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    rip choco taco...?

    Ken Hoffman's icy prediction on the demise of an ice cream favorite that has celebs and the internet on fire

    Ken Hoffman
    Aug 1, 2022 | 9:45 am
    Klondike Choco Taco press conference
    The Choco Taco called a press conference to address the rumors of its demise.
    Klondike/Facebook

    To everybody who’s wringing their hands, grieving and chanting the Tibetan Book of the Dead over Klondike ending production of its Choco Taco ice cream treat:

     

    When exactly was the last time you actually ate one? Uh, think maybe that’s why it’s being discontinued?

     

    I remember the time I told my friend Jimmy that Houston’s legendary hard rock radio station KLOL was switching formats to Spanish-language pop music. He was devastated: “They can’t do that! KLOL is my favorite station!”

     

    I asked Jimmy, when was the last time you listened to your favorite station? He confessed, “I guess it’s been a few years.”

     

    KLOL didn’t change formats because too many people were listening, and Klondike isn’t dropping the Choco Taco because its factory couldn’t keep up with demand for it.

     

     The Choco Taco origin story
    Klondike introduced the Choco Taco 40 years ago. It had a cute name and unique shape. It was a folded waffle shell filled with vanilla ice cream and covered in chocolate. Like a taco. An ice cream cone with bad posture.

     

    Remember the song, “Big Yellow Taxi,” and its telling line? “Don’t it always seem to go that you don’t know what you got ‘til it’s gone?”

     

    Don’t you know, the Choco Taco is gone.

     

    Choco Taco fans took their eye off the ball. They abandoned the Choco Taco for high priced pints by Haagen-Dazs and Ben and Jerry’s, or expensive cones and sundaes at designer scoop shops like Marble Slab, Cold Stone Creamery and Baskin-Robbins.

     

    The 18th-century French philosopher Voltaire wrote in Candide that if you don’t “tend to your garden,” someone else will, and next thing you know, your girl goes out with other guys, KLOL is playing Spanish hip-hop, and Klondike stops making Choco Tacos.

     

     

     
     

    I can't believe the Supreme Court overturned the Choco Taco.

    — Stephen Colbert (@StephenAtHome) July 27, 2022
     

     Why the taco melted away
    Choco Tacos never were a runaway hit with consumers. Choco Tacos never achieved the popularity of Dixie Cups Drumsticks or ice cream sandwiches. Unless you live near a supermarket that carries Choco Tacos or an ice cream truck still plays Yankee Doodle Dandy on a loop down your street, you may not even know what they are. I visited four supermarkets over the weekend. None of them carried Chocolate Tacos.

     

    I have an emotional attachment to the Choco Taco. Over my years as the Houston Chronicle’s lead restaurant critic (under $10), I wrote 1,122 fast food reviews as the “Drive-Thru Gourmet.” The first one I did — on spec — was the Choco Taco. My side hustle was born.

     

    America’s reaction to the demise of the Choco Taco was swift and overwhelming. TV news covered it like a coast-to-coast disaster. Online comment boards were filled with teary-eyed memories. Late night talk hosts delivered mournful remembrances.

     

     Celebrities and the nation react
    Of course, celebrities jumped on the bandwagon, like chef Andrew Zimmern, Chrissy Teigen, Stephen Colbert, and even Stephen King. One, Alexis Ohanian — the founder of Reddit and husband of Serena Williams — provided a eulogy for the Choco Taco, which he claimed was his favorite childhood dessert.

     

    Ohanian also alleged that the Choco Taco did not die a natural death. He suspects foul play. It was murder! And the killer is … the ice cream cone!

     

    “I bet the ice cream cone is happy about Choco Taco’s death – look how inferior every bite (of a cone) is by comparison. He (the cone) was jealous. We have a motive, folks,” Ohanian wrote.

     

    Klondike explained that it was discontinuing the Choco Taco because its sales lagged behind its other ice cream products. That may be true, but here’s the thing about its No. 1 seller, the Klondike Bar. Talk about a design flaw. A Klondike Bar is a square hunk of vanilla ice cream covered by a chocolate shell. There’s nothing to hold onto – no cone, no cup, no stick. You have to grab it with your hands. Eat one outside in the summer and your hands become a sticky chocolatey mess.

     

    The jingle goes, what would you do for a Klondike Bar? I would ask for extra napkins.

     

    While I’m not calling for a murder investigation like Ohanian is, I do smell a phony baloney publicity stunt. Klondike might think, we’ve got a product that is slipping, let’s announce that we’re discontinuing it and gin up some sympathy. We’ve got nothing to lose.

     

    This is Munchausen syndrome by proxy in the frozen food aisle. Klondike is creating unnecessary danger, then expects to be hailed as a hero when it rescues the Choco Taco. It’s a marketing trick as old as New Coke.

     

     Choco Taco going all Coke?
    In 1985, Coca-Cola announced that it was changing the formula of the most popular soft drink in the world. It was being replaced by — yuck — “New Coke.” Coke fans were infuriated and felt abandoned. A few years later, Coca-Cola announced it was bringing back “Classic Coke,” and a grateful public pushed sales through the roof. “New Coke” was ditched, never to rear its horrible aftertaste again.

     

    Klondike already is backpedaling on its death knell for the Choco Taco. Now the company is saying it’s stunned by the outpouring of love for the Choco Taco and we should all “stayed tuned.” It also posted on social media that it hasn’t decided yet what to do with the last remaining 912 Choco Tacos (yes, they counted) at corporate HQ — even asking fans for inspiration with the hashtag #WhatShouldWeDo.

     

    I give it six months for Klondike executives to announce, “We listened to fans of the Choco Taco and we’re bringing it back! Ain’t we just the best people ever?”

     
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    series/hoffmans-houston
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    game, set, zina.

    Best of Ken Hoffman: Interviewing Houston's greatest tennis icon

    Ken Hoffman
    Aug 29, 2024 | 12:30 pm
    Zina Garrison, tennis player
    ITATennis
    Garrison, a tennis legend, is now the tennis director of Houston Parks and Recreation.

    Editor's note: After the sudden death of beloved columnist Ken Hoffman on July 14, CultureMap is republishing some of our favorite "Hoffman's Houston" columns. In honor of the U.S. Open, here's Ken's interview with Houston tennis legend Zina Garrison; it was originally published on June 27, 2022.

    As a child, Zina Garrison learned how to hit a tennis ball on the public courts at MacGregor Park during the 1970s and became, simply, the most accomplished player ever from Houston.

     

    She developed into a Grand Slam champion, a Top 5 ranking in the world, Wimbledon finalist in 1990 with 20 tournament titles, Federation Cup captain, and Olympic gold medal winner and later Olympic coach.

     

    Now Garrison is back where she started, only this time she’s devoted to making Houston a great place to learn and play tennis … again. Like she did.

     

    “I am now the tennis director of Houston Parks and Recreation,” Garrison tells me. “I’m over all the public tennis programs and facilities. The job came open recently and I applied for it.”

     

    Wait... she’s the greatest champion this city has ever produced — and she had to apply for that job?

     

    “To be honest, I was more interested in the benefits than the money. As you get older, you start thinking differently,” she shares.

     

    Unlike the major sports leagues in America, tennis doesn’t provide any healthcare insurance or assistance once a player, even a legend, retires.

     

    “They’re working on it,” Garrison, 58, notes. “But as of now, nothing.”

     

    Garrison said her first priority as Houston’s tennis director is to repair the public courts.

     

    “I want to bring the public tennis facilities up to where I’d be proud, where everybody would be proud, to bring people to use our courts. There are cracks in the courts. Nothing’s really been done in the last 20 or maybe 30 years,” she says.

     

    “I’ve traveled to Florida and some other places and they have really nice public courts. Tennis in Houston was really thriving for a while and we had nice courts and people could play in the parks. We had junior programs. We flourished. That’s my main goal.”

     

    While I had Garrison on the phone, I served up some questions:

     

     CultureMap: Wimbledon is on. You’re familiar with that tournament, right? Who are your picks to win the men’s side and women’s side?

     

     Zina Garrison: Yes, I’m familiar with Wimbledon. I have my alarm set for the early morning so I can watch. I have a weird pick, a more personal pick, for the men.

     

    I would love to see Rafael Nadal keep going on, but it’s going to be tough for him. The guy from Italy, Matteo Berrettini, I watched him play a couple of weeks ago and I think he’s going to surprise a lot of people. And I am absolutely in love with that little guy, Carlos Alcaraz, from Spain. He’s made me watch tennis again.

     

    On the women’s side, I don’t think it will be Iga Swiatek. I think it’s just too hard to keep a streak like hers (35 matches in a row including the French Open title) going in today’s game. It’s really wide open. I don’t really have a pick, it’s just who comes in and plays well at the right time.

     

     CM: What do you think about Natela Dzalamidze, the doubles player from Russian who switched her nationality to Georgia so she could play Wimbledon, which has banned players from Russian and Belarus this year?

     

     ZG: I don’t like that she was able to do that. I was just on the phone with (former pro turned broadcaster) Chanda Rubin talking about what’s going on in tennis these days.

     

    First of all, there is the human rights stuff that’s going on in Russia and Ukraine. We have to start forcing accountability for actions. A lot of people didn’t agree with what Wimbledon did, but I think they had to take a stand.

     

     CM: The women’s GOAT is easy — it’s Serena. But who do you think is the men’s GOAT?

     

     ZG: Wow, that’s a hard one. If you had asked me earlier this year, I would have said Roger Federer because of everything he’s accomplished. But right now I’m going to have to go with Nadal. Nadal has taken tennis to a whole ‘nother level, of getting people to watch, coming out of the pandemic, where he has matches and you think he can’t come back and he’s still grinding no matter what.

     

    For me, he is the epitome of what we need in this world right now: Never give up but not be selfish about helping others. I know it sounds clichéd, but that’s what I’m going through right now.

     

     CM: When I first met you, you were painfully shy. It was hard to get an answer out of you. Now you’re a TV commentator and a regular chatterbox. What happened?

     

     ZG: I was an introvert but I had always been intrigued by people of wisdom. A lot of it came as I developed confidence in myself. I had always been told at a very young age, if you really knew me, I spoke a lot. If you didn’t know me, I would be quiet. I would only speak about things that I was extremely passionate about.

     

    As I’ve gotten older, because of my experiences. I feel like I can help people so I’m not afraid to say what I want to say.

     

     CM: Starting the week after Wimbledon, coaches will be allowed to communicate with men players during matches. Up to now, that’s only been allowed in the women’s game. Every other sport allows coaching. Do you think tennis should allow coaching, too?

     

     ZG: I don’t think coaching should be allowed. That’s one of the great things about tennis. That’s a part of the sport, that you grow and figure things out. You learn to think for yourself.

     

    There’s always been little signals from coaches, but now you have these full blown conversations. Another bad thing about allowing coaching is it gives the players the opportunity to blame a loss their coach. That’s not good for the sport.

     

     CM: You were known for wiggling your butt when receiving serve. Did you know you were doing it? Did you do that on purpose?

     

     ZG: It started off as kind of a joke with my coaches. They said, we need you to move your feet. I said, you mean like this?

     

    So, it started as a joke but I realized that it helped get my feet moving: Okay, I’m going to keep doing this.

     

    I’ll never forget that year after I got to the Wimbledon finals, 1990, I went over to Japan and there were 1,200 people there … and all of them started wiggling!

     

     CM: What was the first extravagant thing you bought for yourself when the tennis prize money started rolling in?

     

     ZG: It was 1982, and I bought a candy apple red Volkswagen convertible with a white top.

     

     CM: You were on the Biggest Loser, the show where contestants compete against each other to lose weight. Let’s just say you didn’t win. Are you happy you went on that show, or do you regret it?

     

     ZG: I was one of the first who had to leave the competition. (No, you were THE first.) It was an experience, but I probably shouldn’t have done it. I think I regret going on there. It wasn’t what I thought it was.

     

    It was reality TV and at the time I didn’t know what reality TV was .I was more ready to get out of there than anything else.

     

     CM: Now here’s the big question, Zina. For years, I’ve had a running disagreement with ESPN 97.5 FM morning host John Granato about which is a more demanding, tougher sport – golf or tennis?

     

     Granato says it’s golf, because the tournament winner has to beat every other player that week, while in tennis the winner just has to beat seven players at most. And, each week, golfers have to contend with a different course.

     

     But, I say it’s tennis because players have to be in top physical condition, while nearly anyone in any shape can win a golf major.

     

     Plus, in golf, players have a caddy helping them make decisions. In tennis, players are on their own.

     

     In golf, you can have a bad day on Thursday and still win the tournament. In tennis, if you have a bad day in the opening round, you’re on a plane out of there.

     

     In golf, it’s the player against the course. There’s no defense in golf. In tennis, there’s a human opponent trying to beat you.

     

     In golf, the ball is lying still. In tennis the ball is coming at you at 140 mph.

     

     So which is the tougher sport, golf or tennis? I’m right ... right?

     

     ZG: Are you serious? Who is this guy who says golf is harder? The answer is tennis and it’s not even close.

     

    You’re playing against someone. You’re only controlling the ball when it’s on your side of the net. You can’t control what the other player is doing. It’s almost like a boxer coming at you.

     

    You have to have both the physical and mental capacity to win. In golf, if you have a bad day, it’s because you’re having that bad day. There’s no opponent competing with you. So, I’m saying it’s tennis.

     

     CM (note to John Granato): I win. Granted, it might have been the way I asked the question. Also, Garrison is a former tennis pro.

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