries so much.
I’ve been to a franchise that clearly just ran out and were using more generic fry seasoning or salt and it was noticeably different and worse. But the other Taco Bells tasted right ( across multiple cities)
Yessir
These nacho fries are so good! I love the combination of the nacho cheese and the crispy fries.
Roselyn
The fries were okay, but didn’t taste like the tacobell ones at all and I followed the recipe right down to grinding the spices. I’d call it just nacho fry recipe than a tacobell copykat.
Johnie
These were so good. I did those fries in my air fryer
P J Keenum
Johnie, at what temp. & for how long did you air fry the fries? I don’t like frying anything if I can cook it another way.