My experience at McDonalds adyar chennai

As a Blogger, I was invited to the food writers meet @ MCdonalds at Adyar chennai, that happened yesterday at the McDonalds at Adyar, Chennai.

We were greeted by chef Swarup Solgaonkar, who was there to take us through the burger creation and unravel the world of McDonalds.

Chef Swarup showed a demo of preparing McEgg

Ingredients needed:

1. eggs
2. buns
3. veg sauce
4. onions
5. magical mix (a mixture of powdered coriander, garlic, turmeric, salt, pepper, chilli)

Here goes the process of making a McEgg at Home:

1. Take a pan..
2. Apply butter on the pan
3. Keep a cylindrical vessel on the pan
4. Break the egg and pour inside the cylinder.
5. After boiling, we will get a circular plate shaped egg patty.
6. Now heat the bun in the pan with little butter.
7. Now place the lettuce, egg patty and sprinkle the magic masala and add the veg sauce and onions between the buns.
8. And the egg burger is ready to be served.

After this demo,the chef had a quiz on eggs about the protein content, the difference between the white and brown eggs etc and the winners were given gifts.

Then we were invited to be shown around the kitchen. We were taken inside the kitchen and was shown the different equipment that were used in preparing the food items that we get from McDonalds.

The kitchen was separated into veg n non-veg area. The following were the equiptments that were in the kitchen space.

• Grillers - for grilling patties
• UHC - universal holding cabinet (heart of the kitchen), all the patties are kept in this cabinet and heated before being used to fill the burgers
• Wrap grillers
• VAT
• Freezers
• Egg cookers

We were also shown the stock room (cold and dry storage units used respectively for the paper plates, boxes and food items)

The kitchen was neatly maintained and the cleanliness was duly followed right from taking the raw chicken patties from the freezers to the process of grilling the patties. 

The kitchen visit was followed by a presentation on McDonald's quality policy in chicken sourcing. The company claims to get the chickens from big vendors like Venkys, Suguna etc.

The major food quality changes that McDonalds focused on, keeping in mind, the calorie conscious audience are:

• sodium is reduced by 10-20% in their items
• calorie (mayonnaise) - reduced by 40-50%
• calorie (burger) - reduced by 7-8%
• 100% veg palmolein oil used which is naturally transfat free

Then a contest was announced on burger preparation. We were asked to participate in the contest either as team or as an individual. I preferred to go solo. 

We were told to select the buns and the patties from the given list. 

After the buns and patties were ready, they were kept on the tables.

Then we were told to prepare burgers with our sense of creativity.

We had to select from the sauce varieties and also from the mix of fillings such as lettuce, olives, onions, tomatoes, etc.

The difference varieties of sauce kept were:

• veg mayo sauce
• tomato mayo sauce
• mint mayo sauce
• tandoori mayo sauce
• chipotle sauce

The Chipotle sauce was my favourite. It was prepared from a chilli variety that were sourced from North America. It had the essential spiciness and also gave the smoky taste.

I opted for 2 regular buns..and a Crispy chicken patty and Mc-grilled chicken patty.

I added two layers of cheese, tandoori mayo and chipotle sauce and made a simple burger and used all the other ingredients (lettuce, olives,tomatoes and onions) to garnish the plate.

My idea was to give a stuffed look to the plate, to make it look like a full-course burger meal that looks like a typical south indian dish.

Later, when the burgers were prepared by the participants, the burgers were tasted by Chef Swarup.

Upon tasting my burger and looking at my preparation, the chef said my burger brought nostalgic memories of Mumbai back to his mind

Few bloggers who came late were taken for the second round of the kitchen visit. Then the winners of the burger contest were selected and announced.

But unfortunately my burger didn't get selected..But never mind. Winning is not the sole motive when participating in contests. Mere participating in the contest gave me an immense joy. What not, wearing an apron, a white hat, and given a total liberty to prepare burgers and the height of excitement is you preparing the burgers and the top chef of McDonalds tastes your burger.

Ended up taking a photo op wid the chef and we all were given gifts and packets of pastas and pasta sauce. I obviously got two packets of pasta, so I can try my lifetime favorite food at home.

Summing it all up, I would say, McDonalds prepares all the food items in a healthy and clean environment, and based on the information they gave, I would say, all the burgers lovers who are thinking about avoiding more calories can surely try the burgers here.