When Nathan Leiper, manager of Aberdeen’s Taco Bell first found out they’d secured a big order, he was over the moon.
But it wasn’t until he realised it was for 1,050 tacos that he really began to question if they could actually pull it off.
Redesigning the Union Street venue’s kitchen for the mammoth order – which was delivered yesterday – he and his assistant manager Becky Wirdnam figured out how best to tackle such an order and added a second temporary preparation line to help.
Said to be the biggest order of tacos from any Taco Bell in Scotland according to Nathan’s sources at the firm, a team of nine was needed to get all 1,050 tacos out in time.
The tacos were made in batches of around 500 with the first round being collected at 4pm and the second round being picked up at 5.15pm.
Hours to make
It took around two and a half hours to pull the full order together, which included a mix of chicken, beef and the vegetarian black bean tacos.
It was then picked up by the team at Unite Students who had placed the order for one of their student experience events.
Preparations in getting the order ready started in the morning, with the nine staff all chipping in to get the order complete on time. Usually only four staff would work the Wednesday shift.
Staff making up the order
Nathan said: “We didn’t realise it was going to be 1,050 when the enquiry first came in.
“We prepped all of the taco shells the night before, as they can be kept hot for 24 hours. The proteins and meat were cooked up that morning and we added to that as we went along.
“A second line was set up because of the order and there was a group of four or five staff running the second line exclusively for this order. It was a big operation.
“Normally we make the taco by layering cheese, then beef, then the salad, and wrap them. But we made them the other way around so they didn’t get soggy.
“We had one person doing the salad, one filling them with the protein, one adding cheese and one person wrapping and putting them in a box.
“It takes around 10 seconds to make one taco because everything is cooked. We took around an hour to an hour-and-a-half to do 500, and the same for the other 500.
“This might be one of the biggest Taco Bell orders in the UK, never mind Scotland.”
Paid in advance
Discount was applied to the order due to its size and also being a student-based business.
Unite Students picked up the tacos at 4pm and 5.30pm and delivered them to eight different sites across the city.
They placed the order last week and paid for it in advance.
Gary Mclennan, sales and service supervisor at Unite Students, said: “Students love free food and we thought it would be a great way to get them out of their rooms and into the common areas to catch up with one another.
“The events are a chance for them to discuss things with us and we normally offer pizza but I think everyone was getting bored of pizza. Aberdeen doesn’t have the widest options for mass food like this, so we thought about trying tacos this time.
“It is a good way to connect the students and there’s music, free drinks and other things that they can enjoy. We delivered tacos to eight venues across the city.
“The students absolutely loved it and the tacos went down a treat!”
