The Daily Omnivore

The McRib is a barbecue pork sandwich periodically sold by the international fast-food restaurant chain McDonald’s. It was first introduced to the McDonald’s menu in 1981. After poor sales it was removed from the menu in 1985. It was reintroduced in 1989, staying on the menu until 2005. From 2006 onward, it was made available for a short time each year. The McRib consists of a pork patty, barbecue sauce, onions, and pickles served on a roll. Despite its name, it is primarily composed of pork shoulder meat, according to McDonalds. The patty is also composed of restructured meat products such as tripe, heart, and stomach and blended with salt and water to extract salt-soluble proteins, which act as a ‘glue’ that helps bind the reshaped meat together. The McRib has 70 ingredients, 34 of which are contained in the bun.

It was developed by McDonald’s first Executive Chef Rene Arend, who had fathered Chicken McNuggets in 1979. ‘The McNuggets were so well received that every franchise wanted them,’ said Arend in a 2009 interview. ‘There wasn’t a system to supply enough chicken. We had to come up with something to give the other franchises as a new product. So the McRib came about because of the shortage of chickens.’ It was his inspiration to shape the McRib patty ‘like a slab of ribs,’ despite the fact that a round patty would have been cheaper to manufacture and serve on standard hamburger buns.

The McMuffin is a family of breakfast sandwiches in various sizes and configurations, sold by the fast-food restaurant chain McDonald’s. It was invented by the late McDonald’s franchisee Herb Peterson in the late 1960s and was introduced nationwide in 1972. In the US and Canada the standard McMuffin consists of a slice of Canadian bacon, a griddle-fried egg, and a slice of American cheese on a toasted and buttered English muffin. The round shape of the egg is made by cooking it in a teflon coated ring. Peterson first presented the Egg McMuffin at a Santa Barbara franchise without the knowledge of McDonald’s Corporate, which at the time served only lunch and dinner at all their locations.

When Corporate discovered Mr. Peterson’s unauthorized breakfast offerings, it initially reprimanded him and threatened him with a number of penalties for breaking the franchise agreement. Today, several countries like Hong Kong serve Egg McMuffins around the clock, due to the prominent use of the egg in meals other than breakfast in those regions. US restaurants usually restrict the item to the breakfast menu. This is due mainly because the grill temperature for the beef patties and the eggs are significantly different from each other.