Tag: Fast Food

I wonder what’s a worse fate for a chicken: To be a grilled or crispy piece of chicken in the new McDonald’s Honey Mustard Snack Wrap.

Sure, there are even worse fates for chickens, like bird flu, being used in some screwed up way in a Jackass stunt, Chicken McNuggets, dancing naked in the Peter Gabriel “Sledgehammer” music video, or being eaten by Nicole Richie, then being regurgitated by Nicole Richie.

Unlike the original Ranch Snack Wrap, which only comes with crispy chicken, the honey mustard one come with either crispy chicken or grilled chicken, which is probably healthier than the crispy version, unless McDonald’s has found a way to grill things by sticking them in hot oil.

Along with your choice of chicken, the Honey Mustard Snack Wrap also comes with shredded cheddar jack cheese, lettuce, a sweet and tangy honey mustard sauce wrapped in a flour tortilla, and for some, it also comes with the guilt of knowing that you’re eating another McDonald’s product despite your promise to swear off of it after watching the documentary Super Size Me.

After trying both the crispy and grilled Honey Mustard Snack Wrap, it’s hard to determine which one I like better. It’s like trying to choose which Olsen twin I like best, because just like Mary-Kate and Ashley, both versions of the Honey Mustard Snack Wrap look alike, are kinda pale on the outside, and don’t have much meat in them.

The crispy version has 320 calories, 15 grams of fat, 4.5 grams of saturated fat, 1 gram of trans fat, 30 milligrams of cholesterol, 750 milligrams of sodium, 34 grams of carbs, 1 gram of dietary fiber, and 14 grams of protein.

The grilled version has 260 calories, 9 grams of fat, 3.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 45 milligrams of cholesterol, 800 milligrams of sodium, 27 grams of carbs, 1 gram of dietary fiber, and 18 grams of protein.

Both versions are about six or seven inches long, which is either small, big, or just right, depending on how big your hands or cock is. For me, the size of the Honey Mustard Snack Wrap was wayyyyyyyy too small and I wished that it was a more reasonable nine to ten inches. But then again what do you expect for some thing that costs just $1.29?

So in the end, which Honey Mustard Snack Wrap do I prefer and which is the worst fate for a piece of chicken, crispy or grilled?

Well, the crispy version tastes better, but the grilled one is healthier. However, the honey mustard sauce had kind of a weird sweet deli mustard spicy taste to it, so it turns out that the worst fate for a piece of chicken would be to end up in a Honey Mustard Snack Wrap and I prefer neither the crispy nor grilled versions of it and I’d rather go buy the much better original Ranch Snack Wrap instead.

I’ll leave the Honey Mustard Snack Wraps for Nicole Richie to regurgitate.

(Editor’s Note: Thanks to Impulsive Buy reader Danton for letting me know about the McDonald’s Honey Mustard Snack Wrap.)

Item: McDonald’s Honey Mustard Snack Wrap
Price: $1.29
Purchased at: McDonald’s
Rating: 2 out of 5
Pros: Now able to choose between grilled and crispy chicken. Decent price. Grilled is healthier. Crispy is better tasting.
Cons: Honey mustard sauce is kind of weird tasting. Kind small for my big…um, hands. Breaking your promise to not eat fast food. Being in a Jackass stunt. Being regurgitated by Nicole Richie.

Isn’t technology great?

Thanks to people who make way more money that I do — the engineers and scientists who advance society — computers have gotten faster, cell phones have gotten smaller, hard drives have gotten larger, sex dolls have gotten more realistic (kind of SFW), and robots have come even closer to making human beings their slaves.

It doesn’t seem like it was too long ago when cell phones were the size of a concrete brick, gave off enough radiation to cook a hot dog, and to talk on it would cost about the same amount per minute as any 1-900 number found in the back of Juggs or Booty Magazine.

Today, cell phones can easily fit in a pocket, can play music, take scantily clad pictures of yourself to post on your MySpace or blog, and thanks to small wireless Bluetooth earpieces, they can also make you look like a crazy person talking to yourself.

Cell phones are a more recent technology, but even one of the pillars of home entertainment — the television — has seen dramatic improvement over the decades of its existence. When I was growing up, televisions came in black and white or color, screen were small, knobs were used to change channels, and PBS had Monty Python and occasional nudity.

Televisions today can come in sizes greater than 100 inches and show a vivid color picture in high-definition which allows you to see blades of grass blowing on a football field or the wrinkles on Larry King’s face that show the number of times he’s been married (It works much like how the rings in a tree can determine its age).

Advances in technology doesn’t stop with just consumer electronics and sex dolls, it’s been also seen in the fast food industry. Burgers have gotten bigger, french fries have gotten fryer, cup sizes have gotten taller, the waists of fast food eaters have gotten wider, and Happy Meals have gotten happier.

However, there has been one area in the fast food industry that hasn’t seen many technological advances — fast food pie technology. Over the years, the only change the McDonald’s Apple Pie has seen in its almost 40-year history was having the fried version replaced with a baked one in 1992. Although despite it being baked, along with Nick Nolte and Tara Reid, today’s McDonald’s Apple Pie is probably the only other thing in existence that is really baked, but looked fried.

Recently, other people who make way more money than me — chefs, nutritionists, and pieologists — have taken the apple out of the McDonald’s Apple Pie and replaced it with exotic fruits like, cherries, taro, and bananas.

Recently, I ate the McDonald’s Banana Pie, which was apparently available for a limited time at participating McDonald’s, because it doesn’t seem to be around anymore. From the outside it looked like a normal fried McDonald’s Apple Pie, but inside was the potassium-rich goodness of bananas, which is also the number one cause of accidents in cartoons.

The pie itself was good and sweet and the bananas inside weren’t mushy at all, but despite it being tasty, I don’t know if just replacing the fruit in a McDonald’s pie is enough of an advancement in fast food pie technology. I was hoping for a bigger pie, a pie that heats itself, or a pie that can make itself a la mode.

Item: McDonald’s Banana Pie
Price: 99 cents
Purchased at: McDonald’s
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: B-A-N-A-N-A-S. Tasty and sweet. Crispy. Potassium from bananas. Bananas weren’t mushy. Advances in sex doll technology.
Cons: Fried not baked. For a limited time. No major advances in fast food pie technology. Cartoon accidents caused by banana peels.

Just like The Rocky Horror Picture Show, AMC Pacer, and the Grateful Dead, the McDonald’s McRib has a cult following.

Although the McRib’s following isn’t as dressed up as those who follow the Rocky Horror Picture Show or isn’t as stoned as the Deadheads, but the McRib cult probably has a much wider ass than all of the other cults combined.

Currently, the McRib is on its McRib Farewell Tour II 06, which when it ends, means the McRib will no longer be offered on the McDonald’s menu.

Now I don’t know about you, but when I see Roman numerals after the words “Farewell Tour,” it makes me a little skeptical that this is the last hurrah for the McRib. After all, if it’s the McRib Farewell Tour II, there apparently was a Farewell Tour I, so there might be a Farewell Tour III, since Roman numerals have been used to keep track of long-running series and events. For example, there have been XL Super Bowls, XXIII Wrestlemanias, and XXVIII Summer Olympics.

(Editor’s Note: Here’s a quick handy guide to Roman numerals if you’re not familiar with them: I is one. V is five. X is ten. L is fifty. C is one hundred. D is five hundred. M is one thousand.)

Another reason why I expect to see the McRib in the McFuture is because of the petition on the annoying McRib website to save it. Although if I have learned anything from signing petitions, it’s that they aren’t very effective at making things happen.

The McRib I tried recently was the first one I ever had and it will definitely be the last one I have, even when the McRib Farewell Tour III rolls around in 2008. For those of you who haven’t had the opportunity to eat a McRib, it consists of a boneless piece of pork, dipped in some kind of tangy barbeque sauce with pickles and onions in between a special McRib bun.

The boneless pork was slightly rubbery and the barbeque sauce was not so tangy or tasty. Although, if you look at the picture above, it seems like most of the barbeque sauce ended up on the box it came in instead of the sandwich, causing its bland taste. The barbeque sauce also ended up on my fingers, shirt, and the crotch of my pants, which would’ve been trouble (or fun) if I owned a dog. Also, I’m not too sure why there are pickles in it.

Due to its blandness and messiness, I don’t ever see myself joining the McDonald’s McRib McCult. If I had to choose between joining the McRib McCult or a cult that involves wearing matching baby blue jumpsuits with matching black Nike shoes and drinking a magical fruit punch that “puts me to sleep” so that I can be taken up in a flying saucer to meet Ldlfjadlrdoiueoriadfij (pronounced Frank) and be married to fifty virgins beyond the Gates of the Shining Starlight, I would probably choose the cult with matching baby blue jumpsuits, not because I would meet Frank or the fifty virgins, but because the magical fruit punch would probably taste better than the McRib.

(Nutrition Facts – 500 calories, 26 grams of fat, 10 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 70 milligrams of cholesterol, 980 milligrams of sodium, 44 grams of carbohydrates, 3 grams of fiber, 11 grams of sugar, and 22 grams of protein.)

Item: McDonald’s McRib
Price: $4.59 (Value Meal)
Purchased at: McDonald’s
Rating: 4 out of 10
Pros: Boneless. AMC Pacer. Magical fruit punch.
Cons: Rubbery pork. Barbeque sauce wasn’t so tangy. Bland like a CBS sitcom. Napkins required. The McRib is overrated. The addition of pickles. McRib website is annoying. Petitions.