The Great Tater Tot Funnel Cake Adventure

I’m a veritable Thomas Edison over here. Or Robert Fulton. Or George Washington Carver. All of those guys you learned about in Elementary school – that’s me wrapped up in one sarcastic package. Some say that great ideas just come to you in the heat of the moment. Others say that they have developed these ideas over a long period. Me? It all came to me on a rainy day stranded in a lonely work cafeteria.

I was trying to figure out what to eat that would be healthy. Well, healthy for me – meaning horrendously unhealthy but just not too MUCH of it. It’s all about portion control, my friends. Anyway, I’ll usually just get a single egg roll or a single hot dog but that day I was feeling spunky. I needed a side to compliment the main course. So I ordered a solitary hot dog and got to choose between fries and onion rings. But wait – off to the side in a lonely little bin of happiness sat a tubful of my favorite guilty pleasure: TATER TOTS! You may wonder why the great excitement – but let it be known that my wife and kids won’t allow tater tots in the house for some reason, ANY reason, so I’m forced to scavenge these off the streets when they are available.

So tater tots it was. The “chef” dumped a pile of the golden tidbits of joy next to my perky hot dog in the white Styrofoam container (I’m painting a picture here) and I was in heaven. I moved dutifully up the line and came across the salt and pepper. What’s a tater tots without salt you may ask? A bad tater tot, I may answer. I dumped the white specks of spiciness on top of my tater tots, making sure that I didn’t dump any on the hot dog of course (since I’m trying to be healthy) and got in line to pay.

I took the white Styrofoam container filled with my treasures back to my desk and slowly opened the lid, waiting for the aroma of the grease-filled tater tots to hit my nostrils. Hit it they did – like a lilac on a warm Spring day. Like a whiff of jet fuel at a road near an airport. Yes, those two aromas are rated equally in the pleasing scale for me.

I grabbed a morsel of goodness and slowly popped it in my mouth. And then it suddenly hit me. These were the most amazing tater tots EVER. Not only did they have the perfect crunch only obtained by the optimum combination of fry timing and grease temperature, they also had a SWEET note of which I had previously been unaware. Ladies and gentlemen, instead of putting salt on these National Treasures, I had indeed sprinkled them with powdered sugar! Right now you are all gasping in horror, some may even be slightly dabbing their tears away while sharing my possible disappointment – but do not fret for me. I had discovered the perfect food:

The Tator Tot Funnel Cake.

You see, ladies and gentlemen, the taste of this Tater Tot combined with the sweetness and come-hitherness of powdered sugar had turned an ordinary snack food into, well, a portable funnel cake! Those wonderful bunches of sugar, greasy goodness that you get at every carnival can now be had at a fraction of the cost! No more carrying around a 12-inch diameter messy funnel cake on a paper plate trying not to run into your Aunt Hazel when she suddenly stops to look at a two-headed frog. Instead, plop a bunch of tater tots in a paper cup, sprinkle it with powdered sugar and BOOM! Portable perfection.

Now, I will admit three things to you that may need to be worked on:

1)      It was an absolutely horrible combination with the hot dog.

2)      I could only eat 3 or 4 of them before my throat closed to the point of not being able to eat anything more.

3)      I felt sick the rest of the day.

But those three small facts should in no way damper my (or your) enthusiasm for the product. As a follow-up, I went down to the cafeteria to see why they had powdered sugar in the salt container and found that I had, in fact, stumbled upon the ‘waffle-topping’ section of the bar. They had one clear glass jar of powdered sugar, and one clear glass jar of cocoa powder (for some reason) to simulate salt and pepper. I didn’t say it was a well-planned cafeteria.

So the next time you have a fancy dinner party, throw these tidbits of tator tot tremendousness out there and I’ll BET you that they are the first thing gone. They’re easy, cheap and quick – and most importantly since they will eventually make you sick – are guaranteed to get everyone out of the house fairly quickly!

You can thank me later.