Takeaway Truth is an occasional Lifehacker feature where we compare marketing images against what you actually get served. Today: McDonald’s Bacon And Cheese Sauce Loaded Fries. (Plus taste test!)
McDonald’s Loaded Fries are a new “upmarket” side option that do exactly what they say on the tin: they’re basically normal French fries with a some extra stuff loaded on top. There are two options: Guac and Salsa or Bacon and Cheese sauce. They are available in single serve sizes for $4.10, or as a larger share pack for $7.20.
Here are the teaser ads:
Of the two flavours, Guac and Salsa is ever-so-slightly healthier: it packs in 1590kJ of energy, 5.7g of protein, 19.8g of fats, 42g of carbohydrates, 5g of sugars and 615g of sodium. The Bacon And Cheese Sauce has 1760kJ of energy, 11.7g of protein, 24.2g of fat, 37.1g of carbohydrates, 2.1g of sugars and 877mg of sodium.
We decided to test the Bacon And Cheese Sauce version, because bacon. Here’s a side-by-side comparison, with the real version procured from a Blaxland restaurant:
This is a pretty rubbish effort. The colours are wrong, the quantities are off and the bacon looks more like a grated beef jerky. Are these even the same ingredients? I’m genuinely not sure. On the plus side, the presentation is pretty neat and the fries still look like fries.
Sadly, the taste isn’t much better — the cheese sauce is way too strong and also made the chips unpleasantly soggy. The “bacon” wasn’t anything special either — if you’re expecting diced rashers of fresh bacon you’re going to be hugely disappointed. I definitely won’t be ordering these again. Ever.
(If your keen to give McDonald’s Loaded Fries a try, you might be better off with the Guac and Salsa version: while I’ve yet to taste it, my colleague Hayley Williams gave the flavour combination a big thumbs up.)
Truth Rating: 3/10
Taste Verdict: 5/10
Which fast food franchise or menu item would you like us to tackle next? Let us know in the comments section below.
Comments
19 responses to “Takeaway Truth: McDonald’s Bacon And Cheese Sauce Loaded Fries”
Totally agree! I had these same cheese and bacon fries at the Mosman Maccas and it was the exact same result as above. Horrendous presentation and the flavour was pretty ordinary too. The worst part though, the hour or so after I’d eaten them. My god. It felt like I had eaten bricks. They made me feel horrible. Won’t be ordering these again thats for sure.
Quality appears to be down to how many fucks your server feels like giving in any given 30 second window.
I’ve ordered both the cheese+bacon and the avo+salsa.
The guac fries were perfect. Drenched in salsa and avocado. Seriously just swimming. The fries were hot and crisp and it was basically like having a plate full of nachos with fries instead of corn chips. Couldn’t recommend it enough.
In the very SAME SITTING, I also had a serve of the bacon and cheese… which was basically a tiny squirt of cheese from a bottle before it started farting its emptiness and the server must’ve shrugged and said, “Fuck it, that’ll do,” before sprinkling it with something reputed to be bacon-powder, then jamming all the fries into it. Or attempting to, at least, in some kind of desperate bid to make sure every fry got a piece of the action even though there wasn’t room for them to. It was like some kind of 100-man+midget bukkake of frenzied dissatisfaction.
I second the quality of the Guac and Salsa ones. They are great. My wife is convinced the salsa is just a mix of ketchup and sweet and sour sauce and not actual salsa, but it still tastes great.
I’d say she’s onto something, and I’d also say that I don’t care what it’s made of, it tastes pretty bloody great. 🙂
I had it and wasn’t impressed. The taste was OK but there wasn’t a whole heap of it (I had the smaller option) an there weren’t really that many fries either. Would also be much better if it came with a fork.
Now that’s interesting… mine did come with a fork and that’s exactly how I ate it.
Yeah, that would have probably increased my satisfaction a little
they were soooooooooooo horrible, the bacon doesnt look like bacon and it was so overly salty!
i ordered the gauc and salsa one, it only had salsa, didnt get any guac.
so far for me, this is the biggest fail from maccas I have ever seen
I got the Bacon and Cheese from Milton McDonalds in Brisbane. Can confirm that it’s as terrible as reported here. Bacon not only looks like, but smells like jerky. Wasn’t appetizing at all. Fries were soggy with this crap cheese ‘sauce’. (I thought it was going to be melted shredded cheese, how naive of me)
0/10
Wouldn’t let my dog near it.
What a rip-off, and anyone who pays the asking price for less than 50 cents worth of ingredients must have more money than sense.
After seeing these advertised, I was going to give the bacon ones a go. Not now, though, they look hideous in real life.
Had the salsa one yesterday and surprisingly tasted quite good and also looked somewhat like the advertisement . Guess I just got lucky someone prepared it properly, or it is actually worth it. I thought it was pretty good. I give it 7/10.
But o my god, the picture of that bacon and cheese you guys tried! This is exactly why I wanted to try the salsa first, because I was kind of weary I would get something similar to your picture.
This puts even KFC’s DIY nacho kit to shame
I LIKED the KFC nachos! I don’t remember them ever being DIY, though… always had them laid out with great proportions of chip/cheese/salsa. I must’ve been lucky enough to get a server who gave two shits.
I think you could order them as takeaway, then they gave you the actual bags with sauces.
what the heck is “guac”?
Guac, short for Guacamole. A delicious paste made of avocados, spices and sometimes lemon or lime juice.
OMG yes, I totally agree. I tried the (alleged) bacon and cheese fries this week, and they were one of the worst things I had ever eaten. The ‘bacon bits’ were dark brown/black and more like vegemite-flavoured jerky; a quick look at the ingredients listed on the McDonalds website shows two completely different ingredients lists for the ‘bacon pieces’ which makes me wonder, why would there be two different varieties of the bacon bits, and is someone else getting a better version than I did? If so, I’m very jealous! Also, the cheese sauce was more gluggy and viscous than cheesy, with a phlegm-like consistency and texture, and tasted awful. Had the rest of the meal not been so caringly and decently prepared, I might almost have suspected the food preparation staff had taken exception to me and sneezed on my fries instead of adding a cheese sauce to them. It’s a pity, really, that the fries were such a letdown, because everything else I bought from Maccas that day was really nice.
I rarely go to McDonalds, I tried the Create your own taste and thought it was great. I had planned to against my better judgement go and order the Bacon and Cheese Fries, they look so good in the adds. But if presented with what is being described here, I probably would have looked at, and returned it immediately. This looks nothing like what I was promised.
I almost never return food, I order without tomato, there’s a slice of Tomato on I’ll just pull it off. But if you forget say the Bacon, the Beetroot and there appears to be a missing chunk of beef patty I’ll request a new one.
McDonalds looses Market share every year, they are fighting to stay relevant and not fade away. I remember when Brisbane’s Queen Street Mall has 8 or so McDonalds, there are now 2 and you could realistically call that 1.5 as they are both in the Myer Centre and the small one is part of the larger one. If they want to stay Relevant they need to create new tasty things not abominations like the Bacon and Cheese one. The Guac one sounds good but I’m too distrustful now, maybe update the article with that one.
I actually enjoyed the bacon and cheese chips. Can someone tell me how they make that cheese sauce? It delicious. I had big pieces of bacon and nice amount of cheese, however this is hit and miss on occasions…