Zero Degrees - Is it cool enough?

Zero Degrees - Arlington

Over the week, a coworker mentioned a place in Arlington that served fries smothered in Hot Cheetos and fuity, frozen drinks topped with Tajin chilli.

A woman's dream.

So, naturally, I had to check it out.

*Cue A Thousand Miles*

Making my way to Arlington, 

Driving Fast, 

Cars, they pass

And I'm food bound....

Anyways, a little background:

Siblings Ken, San and Trinity, according to the Zero Degrees Company website, launched Zero Degrees in 2013 in Orange County under Zero Italian Ice and Custard - which you did good with a name change. Described as Asian-Hispanic fusion, they serve coffee, tea and it is the House of the Mangonada priding themselves on quality, customer service and environment. 

As we arrived, there were no lines to be seen, but the place was already full inside with a small number of seating arrangements. Luckily, we found seats outside the restaurant and after five minutes we received our drinks.

Drinks:

Strawberry Limeade and the Mangonada:

Mangonada, sans mango twist

Strawberry Limeade - $5 for the 24oz. - comes with mint leaves, but we did add the mango twist - +$1 - to it, which is five slices of mango halfway covered with Tajin, a chilli powder used to spice up fruits. 

But that drink was nothing compared to their signature Mangonada - $6 24oz. -, full of mango chunks, chamoy and Tajin.

Food:

Fries w/ Hot Cheetos

Now, we had the Elotes with Hot Cheetos - $6, corn, mayo, tapatio - which I couldn't taste at all - Parmesan cheese, chili powder and crushed Hot Cheetos.. 

Second, we had the Hot Cheetos Cheese Fries - $5, skinny, crispy fries, nacho cheese and you guessed it crushed Hot Cheetos. 

Elote w/ Hot Cheetos

Now, I love elote more than the next person and I mean it when I say you need to step your game up, so much so, I regret ordering the Elote. It was small and honestly I was expecting more out of it. I thought they were going to add steak or more Hot Cheetos or some actual spiciness in their dish. It was dry and honestly it was half corn and half Parmesan/Hot Cheetos.  

We finished about 3/4's of it by the time the Fries came out.

And like the Mangonada, THOSE FRIES WERE BOMB!!!

I mean, FUCK!!! They were on point!! Shit, we even topped them off with the elote, which is the only way to enjoy that so called Elote. 

Customer Service: Not so great. Not to be a cunt, but there were no adults to supervise the kids running the place and It was a confusing system. And we the small amount of clientele, it ticked me off how long it was taking to get our fresh food - which includes simple ingredients. Five minutes after receiving our drinks, we received the Elote with Hot Cheetos and twenty minutes after that we received the Fries.

So, unless you really want to try the deliciousness that is the Mangonada, which I encourage, save yourself a trip, buy the ingredients at the store and make the snacks yourselves. There is more for me to try, but I think it was a bit too over hyped and fairly priced.

Great concept, sorry execution, but there is always room for improvement, y'all.

Muah!