McWow

Sydney Observer get up close and personal with the McDonald’s new gourmet range.

If we’d asked you to guess where the above burger was from, I bet you wouldn’t have picked McDonald’s.

Only three McDonald’s venues in the state are running the Create Your Taste trial, with Waitara the North Shore’s closest. Since November 2014, McDonald’s Waitara have been serving the new gourmet range, with operator Sam Alvaro proud to admit that it has really taken off.

“The response has been outstanding,”Alvaro said.

“It’s blowing all expectations out of the water; that’s why McDonald’s are now looking at rolling this out across the country”.

The new menu is self-service with a twist. Customers have around 19 different ingredients to select from on a life-size touch screen menu, including bun choice options, various sauce flavours and even a choice to determine the cut of your chips. Once you’ve placed your order, you recieve a vibrating token to let you know when your food is ready – just like you would at a bistro or pub.

As the dietry habits of Australians change, so too does the popularity of food franchising. At the moment, raw-food and gourmet dishes are definitely in, representing a considerable drop in the popularity of convenient take-away foods.

“Customers have been telling us for years that they’ve wanted something different,” Alvaro said.

“Customers are demanding a better quality burger, fresher ingredients, and something that they can have more say about. We listened, and now we’re doing it”.

 The verdict?

 Unlike anything you’ve ever eaten at McDonalds, that’s for sure.

The size of the burger was considerably larger than usual, giving the epononymous ‘Big Mac’ a run for its money. There are a few bun choices, including a brioche bun if you’re thinking of going fancy, or a lettuce leaf for the gluten-intolerant. The meat is limited to Angus beef for now, with plans to introduce white meats (and possibly pulled-pork) in the future.

There are an impressive amount of toppings and salads on offer, including two different styles of bacon, and around five different types of cheese. Our pick? An Angus patty, with avocado, red onion, lettuce, tomato, beetroot, crispy bacon, caramelised onion sauce and swiss cheese, all on a brioche bun.

Yes, it was pretty sensational.

What sets the new burgers apart is the quality of the ingredients. The meat had a juicy tenderness, which is a nice change for McDonald’s. The salads were plentiful and crisp, and the bacon strips had a geniune smokey flavour.

But it seemed it wasn’t just us who were impressed.

We bumped in to a couple of high-viz clad scaffolders on their lunch break, who were silently engrossed with their gourmet Classic Cheeseburgers.

Brad Hodges admitted that in the past he has tried to “avoid” eating at McDonald’s, but now he’s had the new range, he says it’s rather popular smoko choice.

“[The Classic Cheeseburger] really filled me up, it was declicioius. You can really taste the beef in it. I will definitely be back” he said.

 Hodges’ colleague, Michael Walker, described the change as more wholesome – in both ingredients and in service.

“I liked the fact that it felt like I got it from a burger shop, rather than a takeaway shop,” he said.

 “It felt like there was more love in it than a normal McDonald’s cheeseburger”.

 But for what you indulge with quality, you sacrifice with timing and service, right?

 Wrong.

Sure, it’s not going to be as quick as your normal cheeseburger and fries, but you should have your customized burger within 6-7 minutes.