Photo credit: www.dichosonline.com
Fortune cookies are an American-Chinese restaurant icon. Even if you don’t eat fortune cookies, chances are you like them well enough to crack one open after you tuck into a plate of chicken balls or egg foo yung. It doesn’t really matter that the fortunes are banal truisms. Fortune cookies make us smile and are part of the Chinese food ritual.
Realizing these facts and understanding that Hispanic cuisine is growing ever more popular, an Arizona couple are trying to duplicate the fortune cookie’s success.
Their invention is a taco shaped cookie that contains proverbs called Dichos, Mexican proverbs. These words of wisdom and inspiration are typed in both English and Spanish before being added to the Dichos before packaging. These entrepreneurs are selling their wares to Mexican restaurants in the US as an end of meal novelty and hope to branch out to Canada and other destinations if things go well.
At $12.50 for a case of 250 cookies, they’ve got an idea that restaurateurs can afford, but will the idea fly? Will people really enjoy cracking open a dicho enough that it will bring them back to a restaurant again? Who knows?
For now, I’m placing Dichos on my trend tracking radar screen. I’ll let you know in an upcoming newsletter if I see this concept going anywhere. In the meantime, you can help by letting me know if you’ve seen or heard of Dichos before today. Thanks!
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I’ve never heard if them, and while I think the idea is cute for a single restaurant, I’d have a hard time seeing the trend appropriated by Mexican restaurants writ large. The fortune cookie concept is simply too tied to our notions (however faulty, since I think they didn’t originate in China) of Chinese cuisine.
Plus, fortune cookies taste like cardboard!
Cheryl raises a good point. This might be too kitschy for the trend to spread.
For me, the real question is — if you add the phrase “in bed” to the end of a dichos, will you still get a laugh?
Time will tell both whether this idea catches on and whether the ‘in bed’ game will work. I give ‘in bed’ the edge though if you force me to choose.
Never seen ’em before, but I like the idea! Much more interesting than a peppermint.
Would like a update on Dichos
Taco Johns, a restaurant in Athens, Ohio, gave out dichos cookies with their orders. I loved them because I was learning Spanish and am now a Spanish teacher. I would like to buy some for my class. So, I would also love an update on dichos!