Location: 195 North Queen Street, Etobicoke
Website: https://www.mcdonalds.ca
McDonald’s has just started a “World Taste Tour,” in which they’re offering items loosely inspired by China, Australia, Italy, France, and Mexico.
I’m not gonna lie — I get more excited than I should probably admit when fast food joints (McDonald’s in particular) do silly promos like this. I can travel the world? Via McDonald’s? Sign me up!
They’re staggering them out over the next couple of months, but the first burger they’re offering is the Chinese Szechuan Burger, which is topped with Szechuan sauce (no, not the Szechuan sauce that caused Rick and Morty fans to lose their minds — a different Szechuan sauce), crispy wontons, lettuce, tomato, grilled onions, and mayo.
It’s not the best. The biggest issue here is the patty itself. It’s the luck of the draw, of course; you might get a relatively fresh patty, or you might get one that’s been sitting in the meat drawer for a while. On this particular visit, I got the latter. It was super dry, even by McDonald’s not-so-great standards.
Everything else was decent. The Szechuan sauce is basically just a vaguely spicy version of a typical Asian sesame dressing — it’s sweet, with a sesame-infused flavour and a spice level that’s so mild you’ll question that it’s even there.
The crispy wontons add a nice hit of texture to the burger, and the grilled onions are actually quite tasty. The whole thing would have fine if it weren’t for that patty — but it was surprisingly substantial and dry AF.
