Today I talked to my father who’s currently in India for two weeks on a business trip. Since his job entails international business, my father has been traveling the world since before I was born, and is able to adapt to different cultures quickly and easily. However, my dad does have some difficulties adapting to India’s spicy foods. According to him, every meal in India (breakfast, lunch, and dinner) is loaded with strong spices. My dad told me he spotted a McDonalds there and was nearly overwhelmed with joy; even though he would never touch fast food in America, he was desperate for a normal meal that wouldn’t burn his tongue off or have his stomach grumbling. Salivating at the thought of a juicy burger, my father literally ran to the fast food joint. Unfortunately, the cow is seen as a holy animal in India, according to religious beliefs. They aren’t allowed to eat burgers, or any kind of beef, and chicken isn’t the safest thing to order at a McDonalds in a third world country (especially India). So, my father was totally out of luck. A McDonalds that doesn’t serve burgers kind of sounds like an oxymoron, doesn’t it?
Yes, I felt terrible for my dad, yet I was also fascinated at the fact that there was a Mickey D’s in India! I had no idea that Ronald McDonald has gone international! I decided to do some Google searching about this and found out that McDonalds offers a regionalized version of their menu in different countries. According to Wikipedia, “the Veg ‘McCurry Pan’, the famous dish is very popular and is an original creation of McDonald's across India. It starts with a rectangular shaped crust that is topped with a creamy sauce, mushrooms, and vegetables including broccoli, baby corn, and red bell pepper. It is then baked until the crust is crisp and the toppings are hot and bubbly.
I found out that there are McDonalds located on almost every continent! In Arabia, the popular item on the menu is the McArabia of course, which has two versions: Grilled chicken, and grilled Kofta (beef with spices). Both are served with lettuce, tomatoes, onions, and garlic mayonnaise in addition to two small patties of grilled chicken or Kofta, all wrapped in an Arabic style pita bread.
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| "McHombard" |
In Canada you can enjoy a Mclobster roll, or “McHombard” in French. You will find an Ebi-Filet-O (shrimp burger), Koroke Burger (mashed potato, cabbage and katsu sauce, all in a sandwich), Ebi-Chiki (shrimp nuggets) and Green Tea-flavored milkshakes in Japan. In hong Kong, the people love their rice, so why wouldn’t their happy meals contain Rice Burgers, where the burgers are in between, not burger buns, but two patties of glutinous rice. In Malaysia's capital of Kuala Lumpur, breakfast at McDonald's includes the Bubur Ayam McD. In Singapore, it's called Chicken SingaPorridge, which is a cup of porridge with bits of chicken, ginger, shallots, onions, and chili peppers.
The list of strange foods go on and on. I must say, I’m actually pleasantly surprised to see these countries have their own unique McDonald menus that stay in accordance to their regions culture. I’m just glad that the western world hasn’t influenced a menu of greasy unhealthy foods that are responsible for the growing problem of obesity in America.
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