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By Matthew Rees

Food and Health Fact #167: McDonald's goes long on gluttony

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McDonald’s has never been anyone’s idea of a healthy eating option, given the presence of gut-busting menu items like the Double Quarter Pounder with Cheese and the McFlurry with M&M’s. But the fast-food behemoth at least offered a few products with nutritional value. That era has ended.

In 2020, amid the Covid outbreak, McDonald’s quietly removed salads from its menus. This was done in the name of convenience, as it accelerated delivery times to customers in the store and in the drive-through (where wait times fell by 25 seconds).

But with Covid threat receding, are salads – which were introduced in 1987 (see the television commercials here) – going to be revived? “Our transition to a limited menu, involving taking dozens of less popular national and regional items off menus, helped simplify operations for our restaurant crew while also improving our customers’ experience,” McDonald’s said in a recent emailed statement to Bloomberg.

In other words, salads won’t be returning anytime soon – and maybe never again.

In fact, the company is doubling down on its calorie-rich products, recently introducing a concoction called the “Choclatey Pretzel McFlurry,” which is packed with 75 grams of sugar and 68 percent of the recommended daily value of saturated fat. Other rollouts include a Bacon McDouble, spicy chicken McNuggets, and the McRib.

While the company unveiled a “Favorites Under 400 Calories” campaign 10 years ago this summer, nothing like it exists today.

There’s one positive in the purging of salads: it prevents McDonald’s from engaging in “healthwashing” (portraying one’s products as healthier than they actually are). And McDonald’s does get a smidgen of credit. I scoured the company website – including its nutrition FAQs and its “Commitment to Quality” page – and while there are a variety of modestly useful measures (like scaling back the use of animal products that have been treated with antibiotics), I did not find any statements claiming the food is healthy, nutritious, or “just plain good for you,” as a food marketer might say (and probably has).

It's nonetheless revealing that at a moment when companies of all stripes are relentless in their virtue signaling, the largest fast-food chain in the United States drops its one healthy product and doesn’t feel any obligation to dress up its offerings.

If you’re looking for a symbol of America’s toxic food culture, this would be a good place to start.