McDonald’s

This McDonalds for some reason has featured in a load of ads for the brand here in Ireland.
It’s a very popular outlet & offers the standard fare.
They’ve recently changed the ordering system with the inclusion of two double sided stand alone kiosks to order & pay by card & re-​configured the counter so that there’s three tills one side where you pay & you then move to the right & wait to be served your food.
It’s a horrible system. I’m all for change, but this was a bad move. Orders get mixed up, the staff look awkward, and the customers are standing waiting to grab their food. Overhead a display counts the upcoming & currently served orders, like in Argos.
Seems to take longer to get served also.

While desperately searching for something fancy and interesting to review I thought to myself ’ Why not keep it local?’. My local Maccers seemed to fit the bill nicely.
The ubiquitous golden arches serve the dual purpose of being my «I’m too broke/​lazy to cook dinner» restaurant and my morning caffeine de-​fibrillation. The breakfast menu is deliciously unhealthy and really challenges my concept of moderation. The Sausage McMuffin defies the laws of physics in that it can contain more saturated fat than a large bucket filled with saturated fat. Also more salt than… well it has a lot of salt in it.
The coffee is surprisingly good and having seemed to realise this, McDonalds have spruced up their coffee even further (though it could be just marketing) advertising it as «full bean» and Rainforest Alliance. This not only appeals to my taste buds but also inflates my sense of superiority over my fellow human as I sip my coffee thinking what a great guy I am helping out all those nice Peruvian coffee growers. Never thought it seemed possible that philanthropy and Mc Donalds would mix. I can see Burger King sponsoring a Burmese child with every Whopper sold to one-​up them someday.
Apart from totally guilt-​free food (ahem) and coffee related smugness it’s a nice quiet place to have breakfast without all the screaming kids of the afternoon. I make a point of getting up early some mornings just to chill out for 15 minutes with one of their complimentary papers. It’s also quite swanky inside. So much so that they film all the Irish Mc Donalds ads in there! Although they did close when they were filming the last one which put a bee in my bonnet. I had a serious caffeine craving at the time!