We ate it so you don’t have to: McDonald’s Szechuan Sauce

OFF MENU IS SPONSORED BY BENDER’S BECAUSE THEY ARE BADASS. DROP BY AND MAKE SOME BAD DECISIONS WITH SOME GOOD PEOPLE!

Welcome to, “We ate it so you don’t have to.”

While some are prepping for St. Patty’s Day and the already released Shamrock Shake, some are still celebrating the Lunar New Year. At leasts it appears Deadmau5 and Rick and Morty still are.

Rick and Morty are known to lure their predominately hetero-normative 18-34-year-old demographic into purchasing almost any brand the show pushes. Even McDonald’s sauces to dip your chicken nuggets into. In the late 90s, McDonalds released their special Szechuan Sauce in partnership with Disney’s Mulan. In 2017, Rick and Morty may have mentioned said sauce in one of their adventures into parallel and bizarro universes and the whippersnappers went insane. As the packets of sauce quickly disappeared from locations because of hoarders hoping to pocket a pretty penny, packets appeared on the internet selling for beaucoup chavo. A 64-ounce jug of the sauce was purchased for upwards of $15,000 and in the end it was revealed who the purchaser was. None of than Deadmau5 himself.

McDonalds caught wind of the shenanigans and asked Deadmau5 to talk about his experience on their podcast. They decided to re-release the sauce and just in time for the Lunar New Year.

Since I was determined to try this miraculous golden sauce, I figured I better be safe and pair it with McDonald’s chicken tenders, rather than their nuggets. Because you know, let’s opt for the more realistic of chicken. That should help. In comparison, the tenders are expensive. You can wrangle up a four-piece for $4. For $5 you can procure 20 chicken nuggets. Luckily, the tenders were fairly large, juicy and extraordinarily crispy on the outside. I have to admit, the texture was dope. Unfortunately, they had absolutely no flavor and I guess that’s where the dipping sauce comes into play. The tenders have their own “signature sauce.” A pink-ish, creamy and garlicky sauce that reminds me a lot of the mayo-ketchup beloved by Puerto Ricans across the globe. Two packets of the signature sauce were automatically chucked into the bag.

When I asked for the Szechuan sauce at the speaker, someone replied, “I’ll have to mark it as no sauce because we don’t have a button for the Szechuan.” Ooh, secret club, eh? When they handed me my bag of shit at the window, I quickly looked inside and as predicted, not a damn packet of Szechuan sauce was in there. They tried to play a playa. I quickly honked the horn and alerted the troops when he returned with a mere two packets. Two packets?! Can a playa have seven more so that I can hoard for 20-years and sell to some other wealthy, nostalgic, EDM celebrity? But, two was all I got.

The sauce is, as predicted, very un-Szechuan like. It contains almost no heat. Heavy on the sweet and gloopy. Golden in color and a formative sweet and sour with some pseudo heat characteristics. I did not enjoy this sauce. I can’t see how anyone would enjoy this sauce. I actually prefer the signature sauce. But, don’t tell that to the Szechuan sauce packet I have in my safe.