The Shamrock Shakes

It's March, the month of extremely unpredictable weather, though with a strategically placed holiday: St. Patrick's Day. Here in America, this has become a day of celebrating the Irish, in the looniest ways possible, but it's only ostensibly about them. It's really about helping us to forget, at least for a day (and a night and a painful morning-after) that Spring, though right around the corner, is still at the end of a very long, cold, miserable street. 

So don't blame the Irish, or St. Patrick, for the abomination that is McDonald's Shamrock Shake.

Now it's rare that you'll indulge in a milkshake and expect it to be anything less than a calorie bomb, double that if you are eating at McDonalds. But there's something special about a dessert that has not just 820 calories in the large (22 ounce) size, but is also home to 54 mostly mysterious ingredients: 

click on the image to enlarge

The maraschino cherry alone has 11 ingredients. 11. Ingredients. In. The. Cherry.

This article from Bamboocorefitness.com goes even farther in-depth, listing every ingredient. and describing what it is and how bad it is for you. By their calculations, there are only 33 ingredients in this science nightmare. I'm not sure, but it may be because they only listed high fructose corn syrup once, whereas the HuffPost graphic lists it every time it occurs throughout the separate elements of the drink. Whatever. I think all reasonable people would agree that 33 or 54, that's still way too many freaking ingredients for a milkshake, especially when the vast majority of those ingredients are dangerous, health-threatening chemicals.

Look, McDonalds, you and I have never really had much of a relationship, so I know I'm not your target audience. What I wonder is, who IS your target audience? Not humans from Earth--I think that much is clear.

FYI: you can't pump us full of chemicals. We're really not made for it. It hurts us, makes us sick, and, over time, kills us. You know, makes us ex-customers. Maybe back on your home world, Carrageenan, things were different. Maybe there, the beings who came through your doors could tolerate the toxic concoctions you serve. Maybe they even thrived on it. But we humans don't; we really, really don't. So please, McDonalds, do the human race a favor: figure out how to put food in your food. Even the desserts. Even the special holiday desserts. Even the St. Patrick's Day desserts, when you think no one can tell the difference anyway. That would be really great, McDonalds.


Thanks to Big Sister Marsha, RN, MSN, for the Bamboocorefitness.com article.