How McDonalds makes its French fries

Horrible confessions from fast food workers

What you should not order at a fast food restaurant

The following question was posed on Reddit:

"Fast food workers of Reddit, what should we NOT order at your restaurant? Why not?"

While it's important to know that none of these claims have been verified, we do recommend bookmarking this thread. Just in case. Tons of answers were submitted,we picked the most curious below.

Anything McCafé at McDonald's
"I work for Mcdonald's and make sure everyone that matters to me never orders anything that comes out of the 'McCafe' machine as these are routinely neglected, in practically all the McDonalds. Not only are staff not properly trained in its cleaning and maintenance, at almost every McDonalds I've had experience with, the managers in charge of training them don't know fuck all either...All McCafe beverages run through a horrifically dirty machine - we're talking 5+ inches of uncleaned, liquid bullshit making up its inside parts"

Do. Not. Order. Hot Dogs. At. Baseball. Games. Period.
"I used to work in a baseball park concession stand. The short answer is not to order anything, but if you absolutely have to buy something, don't buy the hotdogs.

Do not. Buy. The Hot Dogs.

They made it out of the package okay, and might even have been edible after we finished grilling them - and then they went into the water. We kept three pans of water at the back of the grill that held the hot dogs. Any hot dogs left at the end of the day went back into the fridge, and came out again the next day. Me and the other cook put our feet down on throwing out the water and old hotdogs after two full days, but the management didn't want to let us."

On steak and beans at Taco Bell
"I worked at taco bell a little bit ago and I warn everyone to stay away from both the beans, and the steak. The beans start out looking like cat food, and the directions are, 'Add water and stir until you can't see white anymore.' The steak was just the worst on dish duty. If it would sit too long it would become like hair gel. It was the worst."

On Wendy's chili
"I used to work at Wendy's. The meat used in the chili, yeah that comes from the meat on the grill top that expires and dries up that's put in to a warming drawer until you have enough for a batch of chili, which we first freeze and then thaw the next day. Also if the chili sitting in the warmer doesn't sell fast enough we just added hot water to it to mix it up."

For the love of God, don't order anything off the Starbucks "Secret Menu""Former starbucks worker here. Please don't order anything off the 'Secret Menu'. It doesn't exist. If you want a snickerdoodle, nuttella, or captain crunch frappuchino (or whatever other overly sugery thing someone has since come out with), know the base drink and the modifications, and order that. If you just say the name, it's up to the barista to come up with what's in the drink, and it may not be what the last barista you ordered from put in there."

On movie theatre popcorn
"I worked at a theater, don't get popcorn for the first showing- that's all just last night's popcorn put into giant garbage bags and then reheated in the warmers in the morning.

Oh yeah and remember that sticky floor in the aisle of the theater? Well what do you think would happen if you had that at your house. YES THAT'S HOW YOU GET ANTS... and cockroaches, and everything else. Plus it's in the dark most of the time. It's like a bug buffet once the lights go out and the movie starts."

Skip the pasta at Panera, stick to the sandwiches
"Panera- pasta; it's all microwaved, this includes Mac and cheese. Smoothies/frozen drinks- nasty base crap that smells and it's sticky. Cupcakes/coffee cakes- all come frozen. Best items are the real sandwhich/ salads. Real ingredients and usually fresh."

Always ask for "fresh" chicken nuggets at McDonald's
"I used to work at McDonalds. If you order, especially chicken nuggets, just ask for them fresh. Otherwise they've been just sitting in their container in the heat. They have a timer, but 9/10 times when that timer goes off, people just reset the timer instead of making new ones. This could go on until all the nuggets are sold."

Steer clear of beans at Taco Johns
"Taco Johns reporting for all you midwesterners. I would steer clear of the beans, at least outside of peak hours, because they sit on the hot table for a long long time and when they dry out, just add water. Everything else is pretty solid though. Worked there a couple years back in 2007-2009 and still love going back to get my fix."

BBQ Sandwiches at KFC
"Worked at KFC for ~4 years. The BBQ sandwich is actually made from chicken too old and stale to give to the homeless shelters, so they soak it in BBQ sauce until it can be pulled and then they keep it on the heater for a month.

I still order it through"

The quesarito at Chipotle. Mostly because everyone will hate you.
"It backs up the line like no other. If it's not busy, you're fine but PLEASE do not order a quesorito during our peak hours. Employees will hate you. The people behind you in line will hate you. Everyone will hate you. There's nothing wrong with it health/sanitation wise, but too few people order it for our damned managers to rearrange and optimize our food line for quesorito production."

The eggs at Einstein's
"I worked at Einstein's bagel place which is basically fast food. Don't order anything with eggs, they aren't real eggs and if business is slow they could have been sitting in a container for hours after they are microwaved."

On gas station Slurpees
"Gas station slurpee's. The amount of mold in those machines would crush your childhood to a pulp."

The doughnuts at Dunkin (Warning: this will break your heart)
"Currently employed at Dunkin doughnuts and it's sad but true all the doughnuts and baked goods there come to us frozen."

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McDonalds ads vs. real thing

McDonalds wants us to see how they make their nuggets

And a video about their advertising:

Teacher loses weight after eating only McDonalds for three months

KCCI

Remember the 2004 documentary Super Size Me and its blatant lack of a twist ending? Guy eats only highly processed, high-fat McDonald’s food for one month. Guy’s health deteriorates. The end.

Science teacher John Cisna tried out a similar experiment, but saw drastically different results. After eating nothing but McDonald’s for three months, the Iowa man lost 37 pounds and saw his cholesterol level drop significantly, local TV station KCCI reports.

Cisna enlisted his students to help him plan out a 2,000-calorie daily diet plan consisting only of food sold by the fast food giant. They also tried not to exceed recommended allowances of nutrients like carbohydrates, proteins, fat calories and cholesterol.

For breakfast, Cisna typically ate two egg white delights, a bowl of maple oatmeal and 1 percent milk. For lunch, he’d usually opt for a salad. And for dinner he’d order a more traditional value meal, including items like Big Macs, ice creams and sundaes. After Cisna told the owner of the local franchise about the experiment, he was so interested that he agreed to provide all the items free of charge.

During the experiment, Cisna walked for 45 minutes every day, and by the 90th day he reported that his weight had dropped down to 170 pounds from 249. He said he was able to get healthier simply because he made smart choices.

“It’s our choices that make us fat,” Cisna told KCCI. ”Not McDonald’s.”

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Custom-made burgers coming to McDonalds?

McDonald’s (MCD), a company that pioneered uniform, assembly-line hamburgers, is now experimenting with a somewhat antithetical concept: Custom-made burgers. The chain is currently testing them in Laguna Niguel, Calif., where diners make selections on an iPad (AAPL); the burgers cost more than Big Macs, are grilled-to-order, and come with a choice of more than 20 toppings and sauces. The beef patty isn’t cooked until you order, so the sandwich requires extra time to prepare.

It’s a head-scratching departure from the burger-factory model that has allowed the chain to serve food quickly, inexpensively, and profitably. “It goes against what they stand for: speed, convenience, price, and value,” says Darren Tristano, an executive vice president at food industry consultancy Technomic.

On the other hand, McDonald’s isn’t exactly killing it lately. Same-store sales have slowed in the U.S. (They were up only 0.7 percent last quarter and slowed to 0.2 percent in October.) That’s not all: The chain has been plagued by complaints of slow service and inaccurate order responses. In response, McDonald’s has tried to pare its sprawling menu and will redesign its drive-thrus next year to shorten waiting times.

A widespread introduction of custom-made burgers wouldn’t help these issues. What it might do, though, is help the chain stay relevant as consumers—twentysomethings in particular—express interest in customization, Tristano says.

McDonald’s spokeswoman Lisa McComb said in an e-mail that it’s too early to comment on the custom-made burgers, although the test will offer valuable consumer insights. “With these tests, we will have an opportunity to hear directly from our customers in real-time on what they expect from McDonald’s in terms of the overall restaurant experience and their ability to further customize their menu choices,” she said. Even if McDonald’s doesn’t go down the Chipotle (CMG) road, letting customers say what they want on their burgers—”Hey, everyone really likes burgers with guacamole!”—could shape menus in the future.

While the option to customize could help McDonald’s look less like a mechanized food factory, Tristano says most customers would probably continue ordering from the regular menu. “It’s more of a promotion, and marketing, and trying to change its brand image,” he says. Even as McDonald’s expands its premium offerings, its bigger promise to customers is still speed and price.

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What's in the McRib?

McDonalds' McRib inspires a cult-like obsession. Thankfully, though, it's only available for a limited time: If you knew about all the unpronounceable ingredients packed into it, you might think twice about wolfing down the sauce-drenched pork concoction. Think you can stomach what's inside? Read on.

How many ingredients are there?At face value the sandwich consists of pork, onions, and pickle slices slathered in barbecue sauce and laid out on a bun. But the truth is, there are roughly 70 ingredients.

The bun alone contains 34 ingredients, says Meredith Melnick at TIME. In addition to chemicals like ammonium sulfate and polysorbate 80, the most egregious may be azodicarbonamide — "a flour-bleaching agent most commonly used in the manufactur[ing] of foamed plastics like gym mats and the soles of shoes." According to McDonald's own ingredient list, the bun also includes calcium sulfate and ethoxylated mono- and diglycerides, among other chemicals.

So what's the meat made of?Pig innards and plenty of salt. Typically, "restructured meat product" includes pig bits like tripe, heart, and scalded stomach, says Whet Moser at Chicago Magazine, citing a 1995 article by Robert Mandigo, a professor at the University of Nebraska. These parts are cooked and blended with salt and water to extract salt-soluble proteins, which act as a "glue" that helps bind the reshaped meat together.

Is it really that bad for you?Well, it's certainly not great for you. Though "slightly trimmer than the Big Mac," which contains 540 calories and 29 grams of fat, says Christina Rexrode at USA Today, the McRib, first introduced in 1982, still packs in 500 calories and 26 grams of fat. And despite its name, one thing you won't find inside a McRib is bones. The absence of any detectable "rib" is what gives the unnutritious mush its "quirky sense of humor," says Marta Fearon, McDonald's U.S. marketing director.

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McDonalds new dollar menu goes up to $5

Since McDonald’s launched the Dollar Menu nationally in 2002, it has grown to about 13 percent of sales–a whole lot of McDoubles and Sausage Biscuits. But the menu is no longer working for the burger chain, so it’s rebranding it as the “Dollar Menu & More” with $1 and $2 sandwiches and even some items at $5. It’s more like a neighborhood dollar store now: the name refers to the starting price.

The idea is to promote value at additional price tiers. Hey, maybe packaging a $2 sandwich on the menu will make it seem like a better deal. McDonald’s CEO Don Thompson explained during an earnings call on Monday that the menu “gives customers a value ladder of sorts, so that based upon their discretionary spending, they have multiple offers at McDonald’s.” He emphasized that $1 items will remain–it’s still critical to retain customers–and that the chain is not abandoning the old Dollar Menu concept but helping it evolve.

The Dollar Menu & More is already being tested in five U.S. markets, Bloomberg News reported last month. All restaurants will offer Dollar Menu & More starting Nov. 4, and advertising for the menu will launch Nov. 11.

Emphasizing price tiers diverges somewhat from McDonald’s “high-low” strategy that focused on value products like the $1 McChicken on one end and premium products like McWraps and Mighty Wings on the other. (The wings haven’t performed as well as the chain had hoped.) “We have to be able to balance both of those two ends of the barbell, if you will. And also I would say we also have to fill in what’s in between. That’s the reason for Dollar Menu & More, when we talk about $2 price points with sandwiches that have a few additional things to offer than our base value Dollar Menu offerings do,” Thompson said on Monday’s call.

Adjusted for inflation, a dollar bill in 2002 is the equivalent of $1.30 today, making the economics of the Dollar Menu challenging for already strained franchisees. “This is one of the ways that we can maintain the Dollar Menu in the face of rising commodities and labor pressures,” Thompson explained, “but also get a little bit more margin basis on some of the products at $2 and some of the products at higher price points from there and the franchisees support this.”

That raises another point in favor of the higher-priced menu: As seductive as the $1 price point might be, one day it will be impossible to sell a burger for so little. The new menu will help customers become accustomed to seeing the higher prices at low-end of the menu.

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Ronald McDonald prank

McDonald's employees cannot survive solely on their wages

McDonald's, partnering with VISA, has released a not-at-all patronizing budget journal to help employees better navigate the waters of minimum-wage living.

The takeaway? Get another job.

Despite some absurdly deflated numbers — like $20 per month for health insurance — the budget journal acknowledges that it's virtually impossible to live off of the fast food chain's wages, which could be a problem for a company that has recently seen a string of highly publicized strikes in New York City. In addition, corporate giants like Walmart have recently come under scrutiny for allegedly failing to provide its employees with a living wage, which has become an urgent issue as American workers increasingly rely on part-time jobs to get by.

The McDonald's budget expects employees to earn $955 a month at a second job, to supplement the $1,105 earned at McDonald's. On average, McDonald's employees earn $8.25 an hour. Factoring in taxes, employees would need to work full-time to earn the $1,105 per month outlined in the budget, plus an additional 30 hours per week to earn $955.

In other words, without another source of income it would be pretty much impossible to get by on a McDonald's salary, even by the stringent standards outlined by the budget — which, by the way, doesn't account for heating or groceries.

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Best drive-thru service?

How to properly use a ketchup cup

Mind = blown

McDonalds to start posting nutritional information on their menu boards

This week, McDonald's announced that it would begin posting calorie counts on all its menus nationwide beginning next week, a seemingly ballsy move that experts say could have repercussions throughout the fast-food industry. McDonald's already showcases calorie counts at its restaurants in New York City, Philadelphia, and the entire state of California, and the expansion anticipates a provision in President Obama's health care overhaul that will require national chains with 20 restaurants or more to post calorie counts. However, McDonald's is far out in front of the government deadline, which hasn't even been set yet. Here, a guide to McDonald's decision:

Why is McDonald's posting calorie counts now?
McDonald's claims that it wants to educate customers. "We recognize customers want to know more about the nutrition content of the food and beverages they order," says Jan Fields, president of McDonald’s USA. "We are pleased to add to the ways we make nutrition information available to our customers and employees."

Really?
It's a little more complicated than Fields' canned press quote might suggest. The move is a public-relations victory, Tim Calkins, a marketing professor, tells The Christian Science Monitor, bolstering the perception that McDonald's is "a leader in terms of transparency." In truth, McDonald's wasn't exactly a huge supporter of ObamaCare. "They fought and fought and fought against this, and now they act like they wanted it all the time," Kelly Brownell, a food policy expert, tells USA Today.

Will the move turn off customers?
It hasn't so far. Fields says "calorie counts in New York and other markets didn't translate to any significant change in customers' eating habits," says Schuyler Velasco at The Christian Science Monitor. "McDonald's isn't taking a major risk." So it's unclear whether the move will even make customers healthier eaters. Studies show mixed results from posting calorie counts, though some experts argue that "calorie counters might start to become a bigger factor as consumers gain more familiarity with them," says Stephanie Strom at The New York Times.

Will other chains follow suit?
Probably. With 14,000 "locations around the country," McDonald's is "by far the largest chain to post calorie counts nationwide," says Strom. Other chains like Wendy's and Burger King will certainly feel the pressure to be as transparent as their main competitor. McDonald's is also putting pressure on its burger rivals by expanding its selection of healthier foods, introducing, for example, a new "breakfast sandwich made with egg whites on a whole grain English muffin (working title: the Egg White Delight)," says Velasco.

Can customers expect any surprises?
Perhaps. The Big Mac, at 550 calories, isn't close to being the biggest calorie bomb. The Double Quarter Pounder With Cheese is 750 calories, while the breakfast platter — featuring hot cakes, eggs, a sausage patty, and more — is 1,150 calories. (The FDA recommends consuming 2,000 calories a day.) And a sensible-sounding option like the Southwest Salad with Crispy Chicken is 450 calories, 10 more than a greasy Double Cheeseburger.

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Whip up a big mac at home

McDonald's Canada continues its warm-fuzzy PR campaign, trying to convince us that their food is "just like something you would make at home."

First, they gave us an insider's look at their food-styling process. Not convinced that McDonald's is being totally transparent with you? They give it another try with this video of Executive Chef Dan Coudreaut casually preparing a homemade Big Mac (Dan is the chef who famously said he didn't "see anything on the menu that's unhealthy"). Spoiler alert: the "secret" Special Sauce is totally not a secret!

We give Chef Coudreaut credit for ensuring that we never have to give in to a Big Mac craving at an actual McDonald's ever again, but we're not sure that was this PR initiative's intention. He reminded us that the Big Mac's ingredients are available on the internet, so we took a look to see if the ingredients they use at McDonald's are really that similar to what we'd use at home.

Firstly, this is how McDonald's describes their burger on their website: "100% pure USDA inspected beef; no fillers, no extenders." Well, okay. We're glad this burger is 100% what it's supposed to be, but we're not sure that's a wildly impressive claim. This is like bragging that your french fries are made of potatoes. Also, of course this beef is USDA inspected... because it has to be, in order to sell it. One thing is for sure, this guy is definitely the real mastermind behind those paper-thin burgers -- does anyone make burgers that measly at home?

Another area of home-cooking vs. in-restaurant preparation comparison: both the McDonald's bun and the Big Mac sauce contain high fructose corn syrup, an ingredient you'd be able to avoid, if you desired to, when making a Big Mac yourself. Not to mention the propylene glycol alginate listed in the sauce -- maybe that's the secret ingredient?

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What fast food menu items should you never eat?

On the heels of a recent Reddit AMA (Ask Me Anything) with a McDonald's employee, an AskReddit conversation thread popped up yesterday that we couldn't tear ourselves away from.

"Fast food workers of Reddit, what is the one menu option at your employment that you would recommend people never eat? (Because of cooking safety, cleanliness, unhealthy, etc)," asked user 4ScienceandReason. This thread, which generated over 6,000 comments in 24 hours, brought some amazingly gross things to light -- some expected and some unexpected -- as well as some good-to-know tricks for the fast-food customer.

Some things you should probably stay away from:

Chicken Nuggets: Some of the grossest stories on this thread talked about the dubious material nuggets are generally made of. As noted by 4ScienceandReason, pictures and videos like these have already scared a lot of us off of chicken nuggets forever. Just in case that wasn't enough, this comment by Dfunkatron might seal the deal for you, "When I worked at McDonald's, I accidentally left a whole bag of about 100 chicken nuggets out on a counter for way too long. They melted. Into a pool of liquid. I never understood why. But they were completely indiscernible as being the nuggets i once knew."

Wendy's Chili: While not as traditionally disgusting as some other fast food traditions, we found Cozmo23's description of the chili recipe at Wendy's to be pretty stomach-churning -- "The meat comes from hamburger patties that sat on the grill too long to serve to customers. They take them and put them in a bin and then throw them in the fridge. When the chili is made they take it out, boil it, chop it up and dump them in the chili."

Vegetarians Beware: While a lot of comments admitted to using the same grill/spatula/knife on vegetarian and meat items alike, this comment from user attack_goblin made us gasp a little extra: "I used to work at a restaurant where we deep-fried the Gardenburger patties in the same oil we deep-fried the bacon."

Grilled Chicken: If there was any common theme in this thread, it was this: just probably don't order grilled chicken in any fast food establishment ever. One McDonald's employee confessed to slathering grilled chicken breasts with liquid margarine to keep it from sticking. An ex-Subway employee described the defrosting process they used, which involved soaking the chicken in hot water for hours, then squeezing the "chicken water" out at the end of the day.

Five Guys Appears to Be Safe: For now, no one has refuted user Cameron432's claim that they freeze nothing and make most everything fresh. Also, stick to the regular-sized fries, "One thing I will say is that ordering a large fry is always a bad idea. The difference between a large fry and a regular fry is surprisingly small (especially when it's busy)."

One comforting aspect of this discussion was the friendly disagreement. The most disgusting facts were usually counter-balanced by at least one other employee of each chain remarking that they'd always done it differently and that it really does depend on the management of each particular location. So if you have traditionally good luck in life, you can still order chicken nuggets, we suppose.

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Behinds the scenes at a McDonalds photoshoot

McDonald's chef sees "nothing unhealthy" on the menu

Despite recent efforts to reinvent itself with a greater number of healthy items, McDonald's remains a high-profile target in the anti-obesity movement. Daniel Coudreaut, who serves as the senior director of culinary innovation at the Golden Arches, recently made a comment that's likely to fan the flames a little higher.

In an article for the Akron Beacon Journal, Lisa Abraham quotes Coudreaut as saying, "I don't see anything on the menu that's unhealthy." We suppose that "unhealthy" is a relative term, but even the bravest spin doctor would have a hard time defending the statement against health advocates.

Indeed, a quick look at the McDonald's menu reveals many items that, if not "unhealthy," are certainly not on many nutritionists' top 10 lists. For example, the Double Quarter Pounder With Cheese contains 42 grams of total fat and 1,360 milligrams of sodium. That said, McDonald's has introduced healthier options in recent years, including oatmeal for kids.

Coudreaut was in Ohio and ate at a McDonald's, where he answered a few questions from the locals. When asked if he felt responsible for the obesity epidemic in America, he responded that he worries about his own two children and "what goes into their mouths." He and his kids eat at Mickey D's about once a week.

The average McDonald's customer, according to Coudreaut, eats three meals a month at the restaurant. "I feel that if we were to close our doors of all of the McDonald's tomorrow, the obesity problem would not go away," he said.

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Can Taco Bell take the breakfast crowd from McDonalds?

Taco Bell is joining a "mad scramble" of fast-food chains competing for the growing breakfast-on-the-go crowd. The Mexican-inspired franchise business announced Thursday that it is rolling out a morning menu of breakfast burritos, hash browns, cinnamon buns, and other new items in almost 800 restaurants across a dozen Western states. But Taco Bell will have to muscle customers away from breakfast king McDonald's, as well as Burger King, Wendy's, Starbucks, and Subway (another recent breakfast convert). Does Taco Bell stand a chance?

No. McDonald's has too big a head start: "Taco Bell's push may spark curiosity" — breakfast at a taco joint? — but it's waking up to this opportunity too late, says Jeff Reeves at MSN Money. McDonald's has owned the fast-food breakfast market for ages; 25 percent of its sales now stem from Egg McMuffins, coffee, and other a.m. fare. And with so many other fast-food giants doing their "darnedest" to get in on the action, Taco Bell won't sell enough 99-cent bacon-and-egg burritos to make a dent.
"Taco Bell to cook up breakfast burritos"

This formula might just work: Taco Bell has already "made its name as a favorite for the late-night crowd," says Katie Kindling at ABC News. Why couldn't it get early birds to "start to 'think outside the bun,'" too? The chain's "new take on breakfast" did well enough at trials in select California, Oklahoma, Arizona, and Ohio cities. And with the chain's decision to partner with "breakfast food heavyweights Cinnabon, Johnsonville, Tropicana, and Seattle's Best," lots of early risers will be tempted.
"Taco Bell muscles into breakfast market"

The move makes sense for Taco Bell, but not for you: It's hardly surprising that Taco Bell wants a share of the breakfast crowd, says Brand Skokie at Diets in Review. "Breakfast and snacks made up just about all of the restaurant industry's growth in the past five years." But the last things American citizens need is another way to get "fatter, sicker, and ever-more dependent upon their convenience foods." So "think outside the drive-through" and start your day with something healthy at home.

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LivingSocial McDonald's deal is a scam

On December 1, 2011, LivingSocial had a deal for McDonald's Big Macs and large french fries and America went crazy. LivingSocial sold almost 300,000 of these $13 deals which included 5 Big Mac vouchers and 5 french fry vouches. What purchasers didn't realize though is that this "deal" is a scam and you're actually losing money by purchasing it.

Here is the math to prove it:

One Big Mac costs $3.59 and the LivingSocial voucher takes off $1.50. Therefore each Big Mac costs you $2.09. Five Big Macs will cost you $10.45.

One large french fry costs 1.99 and the LivingSocial vouch takes off $1.00. Therefore, each large french fry costs you $0.99. Five large fries will cost you $4.95.

Therefore you spend $13 + $10.45 + $4.95 = $28.40

What would 5 Big Macs and 5 large fries cost you without the deal?

5 x $3.59 + 5 x 1.99 = $9.95 = $27.90

McDonalds made $0.50 cents off of every deal they sold. Sadly, the ambiguous language in the deal led several people to believe that they were getting the Big Macs and large fries for free, not half off.