It seems like these days the goal of every fast-food company is to come up with the strangest, weirdest, and most off-the-wall concoctions that people can dream up. McDonald’s Korea is certainly taking part in this trend with their newest offering, the Spicy Mac and Cheese Burger.
That’s right, macaroni and cheese, on a burger!
If at first it seems like a hideous combination, I wouldn’t blame you for thinking that way. However, taking a step back, think about the ingredients. Cheese, check! Bacon, check! Chicken, check! Spicy component, check! Pasta, check! So far, it sounds really delicious. In fact, only the bread, lettuce, raw onions, and mayonnaise make this combination of ingredients sound appetizing. Hmm, that sounds like a lot of not matching ingredients.
After reading about this new burger online, I had to try it, if only for science.
The picture on the window when I entered this location of McDonald’s actually looked pretty good. Gooey mac and cheese, crispy bacon strips…mmmm!
The digital version over the counter looked even better!
After ordering, I waited for the food to be prepared. I imagine that the macaroni and cheese is pre-made, and the only question is whether it is microwaved or re-heated in a pot, so I hoped it wouldn’t take too long to be ready.
The website for McDonald’s says that the macaroni and cheese is prepare with Cheddar cheese, Grana Padano cheese, and cayenne pepper. It sounded tasty, but until you take a bite, you just don’t know.
My order was quickly ready, and I went and found a quiet table to enjoy my dinner.
I had also ordered a Cajun Beef Snack Wrap to go with my burger, fries and coke, and a Café Latte for after dinner.
The first thing I did was take a look at the Cajun Beef Snack Wrap. This item is on the Happy Snack menu here in South Korea, and it’s a good thing it’s not too expensive, because it is tiny. Just look at it compared to my hand:
The Cajun Beef Snack Wrap comes with a beef patty inside, some lettuce, diced onions, and some Cajun sauce. It was very underwhelming, not only for the size but also for the flavor. The Cajun sauce wasn’t very spicy, and the beef patty is just a plain one you’d find on a Big Mac.
Then it was time for the main event, the Spicy Mac and Cheese Burger.
From the outside, it looked very unbalanced. It seemed as though the macaroni and cheese was all on one side of the burger, and there was a lot of chicken patty sticking out the other side.
Opening it up, it was definitely uneven for the distribution of the mac and cheese.
I decided to bite into the mac and cheese side first, just to see if it was really the star of the show.
The mac and cheese was decent. The cheese sauce was a little grainy, as though the flour hadn’t been mixed properly, or that powdered cheese was used to make this sauce. It had a nice flavor as well, with a good cheese blend that tasted different from boxed macaroni and cheese that I have had before. The cayenne pepper was noticeable, but not super-spicy, so there was a different dimension to the mac and cheese.
The pasta was tender, which was good, because it contrasted nicely with the crispy chicken patty. The bacon was tasty, although not cooked a lot, so if you prefer crispy bacon, you might be disappointed.
Overall, the Spicy Mac and Cheese Burger from McDonald’s in Korea was fine. I didn’t think that there was enough mac and cheese on the burger, as at the end all I was eating was chicken patty. It certainly wasn’t the worst novelty burger to come along, but I think what could have been a home run ended up being disappointing.
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