Yesterday, I had an assignment that took me to the University of Waterloo, which is somewhere between an hour and an a hour and a half’s drive west of Accordion City, depending on traffic and weather. I decided to hold off on breakfast and leave a little earlier than I’d planned, just in case the weather – which has decided to give us the full winter treatment a month ahead of schedule – took a turn for the worse.
While the day was cloudy, it didn’t snow, and traffic moved along the 401 at a decent clip, giving me time to pull over for a quick breakfast. I’d planned on doing the Canadian Thing and stopping for something at Tim Horton’s, but the roadside stop I found had a McDonald’s instead. Rather than go back on the road and start a possibly time-consuming search for Tim’s, I decided to make do and grab a McBreakfast of some kind.
I rarely eat at McDonald’s, and when I do, it’s usually breakfast when I’m on the road or on a business trip and there isn’t anything else nearby. On these occasions, I usually go with the Sausage McMuffin with egg. However, since I’ve been on a conscious “try new things” kick ranging from little changes in my daily routine to a career at The Evil Empire, I thought I’d try something I’d never had before: the McGriddle. It’s the featured item in McDonald’s breakfast combo number 7, pictured below:
Click the photo to see it at full size.
For those of you who are blissfully unaware of the McGriddle, it’s a breakfast sandwich made up of “bread” made of something that approximates pancakes flavoured with syrup and various centres. Breakfast combo number 7’s McGriddle has sausage, eggs and cheese and comes with a hash brown and medium coffee.
Here’s a closer look at my McGriddle:
Click the photo to see it at full size.
Yes, that’s the “golden arches” logo embossed into the McGriddle. You have to give McDonald’s credit for seizing a branding opportunity that others would’ve missed.
Truth be told, it’s better than I expected it would be. If you’re the kind of person who likes pancakes and sausage and likes to pour syrup on both the pancakes and the sausage like I do, you’ll find it’s a decent junk food approximation. It still has that certain overprocessed, hyper-enhanced flavour that screams “McDonalds”. It’s a certain “junkiness” that suggests that it’s like dating the cute but completely certifiably crazy girl in college: try it once, just for the experience, but nothing more.
It’s junk food, but how “junky: is it? Here’s its nutritional info:
- Serving Size 7 oz (199.0 g)
- Calories: 560
- Calories from Fat: 288
- Total Fat: 32.0g (49% of your recommended daily value)
- Saturated Fat: 11.0g (55% of your recommended daily value)
- Cholesterol: 260mg (87% of your recommended daily value)
- Sodium: 1290mg (54% of your recommended daily value)
- Total Carbohydrates: 48.0g (16% of your recommended daily value)
- Dietary Fiber": 1.0g (4% of your recommended daily value)
- Sugars: 16.0g
- Protein: 21.0g
- Vitamin A: 0% of your recommended daily value
- Vitamin C: 0% of your recommended daily value
- Calcium: 2% of your recommended daily value
- Iron: 83% of your recommended daily value
Well, that explains the satisfying high-fat feeling I had after eating it. At least it’s got lots of protein and iron. Although this is breakfast for hundreds of thousands of people – perhaps millions – every day, I don’t think I’ll be eating another one of these very soon.
This organization pioneered the “Jaipur foot” (also known as the “Jaipur leg”) – an effective and easy-to-fit prosthetic lower limb that can be produced for a little as $30 and is provided for free by the charity. The prosthetic was first developed in the 1960s by an orthopedic surgeon and a sculptor. Since then the charity has provided over 300,000 limbs in 22 countries. In the television program a young boy arrived at the clinic hopping on one leg and left running on two, beaming. It was moving to watch. You can read more in this Time magazine article.
