Sampling the New DQ Bakes! Menu at Dairy Queen Headquarters #LoveMyDQ

For 75 years, Dairy Queen restaurants have been the place to take the 8-year old soccer team celebrating a victory, where you’ll find business people on their lunch break, and for families craving great food and soft serve treats.  Their  slogan is simple, Fan Food not Fast Food^TM and with 6000 stores in the US, Canada, and 20 other countries, that makes for a whole lot of fans!

Known to many for their Brazier stores (meaning charcoal grill), and known to me mostly for their upside-down Blizzard treats, Dairy Queen has made a name for themselves with people everywhere for good eats!  I was thrilled to be invited to Dairy Queen headquarters in Minneapolis, Minnesota a few weeks ago to sample the DQ Bakes! menu.  Their newest addition of Snack Melts, Aritsan-style Oven Fresh Sandwiches, and Hot Desserts a la Mode were made fresh by the DQ product development team and some of us even got our hands in on the action.

Meeting the product development team was inspiring, not only are they chefs they are food scientists and each of them talked passionately about their ideas behind the new items they created.  The Artisan-style Oven Fresh Sandwiches are hot and made to order, they’re 630 calories or less and will make you mouth water just looking at them!The bread makes the sandwich, that was a huge statement I took to heart when I watched them build each one top to bottom!  The Chicken Mozzarella has their signature crispy chicken strips, cheese, marinara and to top it all off a fresh basil cheese focaccia roll!  Flavor, texture, goodness in every bite!My second favorite of the 3 new sandwiches was the Chicken Bacon Ranch.  They grilled the chicken, added Swiss cheese, hickory smoked bacon, creamy ranch dressing and veggies on a ciabatta roll!  Look at this sweet thing of beauty, it’s definitely a mouthful but you will not be disappointed. The Turkey BLT is something I’ll always opt for in a sandwich shop, and DQ does it just as good if not better on a ciabatta!  Oven roasted deli-style turkey, aged Swiss, bacon, mayo, lettuce and tomato complete this sandwich that I had to shoot mid bite, I couldn’t help myself!When they told us to come hungry, they weren’t kidding.  We weren’t sampling mini bites of each, we had full sandwiches on our hands and then came the Snack Melts.  Hot, perfectly-sized wraps toasted to perfection aren’t on too many other quick service menus.All 3 melts are made with real cheddar cheese, so I was in heaven.  Also the tortillas slightly puff in the oven when baked giving it great texture to the warm ingredients inside.  My favorite of the bunch was the Chicken Bacon BBQ that had signature smoky BBQ sauce, bacon, and grilled chicken.  The chicken is cut evenly lengthwise instead of being a cutlet to ensure deliciousness in each and every bite.The Chicken Quesadilla Snack Melt was also something delicious as well as familiar, I order this type of thing in restaurants frequently.  With tomatoes, onions, and ripe California black olives, it’s a crowd pleaser! If you like buffalo chicken wings, you get that essence in the Buffalo Chicken Snack Melt that combines, buffalo sauce and ranch dressing to complete the cheese and chicken.  How I missed my photo with that wrap escapes me but a dozen of these cut up bite size sounds like a perfect addition to football Sundays this fall (photo courtesy of DairyQueen.com)!

Here in the trip is where I’d love a second stomach.  It was dessert time and the Triple Chocolate Brownie was up first.  Warm, chewy, rich chocolate (semi-sweet plus bittersweet) topped with Cocoa Fudge^TM and choco chunks is combined with the classic DQ vanilla soft serve, it’s a chocolate lover’s fantasy and I’ve dreamt about it ever since!To be completely honest, this decadence of hot and cold is made for two.  I would have to share with my husband or son, but I get the brownie for sure!  If you have a big appetite you can add this after a sandwich, but for me it would have to be shared on a just a dessert trip to DQ!  Cookies and ice cream are kid-pleasers for sure and the Fudge Stuffed Chocolate Chip Cookie will win my whole family over!The gooey fudge center of what tastes like everyone’s grandmother’s cookie recipe will have you on cloud nine!  Lastly if you’re more of a fruit-for-dessert kind of person, look into trying the Apple Tart.  Made with Granny Smith apples that taste so fresh, the flaky crust is topped with them as well as rolled oats, butter, brown sugar, and drizzled with caramel….drool city my friends!

Nearly in my food coma, we ended our visit with the attempts of making a cone with the perfect swirl!  It may have been a major fail for me as I think I was channeling Olaf, but who doesn’t love a soft serve cone?!Meeting the marketing team and especially the passionate food creators behind Dairy Queen just make you love them even more if that’s possible.  Ever since I’ve been home from the trip, I hear the commercials on the radio as well as on television and I am bragging to everyone how delicious these new menu items are!  Just from perusing the website, I also appreciate that they offer nutrition facts and allergy information for their fans as we’re heading into new territory with our daughters and food sensitivities! I’ll leave you with the commercial, hope you plan on singing the song the rest of the day!

Let me know what your favorite DQ order is!

I was invited on an all-expenses paid trip to DQ Headquarters, all opinions are strictly my own.