Krish Jagirdar, an Indian American tech entrepreneur, never thought he could be partially responsible for the relaunch of Taco Bell’s Mexican pizza — his favorite dish on the menu and a cult favorite in the South Asian community.
He said he felt helpless when he heard that his favorite dish was being discontinued during the height of the pandemic in 2020.
“How could I go on without it? Imagine never eating your favorite food again,” he told NBC News. “I went through the stages of grief, but then, within an hour, I started a petition because what else can you do?”
Jagirdar, who is from the suburbs in New Jersey, was not alone in his disapproval of Taco Bell’s decision. Like Jagirdar, the Mexican-inspired restaurant played an important role in the childhood and assimilation of South Asians into American culture.
And for those growing up in the suburbs with a dearth of vegetarian options, Taco Bell was a place multigenerational families with different diets could come together and eat.
The petition, which Jagirdar said was being circulated in WhatsApp groups, garnered over 170,000 signatures, largely by the South Asian diaspora at first. “This petition felt like it was by South Asians, like, for South Asians,” he said.
“A lot of South Asians, especially first-generation South Asians, grew up vegetarian. We couldn’t go to McDonald’s, we couldn’t go to Burger King, and we couldn’t go to Wendy’s.”
Krish Jagirdar Change.org petitioner
Jagirdar, 33, who grew up in the early 1990s and 2000s, believes the momentum behind the petition happened because of what the dish symbolized.
“This menu item represents South Asian American identity in a really funky way,” he said about the Mexican pizza, which is a dish made of beef and refried beans between two Mexican pizza shells with sauce, shredded cheese and tomatoes. Although, many South Asians would choose to omit the meat.
Taco Bell eventually reintroduced the Mexican pizza last year after the…
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