Creating My Own Burger at McDonald’s

Last week I mentioned visiting the oldest operating McDonald’s in Southern California. Today it’s all about McDonald’s latest innovation – Create Your Taste.

Create your taste is a build your own burger concept at select McDonald’s stores in Southern California.  Recently, I was invited to stop by and try it out at the Laguna Niguel store. Now, I was really curious. How was I going to build my own burger at McDonald’s? Isn’t it all about the quick meal? So I headed on down to Laguna to see what it was all about.

As soon, as I walked into the door I was floored. The restaurant was like no McDonald’s I had ever been in. Warm colors, mod tables and chairs, a laptop bar??? Where was I? And then there was the Create Your Taste kiosk.

The kiosk is inspired by a smart phone with easy touch screen capabilities. Because it’s an entirely new concept, there’s an employee standing by to assist you with ordering. Now there are 22 different ingredients you can customize into your burger. You have your choice of protein, cheese, bread, toppings and sauces. I opted for a burger patty, artisan roll, sharp white cheddar cheese, grilled tomato, grilled mushrooms, leaf lettuce and barbeque sauce. Plus, I added sweet potato fries and a Coke to make it a meal.

I was then invited to the back to see my burger being made. Now, here’s another new concept. Every Create Your Taste meal is made to order. Because of that, it takes about 10 minutes for your meal to be ready so no drive thru option on this one.

Already, this was looking like no McDonald’s burger I’d ever seen before. I headed back to the dining room to await my finished product. Instead of being called to the counter to pick up my meal I would have it delivered to me. When it arrived I couldn’t believe what I saw.

It was delivered on a super cute cart! The fries were in a mini fry basket! And look at that burger!

I took a bite and it was pretty darn tasty. Was it the best burger I’d ever had? I couldn’t say that. Was it the best McDonald’s burger I ever  had? By a long shot. I loved the freshly grilled bun and all the toppings. The patty was the traditional McDonald’s patty. I would have preferred something a little more unique but overall I quite enjoyed it.

Luckily, when I was finished I still had room for dessert because this particular McDonald’s has something special. Create Your Own Dessert! There are customizable sundaes and McFlurries on the menu and they even have chocolate ice cream. There’s also a few on menu sundaes and I got to sample them.

Mm, mm, mm. These were absolutely delicious. I seriously had to hold myself back from devouring both of them.

All in all, I was pretty impressed with Create Your Taste. Kudos to McDonald’s for shaking things up!