The Discontinued Hot Pocket We Hope Stays Gone Forever

Hot Pockets scorched my tongue more times than I can count — and I still kept coming back for more. They were worth every burn. This convenient meal has long held a soft spot for me in the world of frozen convenience food, but not every flavor that graced the freezer aisle has been a smash hit. One of the most forgettable — and, honestly, regrettable — in our authoritative ranking of Hot Pocket flavors was the High Protein Steak Fajita Recipe.

It was one of those ideas that sounded good but wasn't well thought out. It was deceptive in that it had delicious individual components, but it didn't come together how you'd imagine. When the rubber met the road and the Hot Pocket emerged from the microwave, you took that first bite, and the disappointment sunk in real quick. 

Instead of juicy, flavorful steak and crisp veggies wrapped in a flaky crust, you got a mushy, weirdly spicy, and flat-out not good combination of sliced steak, cheddar cheese, onions, and tomato sauce. It had all the visual promise of a hearty meal but none of the flavor follow-through. There's no clear reason as to why this product was discontinued, but there is some speculation that the move had to do with Covid-19 pandemic-related ingredient shortages or the manufacturer prioritizing more popular flavors.

I never personally tried these, but my mom remembers sampling them sometime in 2020; she hated them because they tasted generic. Let's start with the ingredient that was supposed to be the star of the show: steak. This wasn't your tender, sliced beef with grill marks and smoky flavor. It was more so in mystery meat territory, as it was dense, slightly rubbery, and kind of salty without being particularly seasoned — our taste tester unfortunately compared the texture to tinned cat food.

It also didn't help that the so-called fajita seasoning was just a vague, peppery heat that didn't bring much flavor to the hot pocket. That Tex-Mex fajita angle could've worked if the flavors were sharper, but this product just tasted like something you'd find in a bad Mexican restaurant. The cheese was supposed to bind everything together, but instead it only made the filling feel more like a thick paste. Rather than being oozy or melty, it clung to the beef in a way that made each bite feel heavy and unbalanced. Even the vegetables, which could've offered freshness, barely made an impression.

The outer crust, normally one of the redeeming parts of any Hot Pocket, suffered under the weight of the contents. What should've been flaky or lightly crisp was instead soft and chewy. It wasn't terrible, but it certainly wasn't enough to carry the underwhelming filling. It's really hard to even find anyone talking about the steak fajita Hot Pockets online, which feels like further evidence that they weren't great and are justifiably no longer part of the lineup.