I was told when I got hired that I would soon tire of McDonald’s food. Three months later and 40 pounds heavier, they were proven wrong!
I did hate the McDonald’s smell in my uniforms. It was the smell of grease, pickles, and onions because I worked at the fryers and the grill, mostly.
My favorite McDonald’s food item was French fries before they changed their frying medium from the original “Formula 47” which included beef tallow. It came in 40 or 50-lb solid cubes. After closing, there would be some fries left. They were at the stage of being hot and somewhat softer. Irresistible!
The worst jobs there were cleaning grease traps/grill filters and filtering/changing the grease in the fryers.
I also loved the fried apple and cherry pies, so bubbly and crisp. They had to cool for 5 minutes before they could be served or else people would be scalded.
Their menu was much simpler in the 70s. We used styrofoam boxes for the larger sandwiches. Their uniforms were so garish, I was ashamed to be seen when riding my bike or moped to work, already in the uniform. I’m sure I got some looks. Here is my color from the moped era (from my 2nd McDonald’s job) (image from Google images- not me, just the same uniform).
Honestly, I really never met McDonald’s food I didn’t like. I was able to switch up choices enough to never get bored. My first job killed my high school romance potential, which may have been a good thing because of no accidental pregnancies or early failed marriages. Young men are not mature enough for all of that. Silver lining!
Edit: The french fry comments reminded me of a particular Saturday morning.
I was at the ripe old age of 12. I could not wait for my french fry fix. I rode my bike to McDonald’s and decided on 3 large orders of fries for my lunch. I ate them right there in the lobby.
Sure, I could have gotten by with 2, but I powered through them all! They did not have bigger sizes then. It was and always will be my personal best (and worst).
Nowadays that same size is officially called “medium” because they don’t want to shame the overeaters.
When I started working for them later, they trained us never to use the word “small” in relation to sizes. The correct term was “regular”. Not so confusing as Starbucks’ coffee size terms, but that’s marketing. We had to try to upsell desserts and drinks and larger drink sizes as well. This was well before the advent of combo-meal deals.
The drive-through was a brand new thing as well that started just after I did at my store.
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