The goal is to bring lunch from home once a week, but there's just so many super-sized distractions. I'll admit it. Yesterday I had lunch at McDonald's. Oddly enough, I found an idea for a seasonal, quick lunch lurking on the McDonald's menu.
The McDonald's Fruit and Walnut Salad is green and red apple slices mixed with red grapes. Two other compartments in the airline food style package provide candied walnuts and vanilla yogurt.
This morning, I'm re-creating this lunch at home. The biggest challenge is to get my yogurt dip to taste as good as the McDonald's version. McDonald's doesn't say where this secret sauce comes from. (We probably don't want to know.)
The yogurt, which doesn't seem to have any healthy active cultures, has a strong, super-sweet vanilla taste with a texture that's truer to instant pudding than yogurt. Does anyone have any other suggestions on how to get that grandma's yellow cake style blast of vanilla goodness without going overboard and adding more sugar to the yogurt?
I tried adding vanilla extract to my Stonyfield Farm vanilla yogurt to dial up the flavor, but that wasn't the flavor McDonald's had. Next time, I'll put some yogurt in a coffee filter to strain over night in the fridge. That should get me closer to the texture of the McDonald's sauce.
McDonald's seals a gas into the pre-packaged salad to keep the apples from turning brown. I'll steer clear of the science and thow my apple corer in my bag with the rest of my lunch. I've heard that you can also sprinkle Vitamin C powder on apples to keep them fresh and crispy.
The crumbs of candied walnut are a treat too. Today, I'm just taking the walnuts plain, but next time I'm up for more flavor experimentation. Instead of making the walnuts sweet, they could be flavored with a mild curry. Might be an interesting flavor against the apples and yogurt?
This McDonald's dish is their take an old-fashioned dish with New York City roots, the Waldorf Salad. For more ideas in this style, check out Vanessa's version using grapes and blue cheese or search Epicurious.
Are you serious! We're discussing duplicating something done by McDonald's.
Do I really need to come to a cooking site to read about McD's?
A more appropriate slant to this piece would have been, "hey, look at how gourmet has reached the masses!" if you really think their salad was inspired by a Waldorf. I guess. I'm trying to justify this in some way . . .
No offense, but I've tried the apple, grape, walnut salad at Mc D's and honestly thought it was nasty. The apples had a weird almost medicine-y flavor and the yougurt stuff was bland.
For a better alternative for work I would try lettecue, red del. apple slices, dried cranberries and a mix of mozzerlla, provolone and feta cheese crumbles. I tried that once and it was tasty and didn't taste like someone poured Benadryl on my apples!
Not to diss on McD's tho, its fries are bomb-haha
Chris,
I am really surprised that after reading and writing so much on gourmet food, you would venture into a McDonalds for lunch. How ironic! Are you really passionate about your work, or are you just pretending? Alright, I am being a little hard on you. We slip-up every now and then; plus, you attempted to turn a negative into a positive. I also like the idea of a bring your lunch to work segment.
I bring my lunch every day, so here is a tip: Keep some frozen items on hand. Most days I manage to pack up some homemade soup or leftovers. But when I don't have time for that I grab an Amy's organic burrito from the freezer along with a couple pieces of fruit. It takes 2 whole seconds, and it sure beats McDonald's.
Tessa, I agree with you that the fries -- gourmet or not -- are tasty. You can see from my picture I helped myself to some while I tried the salad.
Anon, I develop ideas for posts, I often ask myself (as this mission of this site challenges) to consider my food-related rituals and traditions as well as those of the readers who comment here and email me.
When I honestly looked at my "food traditions", McDonalds was one of them, for better and worse. I have sharp memories of going to McDonalds with my mom and brothers to celebrate report card success. I'm not advocating this as a parenting practice, but fast food is part of my own history and cravings, especially at lunch time. When I try to think up new lunch ideas, I think it's important to know your 'enemies'.
I meant to say in the post that I've read Fast Food Nation, but from time to time, I still find myself running into McDonalds for a snack.
Sarah, I tried to do more research how McDonald's came up with the concept of this salad. I did research in online business publications, but only found vague references to the salad ingredients being similar to a Waldorf. I thought the slight connection between the mighty Waldorf and McDonalds was interesting and a way to frame the whole post around our NYC.
Cooking inspiration can come from many places and I'm not trying to imitate McDonalds. I think we can make a much better lunch.
The King Arthur Flour site (shop.bakerscatalogue.com) sells a flavoring called Princess Cake that might be the non-vanilla flavoring you're looking to replicate. I haven't eaten this yogurt thing, so I can't say for sure...
I agree that there are a lot better quick lunch choices than Mc Donalds, but I am happy to see that someone has admitted that they like the yogurt there- which I would never admit that I actually like it to my foodie friends.
Too bad Mc Donalds can't fry in beef fat anymore- those were the days....
everyone has to eat, and sometimes, mackers is what's nearby
how many of you guys eat at chipotle?
remember, it's owned by mcdonald's....
inspiration can stike anywhere, i'm sure people made fun of andy warhol for taking inspiration from a campbells soup can...
Chris, three cheers and good for you! Toast the walnuts. You won't get the shot of vanilla with extract, but try vanilla sugar in the yogury--ooh--maybe make vanilla sugar walnuts instead.
"McDonald's doesn't say where this secret sauce comes from. (We probably don't want to know.)"
Yes, they do, right on their site. Not that hard to find. It's Dannon Low-Fat Vanilla Yogurt.
Fruit & Walnut Salad:
Apple Slices and Red Grapes, Low Fat Yogurt, Candied Walnuts
Low Fat Yogurt:
Cultured pasteurized Grade A low fat milk, sugar, modified food starch, fructose, nonfat dry milk, whey. Contains milk ingredients.
Yogurt
http://www.mcdonalds.com/usa/eat/quality0/dairy.html
McDonalds has partnered with renowned suppliers such as Dannon and General Mills to supply the Vanilla Lowfat Yogurt found in the Fruit 'n Yogurt Parfait. Dannon has been making yogurt for more than 60 years, and uses only Grade A low fat milk, plus live and active yogurt cultures that are carefully cultivated. McDonalds Fruit 'n Yogurt Parfait makes for a nutritious snack with the combination of creamy low fat yogurt along with blueberries and strawberries.
Anon, this yogurt tastes nothing like the vanilla Dannon and Yoplait yogurts available in stores.
I like the McDonald's yogurt too. I'm not afraid to admit it :) Considering I can't stand other kinds of yogurt so far (I've never been a yogurt person but I'm trying) I've really wanted to know what McDonald's uses.
I might try the Dannon brand since someone mentioned it but considering "Chris" said it's not the same, I'm skeptical. I guess if all else fails, I'll just keep buying the fruit and walnut snack to get the yogurt, since I eat the fruit and walnuts with the snack anyway. No big deal I suppose.
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