by Alan Lan
Most people have the experience of dining at McDonald’s. You know the Big Mac is tasty. But how many of you know how a Big Mac got to taste like a Big Mac? I bet not many. By reading this article, you will discover the mystery of McDonald’s and turn out to be a McDonald’s expert, just like me. I worked at McDonald’s. It was definitely not for any economic reason because beggars earn more than McDonald’s workers. What motivated me to work there was my love for the restaurant. Going to McDonald’s was like going to some paradise for me when I was little because the only things I did were eating yummy French fries and playing with Happy Meal toys. So I started my longtime relationship at that age and I still go very often today. I worked at McDonald’s for 6 months. And I got to know almost everything McDonald’s workers had to know, and even some things that we were not supposed to know. Working in McDonald’s is definitely not as easy as you might think. We are all very well trained before we start working. We all have to watch videos which have specific subjects. For example, we have to watch a series of videos about how to make a Big Mac before we actually go into the kitchen and make one. And we are also required to memorize everything about making the food we are asked to make. From the quantity of chicken nuggets that can be put in the frying basket to the ounces of sauce designed for different kinds of hamburgers, every step and process of food making is all set so there’s almost no room for you to make hamburgers your own way. It sounds like they are trying to make us to get the jobs done like robots do. I have to say that’s the idea. Many people would doubt the cleanliness in a McDonald’s kitchen. Honestly we don’t wear plastic gloves while making food, but we are actually all required to wash our hands thoroughly with some non-toxic sanitizer before entering into the kitchen. And touching anything unclean with your hands is not allowed. Once you touch your hair or apron, no matter what, you have to go wash your hands again. Well, at least that’s what they say in the worker’s guidebook. The guidebook also says you have to obey orders from the managers. Workers in blue shirts are managers. They are responsible for different areas but anyway we have to work harder when those blueshirts are around. Workers in red are so-called McDonald’s Aunties. What they do is play with kids or do surveys with customers and most of the time they just walk around in the dining area and see what they can do to help. Workers with the highest workload and lowest pay are the people in green. They can be at the counter or in the kitchen. We can simply tell how good they are by looking at the cards pinned on the chest. We don’t just see their names but also some numbers put in columns on the card. The numbers range from 1 to 4, and each column stands for a category of work he can do. If you see a guy with a lot of 1’s on his card, that means he is very experienced. So we should go to the guy with a 4 in column “C,” which means he is a begin-ner at the counter, because he would probably forget your order and charge you less money. The person in green with a yellow stamp decoration on the left sleeve is the best of all. He or she usually stands right behind the bin. The person is called the quality controller. What this person appears to do is just wrap or package the hamburgers. But actually what he or she does deserves the highest salary of any McDonald’s worker. The quality controller is more of a quantity controller. They have to con-trol the amount of products put in the bin. This task is extremely important. McDonald’s has a policy that we are not supposed to make customers wait for their orders. So we have to prepare the food in advance and put it in the bin, while we also have this rule that any product should never stay in the bin for more than 10 minutes. Therefore it’s up to the quality con-troller whether customers wait or prod-ucts have to be thrown away. There are tons of things quality controllers must consider. For example, they have to know the day, the time, the number of customers, even the weather, to decide what products and how many of them should be put in the bin. And they still have to go on packing hamburgers. If any mistake is made, there’s no way out. I got to be a kind of fill-in quality controller a couple of times, and I think I could have saved thousands of Africans with the food I wasted. Therefore, the 10 minute rule is not always so accurate. But somehow you can look at the little card put beside the hamburgers on the bin. The numbers seem hard to de-code but if you look at your watch you’ll get it. It’s the time the product is put in the bin but you have to add another 10 min-utes by your watch to get the right time. As for the apple pie, there should be a time written on the bottom of the box. This time no code or password. Just add 90 minutes to it and that’s the time it expires. There are definitely some pass-words between the workers. Sometimes the quality controller or a manager might shout “Big Mac is delicious!” Once the counter people receive that password, they know that there are too many Big Macs in the bin and they are going to expire. So next time the counter guy recommends anything to you, I would say you better think about it, unless what he recommends is exactly what you want. I love McDonald’s. And I am defi-nitely trying to get more people to fall in love with it. I honestly hope my article helps every one of you to understand McDonald’s better and enjoy it more. a
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The Taida Student Journal has been active since 1995 with an ever-changing roster of student journalists at NTU. Click the above link to read about the authors Archives
May 2024
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