Staff have urged people to ‘be honest’ and not to exploit a common ‘life hack’
I worked at a McDonald’s branch for just under four years while at university. Sometimes, customers would come up to me fuming about the same problem so many times—cold fries. Considering fries accompany almost every meal at McDonald’s, it’s not an uncommon issue.
Unless you order in the store and eat them within about five minutes, chances are you’ll end up with a cold side of chips. Once they’re bagged up, they lose heat quite quickly because they are so thin compared to something a little thicker, like oven chips.
If this happens to you often enough, you might want to find a long-term solution. This is exactly what customers and workers did on Reddit, and as someone who worked at McDonald’s, I can vouch for it. In the McLounge forum, someone posted a question asking what they can do to prevent this from spoiling their meals in the future.
They asked: “Not an employee, just a customer who doesn’t want to inconvenience people. I’m in the UK if that matters. I’m very fussy about my fries, I only like them when they are fresh out of the fryer hot.
“I don’t want to be a pain, so I rarely order fries but sometimes I really crave the hot, salty goodness. Is there a way to ask for them that isn’t going to p*** the staff off?”
One person replied: “It’s fine to order fresh food if you’re patient and willing to wait.” Another said: “They take about three and a half minutes to cook, don’t feel bad asking for fresh as they get made so often it’s probably not the big deal most people think it is.”
Fast food fans have shared the ‘trick’ for years that asking for ‘no salt’ on fries guarantees the staff will cook a fresh batch of the iconic golden side order. While this is true, McDonald’s workers say there’s a better three-word phrase to ask for what you really want.
A third wrote: “If you order fries while it’s busy, it will most likely come hot, but if it’s not busy then make sure you ask for ‘cook to order’ instead of no salt.” Someone else said: “Please never ask for no salt, just ask for ‘cook to order’ on anything you want fresh.”
A fifth put: “Just order [at the] front counter [and ask for] cook to order. Say that you are patient and don’t mind waiting.” One more added: “Don’t ask for ‘no salt’, ask for ‘cook to order’.”
Asking for no salt on fries is a perfectly reasonable request, especially if customers are keen to limit their salt intake. Too much salty, fatty food can cause high blood pressure, heart disease, kidney disease or diabetes.
But, people should be aware that, for the sake of fresh chips, the wait time may be even longer than just asking for ‘cook to order’. The request means that staff need to make space for the new fries in the station. While they are cooking, the sectioned-off area is cleaned to remove as much of the previous traces of salt as possible, which means you end up waiting much longer for your order.