Watch This Pastry Chef As She Almost Goes Crazy Trying to Make Takis At Home

The Bon Appetit Youtube series “Gourmet Makes” has gained quite the cult-following for its entertaining videos that follow a pastry chef, Claire Saffitz, as she tries to recreate popular junk and snack foods with higher quality ingredients. While usually Saffitz focuses on popular American foods like Oreos and Pringles, this time around, the Bon Appetit team decided to take their series in a more international direction. The latest snack food of choice? Takis!

Takis may not be for everyone, but for those who have grown up with them, they’re a delicious reminder of barbecues, family get-togethers and the joys of mindless snacking. Although the easiest way to experience a Taki is by buying a bag yourself, the snack food is best described as a small, taquito-shaped crunchy snack that packs a flavor that is reminiscent of both Hot Cheetos and Doritos.Made by Mexican snacking giant Barcel, the chip product is a staple among Mexican and Latinx families the world over. 

So for “Gourmet Makes” fans of Latinx descent, Saffitz’s decision to try her hand at re-making Takis was an exciting event.

Gourmet makes videos are usually composed of four parts. The initial description of the food, the reading of the ingredients, the exhaustive trial-and-error experimentation in the kitchen, and the final, communal taste test that is conducted by Saffitz and her fellow Bon Appetit chefs. And while the above steps may seem simple enough, the final gourmet snack product is usually days-in-the-making, with Saffitz anguishing over every ingredient and every step in its assembly.

Usually, a ton of preparation goes into the recipe-testing for gourmet makes, and this time was no different. Not only does Saffitz measure and weigh each individual Taki to make sure her creation is as similar as possible, but she also dunks a Taki in water in order to “hydrate and soften” the chip to “get a general sense of the shape”.

Although Takis are a popular Latino snack, most of the staff in the Bon Appetit test kitchen have never heard of the cult-favorite food.

After a chorus of “I’ve never actually had Takis” and “What the f*** is this?” from the staff at the BA test kitchen, Saffitz spends the better part of ten minutes researching and learning about the snack food. At one point, she even watches the viral video “Hot Cheetos & Takis” by the Y.N Rich Kids.

This time, Saffitz started her journey by reading out an exhaustive list of Takis ingredients (a reading that will possibly make you swear-off the ultra-processed food forever). After that, Saffitz gets to work assembling the Mexican chip. 

Screenshot via Youtube/ Bon Appetit

First,  Saffitz begins by mixing the spices that make up Takis’ signature spicy-sour-bold flavor. Then, she creates the dough with corn flour and vegetable oil, flattening the dough in a sizzle platter. Then, she rolls the dough onto tiny skewers and bakes them at 300 degrees Fahrenheit for 10 minutes. After they bake, she deep fries them in vegetable oil until they are crisp. For the final step, she tosses the tiny taquitos in her homemade blend of spices. 

And voila! The homemade Taki is born.

Screenshot via Youtube/ Bon Appetit

After three days of intense work, Claire Safftiz has made her very own version of Gringo Takis (which she at one point describes as looking like a “mini canoli”…sigh), and she’s ready to share her creation with the entire Bon Appetit team. We know that the experiment was successful by the first taste-tester who says “It’s just like, almost too much and then you’re like, okay one more!”. And that’s how you know you’re eating a real Taki. Nice work, Claire!

If you ever needed more evidence that Takis are the perfect snack food, you only need to head over to Twitter to find people waxing poetic about these tasty chips.

It’s crazy to think that no one in the Bon Appetit test kitchen has ever tasted a Taki before. We’re glad they’ve finally seen the light.

This person poses an extremely important question about how to responsibly incorporate as many Takis as possible into a balanced diet:

We’re still waiting on an answer to this one.

This person made an on-point observation about the joy Takis bring to life:

If happiness is currently off the table, then Takis are a close second.

This person made a very creative enchiladas dish where the main ingredient was Takis:

Get this person their own Food Network show, stat!

This teacher just became 100% cooler in the eyes of his students:

His “Teacher of the Year” award is in the mail as we speak.