Double Big Mac II ...and the legend continues

What do you remember about the year 2020? Disease, poverty, racism, literal fire and brimstone. Aggressive sociopolitical cancer. Fear and loathing. So now, less than five years later, it's all smeared into a colorless paste that covers the walls and floors of every corner of existence; we forgot because it never went away. We're used to it. I'd gotten used to a world where McDonald's Double Big Mac flirted its way into a one night stand and then never called again. And then, in the darkness of January 2024, the sun came out. 

As the legend goes, when The Double Big Mac was introduced in 2020, it was intended as a new permanent menu item, and supposedly the Corona Pandemic somehow dissolved this fantasy. Something to do with supply and demand I guess; not even this great white whale could get people to leave the house. But I was there, and I indulged in what I thought was the New Normal: Four all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions, on a sesame seed bun. On paper the difference is subtle, but once you're burger-to-mouth, the full richness of the experiment is palpable. While McDonald's cuisine has always managed to linger in my veins and colon, it leaves my stomach and my soul empty; these aren't any prettier to the eye, but what happens is it gets you that much closer to the experience of eating the regular Big Mac you see pictured in the advertisements. 

However, whatever greatness lies within the standard Big Mac, its obstacles are also that much more magnified in this oversized novelty companion. I've always asserted that you can't (or shouldn't) eat a Big Mac in the car - not as a passenger, certainly not as a driver - because the sandwich itself is so structurally unsound that it requires a sturdy surface space directly in front of you. The thing with the Double Big Mac is that there are decidedly no feasible surfaces that accommodate the cumbersome nature of this beast. I've had four of these burgers so far this year and it's consistently defeated me, much as it did back in '20; eating it straight outta the box, even on a table, is not dissimilar to biting into a lubricated deck of glossy playing cards. Its countless layers of meat and bread discs begin to resist one another like the Repelling Force of two magnets. I'm someone who likes to alternate between the burger, the fries, and the beverage, and the simple act of picking it up and putting it down immediately and continuously aggravates it like a frightened insect. 

To combat this moist collapse of my meal I began eating the burger from start to finish without deviating to the sides or even letting go of the thing, which ultimately transforms this otherwise celebratory act of eating McDonald's into a daunting endurance test of thawed meat and wilted lettuce. It's on my hands, it's on my pants, it's in my left and my right ventricles - no break, no mercy, just something to get through while I fantasize about brown paper napkins. There's got to be a better way!

Short of dismantling it down to the pickles, the only approach I could think of was to saw the bitch in half like some fastidious Applebee's patron. Another culinary tradition to hold it together is to put a toothpick in it but that always gives me anxiety that I'm gonna stab myself in the eye. I figured two halves would be easier to control than one whole engagement, or at the very least provide me with an intermission to regroup and assess. 

Even with a serrated knife, cutting through its rubbery innards provoked a sloppy resistance as though it were still alive; a firm press of the palm was applied to restrain all twelve layers but each special saucy component ached to break free. As I consumed, each half behaved in the same manner as its sum; they slipped and slid and folded about themselves as they dispersed lettuce and frustration in their wake, but at least I had that midpoint pitstop for napkins and fries. 

Idealistically, its sloppy aggression is part of the experience and perhaps how McDonald's should be - just in terms of tone: if you're gonna get fat, get messy. Embrace your inner swine to replace the inner child that they left for dead decades ago. I like the burger because it's what a regular Big Mac should be and doesn't leave me with that post-burger letdown of "is that all there is, my McFriend?" Also that magic spell of Limited Time Only always puts me in a trance, no matter what it is; I hate the goddamn McRib but its scarcity has lured me into its blandness on more than one occasion. So for as long as it's around I'll buy it and eat it and get wet with casual abandon. Maybe I'll try a spoon. 

- Paul