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A Blast From the Past with McDonald’s 1955 Hash Brown Burger




A few years ago, McDonald’s introduced the 1955 Burger. This hamburger is still introduced as being made with McDonald’s original sauce and style from 1955.





After doing some quick research, I discovered that a very thick burger with caramelized onions, lettuce, tomato, bacon, and a smoky cream sauce was nowhere to be found on McDonald’s original menu, which featured only the basic hamburger and cheeseburger that still can be found today.





Despite the revisionist history, the 1955 Burger, which I have tried before, is quite good. A little heavy on the sauce from time to time depending on who is putting it together, but overall a decent fast food burger.


It was interest then that I noticed that McDonalds had added a second version of the 1955 Burger which they call the 1955 Burger Hash Brown.


As you can imagine, the burger does include one of McDonald’s hash brown patties. There are also a few other changes.


The 1955 Hash Brown has added sliced purple onions, but removed the bacon. As any meat-lover will tell you, removing bacon is almost sacrilege!


Still, in the name of science I decided to give it a try.





One thing I noticed is that the wrapper is very different from the usual wrappers that McDonalds has. In this case, it was touting a mascot called “Speedee”, which it says is the original mascot of McDonald’s.


Again, after some more research, I found out that “Speedee” was indeed a logo for the McDonald’s brand for a fair number of years.





Another thing I noticed is that Mcdonald’s has changed their cups. The shape and material of the re-useable cups seemed a little different, and the plastic lid that they put on top seemed thinner and easier to recycle. I know that McDonald’s here in Korea has vowed to make more environmentally friendly changes to its supply line, and I guess this is a step that way.





The meal, or set, was standard, with a coke and fries. The fries were the same typical McDonald’s French fries that you’ve come to expect, although they seemed even thinner to me this time around.





Finally, it was time to unwrap the 1955 Burger Hash Brown.





As is almost always the case, the burger looked very little like the pictures that they show in the advertisements or online.


Trying to pick it up, I noticed that there was a VERY large amount of sauce on the 1955 Burger Hash Brown. In fact, after the first few bites, my fingers were covered in the sauce!


One thing that has changed a lot for McDonald’s here in Korea is that the ingredients were quite fresh.


The purple onions and lettuce were both crisp, and the onions added a nice flavor to the burger. The tomato was also fresh, although it felt a little under-ripe. These days in Korea it is very hard to get good tomatoes because of the terrible weather and typhoons during the summer time.


The burger itself was good. It has quite a substantial amount of meat to it. The ingredients are too big for the bun, and I found it a little difficult to eat by the end.





The hash brown added some really nice crunchiness to the 1955 Burger Hash Brown. While not as good as bacon on the original 1955 Burger, it was pretty tasty!





I’m not sure if I would try it again. The amount of sauce is too much for me. The taste is fine, but I would prefer if the other ingredients would have more of a chance to shine. For almost $8, it is a bit too expensive as well.


Overall, the 1955 Burger Hash Brown from McDonald’s in Korea is solid, but not a home run.

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