McDonald's is nothing like it is used to be.

[Aquarius1234]

To think McDonald's is rubbish now.
Burgers taste different now the buns taste/look different.
Yes I know its general crap fast food, but 10 years ago you would get a cheese quarter ponder and enjoy every minute, then maybe 20 mins later think you wish you hadn't as its full of rubbish.
But now its just awful.

I recently had a big mac and yeah the actual burger was different. It even smells different

I used to appreciate getting something quick on a semi-regular trip, saved time & I can have bad ‘hermit’ days so minimal interaction from safety of car was great.

Last (saver!) burger took so fucking long I thought they were rearing the animal first.

I’ve lost a stone+ since Jan 😹

More poison in them than cigarettes!

The problem is the wait is not worth the result. When it was quick the food felt worth it.

Some branches are better than others for accuracy and speed. And size of branch doesn't seem to be the factor - i've no idea what is.

The fries - when you get good ones it's a surprise to be commented on nowadays ! ''Wow the fried are actually good!'' 😝

IME the basic burgers (which is what i've always had) have always looked as if they've been made in a tearing hurry, the bun thrown into the packaging from and distance and then sat on just before service. It's been a running joke since the 90s - hold the real thing up compared to one of the posters for full effect 😂

I voted YABU because it's always been bland, insubstantial rubbish.

Yes but now we wait longer for it it adds insult to injury 😂

I usually send my chips straight back and ask for fresh ones because they put the chips out before they do anything else, and they get cold sitting on the tray.

You what now?
Maccies is what it is. I enjoy just like I have for the last 35 or so years.

They made changes to some of their burger recipes in mid-March.

But tbh I had one yesterday and didn't even notice a difference at all.

It's just greasy fast food, satisfies a craving/ fills a hole.

No different to how it ever was.

(Just more expensive!)

They've given you the cold limp ones probably. Chips are like steak bakes in Greggs, it's down to luck if you get them golden and hot.

Yes but now we wait longer for it it adds insult to injury 😂

This and Phillip the fish made me scoff

We stopped at one yesterday as we needed food in a hurry. 15 minutes later we got our food, took it to the car and the burgers were cold. If we weren’t in a hurry I’d have taken it back.

Since they started the assemble to order system (it is NOT cook to order, they still cook the patties in advance they just don’t assemble them until an order comes in) I have very rarely had a hot burger, or even a warm enough one. I have no idea how it complies with food regulations to keep the patties at a temperature that barely melts the fake cheese!

If you want hot food the chicken selects are normally ok, but I still hanker after a hot, freshly cooked, quarter pounder with cheese.

It’s more likely that you’ve got older and realised what crap it really is! The chicken selects aren’t too bad as they’re proper chicken, but the nuggets are like mashed up floor sweepings rolled into lumps and deep fried.

I am that old that I remember when the first Maccys came to London. You needed two hands to hold a Big Mac and they warmed the buns before putting the burgers in.

It's gone down in quality , speed and customer service in my opinion.

We have given up getting drive thru because our food was never ready by the time we got to the window and always being told to park up and wait but there were never any parking spaces.

They seem to constantly get orders wrong with items missing. It's an almost 100% chance they will forget to put the dipping sauces in.

The buns often look completely lop sided with the fillings half hanging over one side so very sloppily prepared. Food is often cold too.

The wait for food now in our local one can be up to half an hour and it seems to be because of glitches in the ordering system rather than delays in the kitchen. I waited 45 minutes once due to an error in the system but because I'd used the app I couldn't give up waiting and get a refund.

I think maybe the always long queue of delivery drivers is a clue as to why the system isn't working so well for customers who actually go into the restaurant.

The chicken Big Mac is great! As is the double sausage McMuffin.

although I will say Aldi do excellent dupe ingredients

We had five guys once, expensive and unimpressed, plus they cook their fries in peanut oil 🤢. Their milkshakes however are sensational

You may think it tastes rubbish but I can assure you it's not "full of rubbish" at all. You've just decided that yourself. The burgers are 100% British or Irish beef, the fresh ingredients are (now, haven't always been) fresh. The eggs & chicken is all organic and the chicken is 100% breast. Even the milk is organic. The bread buns are brioche. The ketchup & mustard is Heinz. The only thing that can be even slightly considered rubbish is the cheese slice..... Which I'm pretty certain you'd happily purchase for your home BBQ.

It does make me laugh when people declare anything & everything McDonalds serve as 'junk' and then happily buy genuinely junk offal-filled burgers and eyeball-filled sausages from the supermarket and cheese slices etc for their BBQ! 🤨

Well, on reflection ASSEMBLED to order is probably what I meant. Anyway, it doesn’t work well because you get a cold bun on unmelted cheese. The congealed plastic cheese used to be one of the best bits.

In many MCDs, what slows things down is doing the bloody Deliveroo and Uber eats orders, they seem to try and get those out first. I always think tapping away on that screen when ordering takes soooo much longer than just going up to the kiosk and asking for what you want.

I wish they did the nacho cheese bites all year round because the cheese sticks they do sometimes don’t taste of anything.

The app is a generous one though in terms of freebies and offers, and the coffee is well priced still and consistently decent so I still go. My son loves a happy meal and I don’t feel guilty about that- there are pretty stringent regs around the quality of their food.

You've always been able to get oasis dispensed. In our area at least.

Anyway they have just changed the way burgers are cooked to improve the flavour. I'm a fan! The taste is much better

Looks like only the milk is organic. Chickens are free range so the bare minimum and not high welfare. But it least it's 100% chicken and not floor sweepings as suggested earlier

I'm an absolute junk food fiend and I won't even go to McD's anymore. Always a massive wait and always something missing or wrong in the order. I stopped going before they started doing the brioche buns but I also don't like the thought of those either.

@EnglishBluebell I never knew this until I started using the self-service screens! Still very exciting for me anyway! What can I say, it's the little things in life for me. Throw in a Galaxy McFlurry and my day is made!

I've not tried their new style burgers. I'm not keen on the beef, so if they've improved the flavour somehow that can only be a good thing.
I like the nuggets and the breakfast. I'm quite bad in that I eat Mcds a couple of times a week!
Just as it's so bland you know exactly what to expect. I lived in NY for 6 months and theirs was really bad. The fries have something like 50 ingredients!? The UK ones are just potatoes and fat and salt.
For the calories, there isn't much else you'd find to get a hot meal with a decent food hygeine rating for under a fiver. So it certainly has it's place.

My tastes have changed a lot. I don’t think the food at McDonald’s has barely changed at all.
Obviously it’s a lot more expensive. I worked there 25+ years ago when a meal cost £2.88