The last two bags I’ve purchased aren’t the same as they were in the past; the cooking time and temperature are the same, but the taste and texture are different. These are not as crunchy, and not as flavorful as they were before.
Does anyone else have a similar experience and wish to comment?
I noticed the same thing, starting several months ago. Texture and flavor seemed different, and they cooked differently. I actually switched to buying the Kroger store brand, which I feel now tastes.
“now tastes better.” Silly typo.
While I’m trying to reduce my consumption of processed potatoes, I am a sucker for Tater Tots and their evil little brother, Crispy Crowns.
There is a secret to them, if you happen to have a convection oven (basically a giant air fryer). Just set the oven to convection bake and 25 degrees lower than the recommended temperature. They’ll cook faster, so you need to watch them, but they’ll be much more crisp and more similar to a deep-fried tot. This also works well for their oven fries.
I’ve purchased Crispy Crowns recently, and didn’t see any difference there.
I’ve always liked Crispy Crowns but they did seem to change the recipe over the past few years. I don’t eat them often, but when I do outdoor grilling my favored method of preparing Crispy Crowns is to array them out on a sheet of double layer aluminum foil, fold a layer of foil over the top, and crimp the open edges shut. This made an a pouch of sorts, and I then poke small holes in the top layer to let steam escape, and put it directly on my charcoal grill. 15 minutes double side down, 8 to 10 minutes single side down. The aroma and sound told me how they were doing. The savory potato-y taste and crunch was perfect with a steak.
They always came out perfectly crunchy and golden brown ( just like on the picture ) and nicely moist inside. That was then. I suspect they switched to a different shortening because the “window” of cooking time seems much smaller and it’s harder and harder to replicate the perfection of my prior efforts. Now, for the most part, while still edible, they seem oilier, smell oilier ( in a way that’s slightly unpleasant to my nose ), and have a weird greasy taste and the outside seems to have a denser texture. I can still get lucky and make the perfect batch, but the transition of extremes from firm and greasy to charred and hard comes much more suddenly…the in between “window” being very small.
I’m glad I use this method to cook them outside because with apparent the new shortening, the greasy smell they’d make inside if cooked in an oven would make me gag.
Maybe you have the Omega Iota COVID variant.
Is there a convection oven that has an amber alert when they’re done?
They all do and you can’t disable it. Therefore it’s not a good idea to leave your oven on all the time, even if you don’t want to have to remember what temperature you had it set on the last time.
Yeah, I have an air fryer. Frozen spuds of any kind always come out top notch in my air fryer.
Since we’re talking about Tater Tots, why in the world haven’t the companies figured out how to make their bags resealable. My grapes and cherries come in throw-away zipper bags. They must think that everyone cooks the entire bag at once. The first company that advertises Resealable Bag will get me to buy at least one bag.
I’ve been getting the McCann version, and have liked them. Seasoned crisps, or something along those lines. They come out well in the air fryer. I got a bag of " tater tots’ and they came out mushy. Or off flavor. Won’t go there again.
And I agree on the resealable bag.
My wife always undercooks the tater tots. They come out still a pale yellow and are all mushy, I can barely stand them (can’t really, I will usually refuse to eat them). When I cook, I leave them in the oven until they are a nice golden brown and crispy like I like them.
Once she mentioned that she likes how I cook them better. I said all I do is leave them in the oven longer. She had apparently cooking them according to the instructions on the bag and didn’t know you could change that 
Back to the OP… the formulas may have changed (don’t know, I usually buy the generic brands) but have you tried cooking them longer or at a different (probably higher) temperature to achieve the result you want?
Not noticed a difference. But it’s been a while.
Anyone use TT’s as a substitute for hash browns? I thaw them, smoosh them with some butter and fry them up.
I’ve gone over to Alexia in their assorted versions. It’s childhood comfort food, but a quarter step up.
Same here. Steak fries do especially well!
Dammit, now I have a hankerin’ for tater tots (or Food Lion’s generic equivalent)
I contacted Ore-Ida about this, and got an e-mail back from them earlier today apologizing for any inconvenience, and offered to send me some coupons. I’m perfectly OK with that.
I also had some earlier for dinner, and cooked them a little longer than usual, so they were nice and crispy. Maybe they just need to be final-baked a bit longer. IDK.
Did they acknowledge something was changed? Typically, these messages are just meaningless lip service and it would be cool if this one was different.
I’m not normally much of a Tater Tot consumer but I recently shared some with a friend at BW3s and can report they were amazing. They really pair well with buffalo wing sauce. These were deep fried, though.
It totally smacked of a form letter, but I did leave my real name and address when I made the comment. I’ll be sure to post here if I get some coupons in the mail soon; I’ve heard of people getting the actual product, but this is a frozen food and not exactly cheap to ship.
Today’s mail brought me a $4 coupon for any Ore-Ida product. I’m OK with that.