Burger King

In Canada, poutine, fries covered in cheese curds and gravy, is offered at almost every fast food restaurant, but BK offers their own varieties that fit in with the rest of their food –most notably, the Angry Poutine with fried onions and peppers on top.

In Puerto Rico, mallorcas, sweet pastry buns, are a popular breakfast treat and Burger King takes full advantage of the popularity of these buns by offering the King Mallorca, filled with ham, eggs and three different cheeses. If you want something even more filling, you might want to try their Enormous Omelet, which isn’t an omelet at all, but actually one of the restaurant’s long hamburger buns filled with a hamburger patty, two eggs, bacon and cheese. Later in the day, you can always snack on some King Wings, which are buffalo wings marinated in honey –why aren’t these sold in America yet?

In many countries, including the Dominican Republic, Costa Rica, Colombia and Mexico, you can enjoy the deliciously fatty Cheesy Whopper, which features a deep fried disc of cheese on top of a standard Whopper.

Personally, I want to try the Hawaiian BK Chicken available in New Zealand, which is like all the other chicken sandwiches Burger King sells, only it features bacon and pineapple. Sign me up!

KFC

The variety of KFC’s international menus is simply astounding, as the American version exclusively limits itself to fried chicken and a few sides, while the international franchises seem to have no limits on what they serve. On the more standard side, there is the Fillet Tower Burger, which is available throughout Europe and other locations, which is essentially just a chicken sandwich topped with a hashbrown. On the other end of the spectrum is the menu from Thailand, which features stir fries, a tuna and corn salad, fish fingers (like chicken fingers, but fish) and a donut filled with shrimp meat. China offers a similarly strange menu compared to the standard KFC fare, as it includes corn salad, beef wraps, red bean porridge, shrimp burgers and an egg and vegetable soup.

Some of the desserts featured in other countries sound downright delicious, particularly those available in France. Some French KFC dessert selections include a banana and passion fruit tart, panna cotta with raspberry sauce and tiramisu.

As for unique dishes, the Cali Maki Twister, available in the Philippines sounds good but weird. It is a chicken wrap with mangos, cucumber and spicy mayo. Japan’s shrimp bisque pot pie also sounds pretty tasty, although the picture looks a little strange.

Pizza Hut

Naturally, Pizza Hut’s main offering around the globe remains pizza, but what does change is their topping selection. Depending on where you go, you can top your pizza with apricot sauce, asparagus, broccoli, calamari, capers, carbonara sauce, chicken fajita meat, chicken tikka, chorizo, clams, corn, crab, cranberry sauce, cream cheese, curry sauce, eggplant, goat cheese, hot dogs, kebab meat, mashed potatoes, mayonnaise, mint, mussels, potato chips, roast beef, salsa, satay sauce, seaweed, sour cream, shrimp, spicy Thai sauce, sweet corn, tandoori spices, teriyaki chicken, thousand island dressing, tuna or yogurt. And I bet some of you still think pineapple is a weird pizza topping.

As if that weren’t enough variations on your pizza, the restaurant also offers a variety of different stuffed crusts and cheesy bite fillings, including a stuffed crust with kebab meat inside and a cheesy bite crust with shrimp inside.

If you really want to see some different menu items at a Pizza Hut though, head to Hong Kong, where the menu reads more like a five-star restaurant than a crummy American pizza chain. A few highlights: escargot with mashed potatoes, lobster soup with puffed pastry, paella, squid in risotto with shrimp in a lobster sauce and crème brule. It would sound great if the sign on the restaurant didn’t still read “Pizza Hut.”

Image Via tangdersons [Flickr]

Taco Bell

Taco Bell’s international menus are perhaps the most similar to the American version, with a few exceptions. Most notably, in Spain you can order tater tot nachos with sour cream (yummy), and a Chocodilla, which is exactly what it sounds like –a chocolate quesadilla. Also, in India, many of the traditional Taco Bell items can be served with potato in place of meat.

McDonald’s

While McDonald’s is certainly the largest fast food restaurant in the world, I did neglect to include them in this list only because I already wrote about many of their international treats in this McFacts About McDonald’s article. Just in cast you’re feeling too lazy to click over though, here is a highlight:

Most Indian menus are largely different than those in America, as pig and cow products are not served outside of Southern India. The chicken and fish are also prepared in separate areas because or strict religious laws regarding the preparation of food for vegetarians. One of the area’s specialties is the Maharaja Mac, which was originally made with lamb meat but now is made with chicken. They also serve a dish called the McCurry pan, which consists of a bowl made from flakey dough filled with chicken in a tomato-curry sauce.

Naturally, there are plenty more international fast food menu options, but we’d be here for weeks if I actually described them all. If you do happen to live outside the U.S. and know of a local offering from a major chain restaurant, feel free to talk about them in the comments. Similarly, if you’ve tried any of the snacks included here, tell us what you thought about them.

Sources: BK.com, KFC.com, PizzaHut.com, Taco Bell Spain, Taco Bell India

It’s prepared on a bed of rice in a rice cooker, which magically makes everything healthier. Be sure to use all of food-like products included in the meal. Yes, even the Coke Zero. Pour it in. Cook for a few minutes and then serve with chopsticks. Read the step-by-step instructions provided by one brave culinary explorer at the link.

Link -via Ace of Spades HQ | Photo: Rocket News 24

The ad agency Leo Burnett, maker of clever campaigns like landmine stickers and human billboards, designed this glorious billboard. It is shaped like a fry box. Yellow lights projecting upwards like a pillar of fire guide the hungry forward from up to three miles away.

Link -via That’s Nerdalicious! | Photo: Leo Burnett

Quick: who is the typical customer of McDonald's? If you answer "the poor," you'd be wrong.

See, contrary to conventional wisdom, the poor actually don't eat a lot at McDonald's, but people in the middle class do:

Leigh and colleague DaeHwan Kim analyzed 1994-96 data from the Continuing Survey of Food Intakes by Individuals and the accompanying Diet and Health Knowledge Survey. The data included responses from 5,000 Americans who were asked about restaurant dining habits, income, race, gender, age and education.

The researchers found that people visited fast-food restaurants more often as their household income increased — at least up to a point. Fast-food visits rose along with annual income up to $60,000; beyond that, visits started to drop back down, replaced by full-service, sit-down dining at slightly higher prices.

Based on the data, the researchers described the typical fast-food consumer as a lower-middle income head of household, who is budget-conscious and harried and likes the convenience and low price of fast food, compared with other restaurants. Poor people, by contrast, can't easily afford fast-food "value meals," and the poorest, who may rely on the FNS Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, certainly can't use food stamps at McDonald's.

Link

The McRib sandwich is back, and with it, the horde of cult-like fans of the McDonald's pork sandwich.

Despite its name, the McRib sandwich actually contains no rib meat. But what exactly is it made of?

The Week explains some of the 70 ingredients of the McRib (which you may want to skip if you're a fan of the sandwich):

How many ingredients are there?
At face value, the sandwich contains just 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, says TIME's Melnick. 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 the and soles of shoes." According to McDonald's own ingredient list, the bun also includes calcium sulfate and ethoxylated mono- and diglycerides, among other chemicals.

Link (Photo: The Impulsive Buy/Flickr)

We’ve already learned that Grimace has a dark, criminal past. But the 1970s specification manual at How to Be a Retronaut also reveals that, at some point, Mayor McCheese lost his seat. Or he stopped holding his sham elections. It’s a bit ambiguous.

Link

If you’re really curious, you can check out the official unveiling of the World’s Largest Big Mac featuring Ronald McDonald himself.

Link via Insanewiches
Photo: Henry Ray Abrams/AP

Photo Credit: Tomin Taipei

Here is a very graphic depiction of the Italians giving McDonald’s a slight hint. That’s fine. No McSpaghetti for us, and I don’t think that’s such a bad thing.  Think the mob financed it? Who knows. But I gotta say, I don’t think anyone will find the Hamburglar any time soon.

Link

Image: McDonalds.com

If you’ve ever thought Grimace from McDonaldland looks like Saquatch’s purple cousin or if you’ve ever wondered if a Charlie the Tuna sighting would cause the came controversy as a Nessie spotting, well, you’re not alone. Humorist Hudson Hongo agrees with you, and he’s posted a few corporate cryptid sightings of his own. He even caught the elusive el Chupahoagie on film…

Link via Laughing Squid

You see, McDonald’s lawyers are arguing that the fast food chain should be classified as supermarkets rather than restaurants to avoid a huge tax bill:

In a legal battle that is likely to see dozens of other fast food chains in the world’s largest country following suit, McDonald’s successfully argued that it should be classified as a food retailer for tax purposes rather than as a restaurant since many of its products are pre-packaged and sold to customers in the style of a supermarket rather than a restaurant.

It is a decision that will allow McDonald’s in Russia to continue paying ten per cent tax on its profits rather than the eighteen per cent tax levied on restaurants.

Link

Around 1963, a McDonald’s in Washington, D.C., decided to boost business by sponsoring “Bozo’s Circus,” a children’s show featuring future “Today Show” weatherman Willard Scott.

It was very successful, increasing sales by 30 percent fairly quickly.

As part of the show, Scott created a new character, Ronald McDonald, that looked much different than the famed clown seen today.

This Ronald had a food tray for a hat and a paper cup for his nose, but Smith says corporation executives were able to see the possibilities for something even more iconic.

But it was another clown who refined the character into a company mascot. Read all about the history of the McDonalds clown at AOL Weird News. Link

Previously: Ronald McDonald’s first ad.

What? You won’t stoop to eat proletariat food of McDonald’s? Perhaps all you need is a little bourgeois re-imagining.

In a project called Happier Meals for The Grid, four Toronto chefs turned a Big Mac combo (that’s burger, fries, a coke, and condiment) into a five-star meal. Well, what looks like it anyhow. This one above is by Raj and Aravind Kozhikott:

Aravind’s Open-Faced Samosas
Father-and-son team Raj and Aravind Kozhikott wanted their creation to reflect their restaurant’s Indian cuisine. To make the samosa filling, they diced the meat, mixed it with the onion and used barbecue sauce as a binding agent before wrapping it in two rolled-out-and-fried burger buns. The fries were bundled up using strips of a cut-up fry box. The cheese from the burger was scraped off the patty and used as a sauce.

Yum! Link – via The Nag on the Lake and Laughing Squid

"I plan on eating Big Macs until I die," the Fond du Lac, Wis., man said. "I have no intentions of changing. It’s my favorite food. Nothing has changed in 39 years. I look forward to it every day."

Gorske, 59, says he’s in good health and that he has the checkups to prove it. His cholesterol level is low and he was given a clean bill of health two months ago during his last physical, despite the fact that he exercises minimally.

Take that, Morgan Spurlock!

Link (warning: auto-starting video clip) | Photo: Patrick Flood/The Reporter

Officer Courtney Vassell pulled up behind Spen in the drive-thru lane, and got out of the patrol car. With police lights flashing behind him, he told her to pull out into the parking lot for a traffic stop, according to a police report.

Spen, though, completed her food order, paid the bill, and then drove her bronze 2001 Chevrolet out of the parking lot and onto Northwest Sixth Court, Vassell said.

Vassell again flipped on his siren and stopped Spen outside the McDonald’s, where he said she "rolled her window down one inch and said she was not speeding and she would not roll her window down."

Link

This great shot of two (presumably) cosplayers was shot by Steve Burt at Anime Expo 2008 in Los Angeles. Ronald Sephiroth battles Colonel Cloud. If Wendy joined in, what Final Fantasy character would she be?

Link via Popped Culture

This YouTube clip of a McDonald's commercial in Japan featuring SpongeBob straws immediately brought two things to my mind:

1. What the heck is in that juice?
2. What sane parents would buy something that turn their kids into a pile of screaming nuts?

Hit play or go to Link [YouTube]

Previously on Neatorama: 10 Neat Facts About SpongeBob SquarePants

Parts of Australia are seeing the worst flooding in years. In Brisbane, a video crew paddles through a McDonalds outlet in a canoe. The song is “Fish Heads” {wiki} by Barnes and Barnes. -via the Presurfer

The world’s most infamous cup of coffee spilled on February 27, 1992 in Albuquerque, NM. Stella Liebeck, a 79-year-old grandmother, was a passenger in her grandson’s car when they drove through at a McDonald’s, and after she received her styrofoam cup of joe her grandson pulled the car forward and parked so Liebeck could mix in her cream and sugar.

Liebeck braced the cup between her knees, but when she tried to pull off the cup’s lid, the entire cup of coffee spilled into her lap. Although subsequent developments in the courtroom turned Liebeck and her case into objects of derision, it’s worth noting that she actually suffered legitimate injuries from the accident. Liebeck’s sweatpants absorbed the hot coffee and held it next to her skin, which helped lead to third degree burns on six percent of her body. Liebeck ended up spending eight days in the hospital and undergoing skin grafts to counter the effects of the burns.

But that’s only the beginning of the story. Liebeck asked McDonalds for $20,000 to cover her medical expenses and lost wages. McDonalds offered $800. That’s when the story starts to get complicated. Read the entire account of how a jury decided to award Liebeck $2.9 million when the case went to court (and that’s not even the end) at mental_floss. Link

This image of mysterious origin is going around the ‘Tubes today. Which brilliant artist will step forward and claim responsibility?

via Geekologie

A former manager of a McDonald’s franchise in Porto Allegre, Brazil, sued the hamburger chain for making him gain 65 pounds while he worked with them for over a dozen years. McDonald’s must pay him $17,500 as recompense for his weight gain, a Brazilian court ruled on Tuesday.

The 32-year-old man, whose identity wasn’t disclosed, complained that the company’s policy of mandatory food sampling caused him to balloon from about 155 lbs. to 231 lbs. while working at their restaurant in southern Brazil. [...]

The man said that he felt forced to taste everything on the menu to ensure the quality of the food because McDonald’s hired undercover customers to randomly visit restaurants and report back on quality.

Also, he blamed the free lunches consisting of burgers, fries and ice cream, which contributed to his excessive weight gain during the course of employment.

Judge Joao Filho agreed with the man, and issued a ruling against the company, ordering them to pay $17500 to the ex-employee.

Link – via Arbroath

The new system involved an employee-activated device that sprays a fine, barely visible mist laced with synthetic DNA to cover anyone in its path, including criminals, and simultaneously alerts the police to a crime in progress.

The mist — visible only under ultraviolet light — carries DNA markers particular to the location, enabling the police to match the burglar with the place burgled. Now, a sign on the front door of the McDonald’s prominently warns potential thieves of the spray’s presence: “You Steal, You’re Marked.”

Link via Ace of Spades HQ | Photo (unrelated) via Flickr user Leonid Mamchenkov used under Creative Commons license

Sally Davies took pictures of a McDonalds burger and fries for 137 days, and the pictures never changed. It wasn’t the first such experiment, but could it be replicated under normal conditions? Some say a Happy Meal will last forever, but YouTube member GitEmSteveDave had very different results. You can skip the first minute if you’re in a hurry.  -via Breakfast Links

The package has all the details to attract a wedding banquet cynic or a Golden Arches obsessive: a baked apple pie wedding cake, dress made out of party balloons, kiddie party favors for guests, and of course, catering by McDonald’s.

Alcohol is banned to make sure there won’t be drunk party guests acting inappropriately at the family venue, so newly weds will have to toast their union with soft drinks instead.

The cost will be a few thousand Hong Kong dollars, depending on what guests order on the spot. It’s unlikely that the couple will be able to book the entire restaurant for their wedding, but at that price, who cares if there are babies screaming in the booth next doors?

Link via Glenn Reynolds | Photo by Flickr user Ian Muttoo used under Creative Commons license

Stephen Von Worley created the above map of all McDonald’s locations in the 48 contiguous states. A spot in northwestern Nevada is the most McDonald’s-free on the map. It’s the McFarthest spot (to use Von Worley’s term) at 115 miles to the nearest McDonald’s restaurant. You can read about Von Worley’s discovery here, or about his subsequent pilgrimage to that location here. Von Worley brought McDonald’s food with him.

via Ace of Spades HQ

Previously about Stephen Von Worley:
Infographic on Burger Chain Dominance
Crayola’s Law

New York artist Sally Davies bought a plain hamburger Happy Meal from McDonalds. She didn’t eat it, but took pictures of it every day -for 137 days so far. The project will likely continue at least until the meal starts to look different. Link -via Cynical-C

Artist Angus MacLane made Corellian Cheeseburger — a Millennium Falcon-type vessel. Except that it’s a cheeseburger made out of LEGOs.

You can view more images at the link, including a R2 unit that appears to be modeled after the McDonald’s mascot The Grimace.

Link via Super Punch

What are these people in Moscow lined up for? Jobs? Cash? No, about 30,000 people lined up for the opportunity to eat at the first McDonalds to open in the city, in 1990. -via Buzzfeed

J. Kenji Lopez-Alt of The Food Lab (over at Serious Eats) likes a challenge, so he decided to reverse engineer what is considered to be world's most perfect fries: McDonald's french fries.

Now, you may disagree that the words "McDonald's" and "good" belong in the same sentence, let alone "perfect" - but there's something in their french fries that makes Americans go nuts. I personally don't get it - perhaps because I didn't grow up eating McDonald's fries, but my wife swears by 'em. And she's not alone: over 2 million pounds of McDonald's fries are consumed every single day. That makes Mickey D the largest potato buyer in the United States.

Back to Kenji's quest. So how hard is it to reverse engineer McDonald's french fries? Turns out, it was very, very hard, so Kenji decided to do the next logical thing: he's going to steal McDonald's recipe.

Anyone with a buck can get a batch of fully cooked McDonald's fries, but I was after something more. I wanted to get fries from the store in their fully frozen state so that I could examine their surface for clues on how they were parcooked, as well as attempt to fry them myself at home to discover if there is any secret in the fry oil in the shops.

I figured I'd be just be able to walk into the store and order them straight from the cashier.

"Welcome to McDonald's, may I take your order?"

"Yes Ma'am. I'd like a large fries please, hold the cooking."

"Excuse me?"

I know she's already said no in her head, but I press on just the same: "Um... I'd just like the frozen fries please."

"I'm sorry sir, we just don't do that."

Time for some intimidation tactics: "Ok. Could I speak to the manager please?"

"I am the manager."

Sh*t. I bring out the really big guns: "Listen, the thing is, my wife is pregnant—like really pregnant—and she sent me on a quest for McDonald's french fries. But she only likes them really fresh, like straight out of the fryer fresh, so I figured I'd just get some frozen, and fry them for her at home. You know how it is. Women—no accounting for'em, right?"

She remains unimpressed, and needless to say, I go home fry-less, contemplating whether attempting to leverage an unborn, un-conceived son in exchange for a couple dozen frozen potato sticks is grounds for eternal damnation.

Thank goodness that Kenji didn't give up easily. One of his Facebook fans managed to come up with the perfect ruse. Head on over to Serious Eats to find out exactly what happened and how you can make your very own McDonald's fries in the comfort of your own kitchen: Link

Image via ChicagoGeek [Flickr]

How Did McDonald’s Get Taken Over By Kroc?

When I was a kid, I always thought whoever Mr. McDonald was, he must be super rich. As it turns out, Richard and Maurice McDonald, who started the original restaurant, only made $2.7 million on the deal. While that does seem like a good amount of cash, just think how much the restaurant is worth these days. To make matters worse, the brothers insisted on retaining the rights to their first restaurant in San Bernardino, so Ray opened a McDonald’s restaurant right by theirs and ran them out of business. Worse still, even though the original deal involved the brothers earning 0.5% of the chain’s annual revenues, Kroc refused to honor that part of the verbal agreement after the McDonald’s brothers refused to sell him their original restaurant and the land it stood on.

And it’s not like the McDonald’s Brothers didn’t do anything but open an everyday burger joint; if they did, Ray probably wouldn’t have been so interested in taking the whole thing over. They innovated many of the ideas that have made modern fast food restaurants so successful, including assembly line kitchens, simplistic menus and self-serve counters. The menus had nothing on them but hamburgers, cheeseburgers, French fries, potato chips, sodas, milkshakes and apple pies. Because things were so quick and efficient, prices were about half of what it cost to get a similar meal at a diner.

Image via _skynet [Flickr]

McDonald’s Across the Globe

It wasn’t too long after Kroc took over completely that the chain expanded out of America, first to Canada, then Costa Rica, Panama, Japan, Europe and Australia. These days, there’s McDonald’s located all over the world. In fact, the image above shows just how widely spread they are in the U.S.

While this world-wide globalization has led to many negative views of the corporation, some people say the company has actually helped improve the standard of service in some areas of the world. For example, when McDonald’s opened in Hong Kong in 1975, it was the first restaurant to consistently offer clean public restrooms. Soon afterwards, customers began to demand the same from other restaurants in the area.

Whether McDonald’s has a positive or negative impact in the country it enters may be a matter of opinion, but one thing the restaurant takes great pride in is their localization of the menu based on the native tastes of the area. Some interesting menu items from around the world include:

• Quebec has a regional treat known as poutine, which is a dish with French fries and cheese curds covered in gravy. McDonald’s in the area serve this as a popular side dish.
• Throughout Canada, you can order chicken fajitas from McDonald’s. This seemed weird to me that you can’t find these in South Western American states where fajitas are a popular staple of Mexican restaurants.
• In Egypt, you can find Big Macs with chicken or fish in place of beef and a “McFalafel” sandwich.

• Throughout the Middle East, McDonald’s offers a “McArabia” sandwich, which is a piece of flat bread with chicken or beef patties. They also serve a special wrap called the Paneer Salsa wrap, which takes fried, seasoned cottage cheese and wraps it in flat bread with veggies.
• Most Indian menus are largely different than those in America, as pig and cow products are not served outside of Southern India. The chicken and fish are also prepared in separate areas because or strict religious laws regarding the preparation of food for vegetarians. One of the area’s specialties is the Maharaja Mac, which was originally made with lamb meat but now is made with chicken. They also serve a dish called the McCurry pan, which consists of a bowl made from flakey dough filled with chicken in a tomato-curry sauce. Of all the international McDonald’s menu items, I think this is the one I’d want to try the most.

• Throughout Asia, you can order a side of McRice in place of fries, this is just an order of plain rice with a cool name.
• In China, you can enjoy pineapple and taro pies and a Shogun burger with teriyaki pork. You might also consider the Rice Fantastic, which is like a beef or chicken sandwich with rice patties in place of buns.
• On the Chinese island of Cheung Chau, you can also enjoy mushroom burgers in place of beef during the local Bun Festival.
• In Japan, they serve something called the Ebi Fillet-O, which is a fried shrimp sandwich. There is also a Tamago Double Mac, which has three beef paties, a poached egg, bacon and pepper sauce. You can even top off your meal with tea milkshakes.
• In Thailand they sell corn pies.
• In Finland and Norway, you can have wraps with fried fish instead of chicken or beef.
• In El Salvador, you can often have French fries made with yucca instead of potatoes.
• In Mexico, a popular breakfast option is the McMolletes, English muffins with refried beans, cheese and pico de gallo salsa.
• In New Zealand, a popular favorite is the Kiwiburger, which has beef, a poached egg, veggies, cheese and beetroot.

Images via Weather Sealed, xetark [Flickr], Allan Reyes [Flickr],

Good Ol’ American Innovation

Even in America, certain locations have their own specialty treats. The McLobster and McCrab are served seasonally throughout New England. And in the late 1990’s, Chicago locations offered a hamburger with barbecue sauce and Canadian bacon that was dubbed “the Beef Wennington” after a notable Chicago Bulls player.

Many of the company’s biggest successes were actually created locally by franchisees, including the Filet-O-Fish, the Big Mac and the Egg McMuffin.  The Filet-O-Fish was made by a Cincinnati franchise owner who wanted to offer his Catholic customers a meal they could still eat on Fridays and during lent. Ray Kroc tried a similar idea at his original restaurant, but his Hula Burger, a sandwich a pineapple slice in place of meat was a huge flop.

As for the Big Mac, it was created by an early Pittsburgh franchiser who wanted to serve something adults would enjoy when feeding their kiddos at the restaurant. The corporate heads told him he could only create new menu items creating ingredients on the existing menu, which is where the Big Mac was born.

The Egg McMuffin was in a similar position as the Big Mac inventor, only he went ahead and added a new creation to the menu without contacting headquarters. The corporation was quite upset that he started selling the McMuffin without their blessing, but they quickly changed their minds when they saw how popular it was.

Image Via VirtualErn [Flickr]

McDecor

It’s not only the menu that headquarters like to keep consistent. Locations are largely required to look similar to one another on the inside. That’s not to say there aren’t a few stand out locations though. The “Solid Gold McDonald’s” by the Rock and Roll of Fame is themed after fifties rock and roll. Victoria, British Columbia has a restaurant with a 24-carat gold chandelier and other fancy light fixtures (seen above). The McDonald’s in Stratford-upon-Avon has a very subtle design, as all buildings in the area are required to conform to the historic look of Shakespeare’s birthplace.

Whether you love McDonald’s or loathe it, there’s no arguing that the restaurant has had a huge impact on our society. Heck, Fast Food Nation has estimated that one of eight workers in America have been employed at the restaurant at some point of their lives. So you guys have any weird McDonald’s in your area? Maybe one with unique menu items or a strange design.

Image Via buschap [Flickr]

Sources Mental Floss #1, #2, Food Network Humor, Wikipedia #1, #2, #3

The waitress was fired last March after she sold a hamburger to a co-worker who then asked for cheese, which she added.

The fast-food chain argued this turned the hamburger into a cheeseburger, and so she should have charged more.

The fired employee sued, and won:

The fast-food chain had argued that the waitress – who was employed at a branch in the northern town of Lemmer – had broken staff rules prohibiting free gifts to family, friends or colleagues.

But the court said in its written judgement: "The dismissal was too severe a measure. It is just a slice of cheese," reports AFP news agency.

Link

McDonalds in Japan is selling a series of hamburgers called Big America. There are burgers named for Texas, California, New York, and Hawaii and they look really big. Too bad we don’t have them in America! Link

AdFreak has a list of the thirty strangest commercials of 2009. The above video is a Swedish commercial for McDonald’s featuring children who express their impatience with a long car trip in a particularly creepy way.

Link via TigerHawk

Stephen Von Worley created a map of the USA showing where McDonalds outlets are. As you can see, they are (almost) everywhere! You’ll have to go to South Dakota to get 100 miles away from a McDonalds. Link -via Buzzfeed

This lamp post is an ad for McDonalds in Vancouver. You have to wonder 1. how much light does it really emit, and b. is the coffee still free? -via Gizmodo

You’ve won’t see an advertisement quite like this on US television (and for McDonald’s no less!), but thankfully our partner Very Funny Ads got it: Link

McDonald’s food is often the butt of jokes, but those days are gone if foodie Georgia Hardstark of The State That I Am In blog and her friend Alie Ward of Curiology have their way.

You see, they’ve concocted that could surely be called as the perfect alcoholic beverage/dinner/dessert, the McNuggitini:

Recipe by Alie and Georgia

Prep Time: 5 minutes
Cook Time: 0 minutes
Yield: 2 servings

Ingredients:

2 McNuggz (plus more for snacking)
1 tub McDonalds Brand Barbeque Sauce (plus more for licking off pinky finger)
1 lg. Mcdonalds Brand Chocolate Milkshake (plus more for bringing all the boys to the yard)
1 bottle Vanilla Vodka (recommended brand: Absolut)

Open the McDonalds bag. Eat one McNugg each, followed by two bites of the Filet-o-Fish (make sure you don’t tell anyone that you eat Filet-o-Fishes).

Mix three or four shots of vanilla vodka in the McDonalds Brand Chocolate Milkshake, followed by one shot each directly into your mouth.

Rim each martini glass with McDonalds Brand Barbeque Sauce, and pour milkshake/vodka mixture into the glass. Garnish with a McNugg (which is to be swiped along barbeque sauce rimmed glass after the milkshake has been finished, and consumed with pure, unadulterated glee).

Details at This Recording blog: Link – via Didn’t You Hear?

Told McDonald’s was out of Chicken McNuggets after paying for a 10-piece meal, a local woman called 911.

Three times.

“This is an emergency, If I would have known they didn’t have McNuggets, I wouldn’t have given my money, and now she wants to give me a McDouble, but I don’t want one,” Latreasa L. Goodman told police. “This is an emergency.”

The McNugget meltdown happened last week at a McDonald’s in the 600 block of North U.S. 1 and ended with Goodman, 27, getting a notice to appear in court on a misuse of 911 charge, according to a recently released police report.

Goodman told investigators she tried to get a refund for the 10-piece McNuggets, but the cashier told her all sales are final.

“I called 911 because I couldn’t get a refund, and I wanted my McNuggets,” Goodman told police.

Link

Wow … we all knew fast food was bad for us, but really? For starters, their burgers can apparently last for 20 years … longer than the average vehicle. Next up: you would have to walk for seven hours to burn off a Super Sized Coke. Seriously.

Heck, even pet food can be healthier than McDonalds according to a recent study – and the list goes on. So, before you head out for your next set of burger and fries read this and be amazed (or utterly disgusted). Of course you could also watch Supersize Me but this list arguably tops even some of his encounters.

In 2007, the employees of an Orlando-area McDonald’s were caught on camera pouring milk into the milkshake machine out of a bucket labeled “Soiled Towels Only.” That particular restaurant had already been cited for 12 different sanitary violations. Though McDonald’s proudly stands by its safety standards, and not every restaurant has such notorious incidents, the setting of a fast food restaurant staffed with low-paid employees at a high turnover rate arguably encourages bending the rules. (McDonald’s isn’t alone in this, of course – Burger King is actually ranked as the dirtiest of all the fast food chains.)

Link

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by Urbanist.

Self proclaimed mainstream-subversive art collective Superflex, decided they’d answer a question nobody had ever bothered to ask: "What does a McDonald’s restaurant look like as it slowly fills with water?"

Although we should thank them as they took the time to painstakingly recreate a McDonald’s and slowly flood it, filming it all for an exhibition at the South London Gallery.

It’s actually quite a satisfying thing to watch a generic boring fast food joint wash away, be sure to check out the video on the page.

Their latest work is a short film, “Flooded McDonald’s”, where they’ve (shockingly accurately) created a full-size replica of the inside of the ubiquitous fast food joint and then slowly filled it with water. Playing now in an exhibition at South London Gallery, the film is exactly what the title suggests and yet so much more.

Link – via reddit

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by Jake.