I know, who the hell eats at McDonald’s when they’re on vacation right? Well, I’ve made it my personal jihad to check out McDonald’s in the different countries I visit for their localized menu items.
It’s like stamp collecting – how do you explain it? I can’t, an inexplicable urge came over me and I told the tuk tuk driver: “Bring me to your leader!”
I meant bring me to the nearest McDonald’s.
The first regional difference is their sauce – instead of chilli sauce, their chilli sauce is infused with garlic. Nice! There is no regular chilli sauce here.
McDonald’s is renowned for their signature Big Macs. The Big Macs in Sri Lanka comes in two variants – beef and chicken (due to the religious constitution – Hindus don’t eat beef).
The staff is very friendly and accommodating – but perhaps only to foreigners, since I noticed they were decidedly cold towards a local who was short LKR 50. I paid for her; it’s only RM 2, not a big deal to us, my good dead for the day. 😉 I also got a free Coke from this scratch and win contest they’re having. It was either a drink, a t-shirt or a trip to South Africa to watch…you guessed it, cricket!
I ordered a McRice with Chicken (LKR 220 or USD 2.20). It also comes with the option of fish (since Sri Lanka is an island in the middle of the ocean) or vegetables (a sizable community here is vegetarian).
The chicken is nothing to write home about – it’s just a piece of fried chicken breast.
However, they do have a rather tasty sauce of onions with gravy that adds that extra dimension of taste to the chicken. The rice on the other hand, is really something I would take the time to draft a long correspondence back for!
The interesting thing about their rice is that it’s heavily flavored by various spices and comes with a side serving of shallots. I notice that Sri Lankans loves their red onions. It’s served at almost every meal!
I also got a Vegetarian Burger with Cheese (LKR 360 or USD 3.60). It’s obviously not for vegans due to the cheese but it tastes good – like the Vege Burger I had in Melbourne.
I was stuffed at that point but I insist on trying all their different menu items so I had a Chicken Big Mac (LKR 410 or USD 4.10) to go. It’s unusual, tastes like a McChicken instead of a Big Mac, but with two all-beef chicken patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun.
The other thing I noticed about McDonald’s in Sri Lanka is that they don’t have proper sealed sauces for take away.
They use a flat round container instead. This is how it looks like beside a LKR 5 coin. I’m not sure if this is a recipe for botulism but since it’s Maccas I guess they should have reasonable standards, even in Sri Lanka. 😉
McDonald’s in Sri Lanka is quite expensive when you consider the currency exchange. I paid the equivalent of RM 12 for a Chicken Big Mac. I don’t know how it rates on the Big Mac Index by The Economist magazine, but it’s certainly not cheap.
Posted: 10:04 PM Sri Lanka time.
