quarter pounder with uh oh
Shortly after noon on Saturday, I was walking down to the car rental place on 77th Street. We were off to the country to visit some friends. I was feeling a little peckish, as the British say, so I decided to grab something quick to eat on my way. On a whim – I swear I don’t do this more than once or twice a year — I popped into McDonald’s and ordered a Quarter Pounder with Cheese to go. I unwrapped it and was happily munching away as I walked down Broadway, when I ran into a friend who also happens to be a regular follower of this blog.
“What’s for lunch?” she asked with a smile, but when I got closer and she saw what I was eating, the smile turned into a look of disbelief and disillusionment.
“McDonald’s? You?”
“Well, you know …” I blushed and tried to hide the sandwich with my other hand. Maybe, I thought, I could convince her it was a buttered baguette stuffed with imported prosciutto.
“What is that, a Quarter Pounder?” This was from another acquaintance who happened to be strolling by with his wife. The two of them are well-known Upper West Side foodies.
“Well, every now and then … “ I mumbled, trying to extricate myself from the growing mob.
“Oh, the big gourmet,” said Frank, another foodie acquaintance of mine who popped up out of nowhere. “Those things’ll kill you,” he said with a supercilious look.
The crowd was growing – in both size and hostility. It was like I had defiled some shrine or something.
The problem became the smell. If you eat anything from McDonald’s – even if it’s just a diet Coke or something – the smell stays with you for three days. You can shower; you can brush your teeth; you can change your clothes – it doesn’t matter – you smell like McDonald’s for three days. I think it’s part of their marketing philosophy.
Our doors are closed to you, sir.
Now the smell was actually drawing people – from across the street, from around the corner – fourteen members of the Upper West Side Chapter of the Chaine des Rotisseurs showed up out of nowhere and surrounded me, babbling in French. They pointed at my half-eaten burger and shook their heads with disdain.
Okay, I’m exaggerating. But oh, how I yearn for years before I had my food blog, when I could chow down on the street with anonymity.
Those days are gone for good.
Sometimes I say yes to the grandaughters plee for Mcdonalds just so I can guilt free have a double cheese burger.
I was there for them, and I, I mean they loved it.
I’ve loved taking the grandchildren too but on my current vegan menu I’ve been reduced to McDonald’s oatmeal.
Just so you know Mike, they’ve opened a new Gino’s in Towson and one is expected at Camden Yards. Maybe it’ll help the attendance at Oriole games.
There is an exception. West coast style…
Hail to the In and Out wrap and fresh cut fries – 4 bucks anytime day or night drive thru!
My son and his band steer me there after late night gigs and we, along with dozens of large late night Angelenos, share in the moveable feast!
LA is the capital of truly international street food. With over 70 languages spoken in our public schools that reflect our diversity and culture we can get any taste almost anytime.
Now if only we didn’t have to drive to get it…..
My daughter in law works in the corporate offices of Jack in The Box. I will forward this to her. They might want to use the section on the smells in one of their ads. If you hear from them charge them double your usual fee.
Have to admit giving in to such a whim on occasion, usually on the drive home from a late night at the theatre. A few weeks ago, I gave in to such a whim but was surprised and felt a bit less guilty when I noticed the vanity license plate on the car ahead of me in the drive through. It was from a nearby SPA where they preach all about healthy eating. My guilt was washed away.
I have a very close friend that is a Professor at Yale, and spends many months in Italy on Lectures. He has convinced his children that McDonalds is only Dog Food, he will go to the drive thru, order a burger, and they would feed it to the dog. On one occassion his kids happen to notice “People” eating there as they exited the drive thru and said with horror on their faces “Daddy those people are eating Dog Food”! We still laugh at the thought of them seeing people eat dog food and many years later they still dont eat dog food! Buon Appitite Tutti
Mike: there’s a little place on the autostrada, maybe a half hour from Fiumicino, where our friend Frances always stops when she picks us up and drives us to Cannara for our Umbria photo workshops. We can’t leave without having at least a panini, a couple of pastries and, of course, several cappuccinos (cappuccini?)
We also stop there for wonderful homemade mozzarella and breakfast bread with the hardboiled egg inside, so we can share it with our students after they arrive (if there’s any left, of course.)
I bring all this up because Judy and I tend to eat at McDonalds only when we are on the road in the States. She bows to no one in her love of Big Macs and it’s a real treat for her to get one, say when we are heading up to Maine for the summer. Since I never did cotton to the idea of Russian dressing (sorry, special sauce) on a burger that’s the width of a shoe sole, I love the fact that they now offer far heftier Angus Burgers (my favorite is the mushroom Angus.)
Let me also tip my hat to McDonald’s fries–I love ‘em, regardless of what kind of fat they fry them in. Only the best pomme frites rival them. Maybe it was because of the setting but the best Mickey D fries I ever had were the ones I ate decades ago on the Champs d’Elysees–just as the tour de France was ending and a frenzied crowd was cheering the winners.
Did we ever eat at the McDonalds in Venice when we were working on our book? What are you, crazy? This is Italy, for goodness’ sake. All I am saying is that, given the right time and place, there is room for all kinds of culinary indulgence.
Pax tibi, go forth and sin some more.
–Frank VR
Hi Mike, We’re here in Zihuatanejo with you baby brother and his beautiful wife Barbara eating anything but Big Macs
I never would have told. I swear!
Mickey D’s for fries (and, if you’re in Tokyo, Filet O’ Fish… heaven), Wendy’s for burgers, and Burger King for the faux chicken sandwich (the original oval patty). Sonic for burgers & onion rings & chili dogs. Let’s keep our fast food splurges in order, please!
Last night Howard Hesseman and I went to UMAMI BURGER:
http://umamiburger.com/
We had hand chopped seared tuna burgers with wasabi and fresh sliced ginger and shared tempura onion rings and thinly sliced sweet potato fries.
Oh yeah!
Ya know I was just remembering a McD’s across the piazza from the Spanish Steps (actually the largest in the world) and one in the piazza at the Partheon..maybe there is something to those burgers? And one near the train station in Florence come to think of it. Never at a burger in any McD’s in over 40 years but in Itay I did have their Pizza..pretty good I must say!!
@ Lucille — Oooo, you ate McDonald’s in Rome. É una vergogna.
@ Erick D. — It’s good to hear from the mouth of a true expert. Thank you.
@ Becky – you started this whole mess.
@Julia and Len — give my love to Ed and Barb
@ Frank — I know that Mozzarella place – near Orte. Fantastic.
@ Lucille – I love the dog food story; I’m going to steal it.
@ John – Yeah, everybody sins – thank God.
@ Jim – Smells are where it’s at.
@ Charlie – I know The In And Out – and the old in and out.
@ Nelson – Gino’s! That rings an old bell.
@ Rebecca – Whatever works – sure, blame it on the kids.
One of the few drawbacks of Manhattan living is not having the easy anonymity of a drive-thru where you can furtively shove fast food into your pie-hole and no one’s the wiser. Not that I’d know anything about that :-)
Like Lucille’s friend the Yale professor, we had trained our kids to loathe the very idea of McDonald’s. We once were compelled to rue this moral and culinary superiority when, on a nine-hour drive home from Maine, we were desperately hungry and got off the Interstate in St. Johnsbury, Vermont. Not wanting to waste time, I drove right to a McDonald’s, and got in line for the drive-in window — whereupon our kids (maybe 7 and 9 at the time) started screaming about how terrible this was, that McDonald’s served poison, and they refused to eat there. The price of those years of training them? Close to an hour in a dreadful local diner, eating the inedible and thinking the unthinkable.