McDonald’s My Burger Big Uno

Review of McDonald’s My Burger Big Uno

Website: http://www.mcdonalds.co.uk/ukhome/product_nutrition.beef.1311.the-big-uno.html

What they say:

Take a bite out of 100% beef, bacon, cheese slices, tomato ketchup, red onion and shredded iceberg lettuce with cool mayo in a tasty sesame-topped bun. The brainchild of Tammy Rose, this winning burger is packed with flavour.

Price: £3.99 for the burger only (subject to variation).

Calories: 707 kcal.

Welcome to week one of the My Burger promotion from McDonald’s, where we take a look at the first burger made by you, enjoyed by everyone – The Big Uno.

McDonald's Big Uno
McDonald’s promotional picture…

Now as you know, Burger Lad® was a finalist in this competition, and although disappointed not to have made the final five, we were still very glad and grateful to have participated.

Let me set the scene for you – two years ago we setup this fledgling burger review website.

Within the next few months we started searching the world looking at promotional items on the menu in other countries.

During this time, the My Burger promotion appeared on the BL® radar which was running in Germany.

We tweeted McDonald’s on numerous occasions asking if the UK would ever see it and always had the same response – “no plans at present.”

Imagine how flipping excited we were when we were informed it was coming to the UK.

Imagine then, how excited we were to just submit and see a Burger Lad® burger on the McDonald’s website.

So can you picture our reaction and celebration to make the finals and actually travel to McDonald’s UK HQ and create our burger!? And to meet all the people that day and to find out just how many of them had heard of us and read the website or watch our YouTube videos!?

So yeah. We were disappointed not to make the final five but it really wasn’t the end of the world like some of you would like to believe.

And no amount of anonymous trolling via the comments section and/or our Facebook page will detract from that.

After all, Burger Lad® will still be blazing a trail of burger glory in the fast food lane long after the last My Burger carton has been discarded in the bin.

McDonald's Big Uno
Five weeks, five burgers, five reviews…

So why was the Burger Lad® burger not picked?

Well firstly there were five or more better burgers available to choose from. And after all, did you really think that McDonald’s would want to associate with the original loose cannon!? Of course not…

The average UK palate is not ready for our creation yet and at the end of the day the Golden Arches are in the business of selling the most burgers possible.

Plus mushrooms are not everybody’s favourite ingredient – we were told it’s the one component that always fails at the product development stage…

Please don’t take this as being bitter as we really are not.

We are your favourite, impartial burger review website and with the previous disclaimer out of the way we can now review all five weeks burgers without any allegations of bitterness or sour grapes.

Just read any of our McDonald’s reviews since we launched in October 2012 – how could we not be excited by five new burgers from Ronald and friends!?

And remember… we were the first in the world to reveal the names of the winning burgers.

Without any more delay let us take a look at The Big Uno…

We were there on day one and probably one of the first in the world to try the Big Uno – just check Twitter to see when we had photos out there!

Had to wait quite a while today as this was being made from scratch so there would be no burger slide on this occasion.

McDonald's Big Uno
My Burger promotional box…

After a while, I received the promotional box above which is a generic My Burger carton showing the five winning burgers.

We parked up in our secret burger location and did the usual photo shoot and filmed the latest episode of BLTV which you can see below.

I was pretty impressed with the presentation of the Big Uno, especially as this was possibly the first made up at the drive-thru I visited this morning.

At the heel end of the burger sat the oval shaped patty with a solid amount of bacon and this had a layer of ketchup over. On top of the bacon the cheese was just slightly melted by the warmth of the proteins below.

McDonald's Big Uno
First look at the Big Uno…

As you move up the build there is a good amount of shredded iceberg lettuce and a considerable amount of the fresh red onion.

The Big Uno is completed at the crown with a fair few splurges of cool mayo. But how do you ask, did it taste?

Well I liken the Big Uno to the New York Classic and you can see our comparison table below.

My initial bite was a sharp taste of red onion which was fresh and strong on the palate. It’s definitely one of my favourite burger toppings but anyone not a fan could be put off by the vast amount on-board.

I’ve never been a fan of ketchup but with it sandwiched between the cheese and bacon and combined with the flavour of the beef it was inoffensive and I actually quite enjoyed its presence.

McDonald's Big Uno
McDonald’s My Burger Big Uno…

Weighing in at a massive 707 calories this is not a daily burger to be participating in. But I liked the taste combination of the Big Uno but more than anything it was the textures that worked on this burger.

You’ve got quite a chewy sensation of the bacon to satisfy the primitive carnivore in you (and obviously the beef) but there’s a crispy/crunchy feeling from the lettuce and red onion.

Overall, not a bad start to the My Burger promotion and I can see why McDonald’s would begin with this one compared to the more adventurous offerings in weeks 4 and 5.

I guess it is to entice the average consumer in with something not too off-the-wall as, like I said, this to me is very similar to the New York Classic. As you can see there are huge similarities…

Big UnoNew York Classic
100% beef patty100% beef patty
Sesame-topped bunChilli, chive and sesame topped bun
BaconBacon
Cheese slicesCheese slices
Tomato ketchupKetchup
Red onionRed onion rings
Shredded iceberg lettuceShredded lettuce
Cool mayoCool mayo
Mustard

So as you can see above it’s not the most innovative creation ever… but it works! And it works well and McDonald’s will want to sell as many of these as possible, so in my opinion this is a safe bet release.

McDonald's Big Uno
Lifting the lid on week one…

I liked the Big Uno and we’ll be getting another one later in the week as I am conducting my own social experiment where a few close friends (not burger or McDonald’s fanatics) will be scoring each of the five winning burgers and then ranking them in our final review in week five.

In the meantime check out our latest episode of Burger Lad® TV and our initial reactions and thoughts on the Big Uno…

We’ll be back on day one of week two to bring you our expert analysis of the Sweet Chilli Fiesta.

Thanks for reading!

McDonald's Big Uno
A “safe” launch burger…

Burger Lad®

8 thoughts on “McDonald’s My Burger Big Uno

  • 15/10/2014 at 5:50 pm
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    I tried this today too. It was a really tasty burger but when you break down the ingredients its actually just a Whopper cheese and bacon minus the gherkins. Still, as you say it works and works well at that. I have a feeling this may be the one that sticks around (if any?).

  • 15/10/2014 at 5:50 pm
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    I tried this today too. It was a really tasty burger but when you break down the ingredients its actually just a Whopper cheese and bacon minus the gherkins. Still, as you say it works and works well at that. I have a feeling this may be the one that sticks around (if any?).

  • 17/10/2014 at 11:33 pm
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    Nice, got one earlier. Nice patty, nothing to dangerous here but a good burger. Only £3.69 in my local in Leeds which always seems to have our 'standard price'.

  • 17/10/2014 at 11:33 pm
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    Nice, got one earlier. Nice patty, nothing to dangerous here but a good burger. Only £3.69 in my local in Leeds which always seems to have our 'standard price'.

  • 23/10/2014 at 7:20 pm
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    how can you compare this bland rubbish to a whopper? THE most boring, uninspired attempt I have ever seen.

  • 23/10/2014 at 7:20 pm
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    how can you compare this bland rubbish to a whopper? THE most boring, uninspired attempt I have ever seen.

  • 01/11/2014 at 3:01 pm
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    Hmmmm……anyone else think there's a "political agenda" behind the Big Uno getting as many votes as it has?…….come on, how come the big uno votes are so far in front of the sweet chilli burger when the SCF murders it on taste.
    Me thinks McDonalds have made a right pigs ear of this promo!!!!!!!!!!

  • 01/11/2014 at 3:01 pm
    Permalink

    Hmmmm……anyone else think there's a "political agenda" behind the Big Uno getting as many votes as it has?…….come on, how come the big uno votes are so far in front of the sweet chilli burger when the SCF murders it on taste.
    Me thinks McDonalds have made a right pigs ear of this promo!!!!!!!!!!

Comments are closed.