Taste Test: The McRib

AS A rule I generally avoid McDonalds on the grounds that its food is shit and is best used to keep annoying kids happy and/or as fertilizer. Then again, the McRib is only put on the menu at certain times as a publicity stunt treat for its customers so I thought I’d swallow my pride (along with a ton of salt, HFCS and fat) and give one a go.

Here it is with the bun* removed. The boneless all-pork patty, which is stamped to make it look like it contains ribs, is slathered in sauce, onions and pickles. I’ll give it one thing — at $2.69 it’s dead cheap. As for taste… I’m surprised to say it’s pretty good. The sauce makes it, to be honest, and adds some much-needed moistness to the crappy, crappy bun. The “meat” (quote marks are there because this is McDonalds we’re talking about) isn’t, well, that bad and the onions add some zing. It’s way, way better than any of McDonalds’ regular burgers but that doesn’t say a lot for the McRib. Take away the onions and doesn’t taste that much different to a regular pork joint covered in barbecue sauce. Would I get another one? For that price, yes.

*Which on its own contains flour (wheat flour bleached and enriched with thiamine, riboflavin, niacin, iron, folic acid, malted barley flour), water, high fructose corn syrup, yeast, vegetable oil (partially hydrogenated soybean oil, cottonseed oil) and contains 2 percent or less of dextrose, fumaric acid, calcium sulphate, salt, acetic acid, soy flour, monocalcium phosphate, ammonium sulphate, cornstarch, fungal protease, natural culture, ammonium chloride, ascorbic acid, azodicarbomide, mono– and diglycerides, propionic acid, phosphoric acid, corn flour, calcium peroxide, calcium propionate, dicetyl tartaric acid esters of mono– and diglycerides, ethoxylated mono– and diglycerides… remember when bread was bread? Thanks to Fast Food Facts for the ingredients.