Hello it's blogging time once again and it's St. Patrick's Day again! But for today's blog celebrating, Ive had a sad experience today indeed as I was unable to get McDonalds signature menu item offered every St. Patrick's Day: The Shamrock Shake.
Yes, i've already mentioned the history of the Shamrock Shake and its Uncle O'Grimacey mascot used to advertise it back in the 70's, and mentioned the shakes cult reputation it has with a lot of people, myself included, even talked bout my walks to obtain one. But today I was greeted by an unfortunate sight when using the McDonald's App:
After further investigation, while the kiosk said sold out, I actually think i've been hit with one of the most notorious problems with McDonald's, The ice cream machine was broken! Yes this is such a problem with McDonald's, it's become a joke over the years. But believe it or not, They're not wrong, their machines are broken. Thats because they use whats possibly the worst soft serve ice cream machine in history, The Taylor C602.
These machines are infamous for 2 reasons: 1). The machines require extensive cleaning and maintenance routines, which is often overly complicated and time-consuming. Making it more likely to result in mistakes during the cleaning process, leading to potential breakdowns, and 2). The machines run on proprietary software that make it prone to problems or errors, requiring specialized technicians to perform repairs.
It's so bad, that the website McBroken.com tracks which ice cream machines at McDonald’s are out of commission, a third party company called Kytch has created a modifactation to allow for clearer error messages (Resulting in legal action), and even the FTC and legal action has been involved resulting in a right to repair exemption being granted to franchises by the US Copyright Office in October of 2024.
So why is McDonalds supplied with such an unreliable machine? Well the answer traces back to the early days of the franchise. In 1956, Ray Kroc made a handshake agreement with the Taylor Company to supply milkshake machines for the fast food chain as its exclusive supplier. Ironically, Kroc was a milkshake mixer salesman by trade, and had been trying to get the McDonald brothers to buy his companies design, but the rejected him each time he tried.
Taylor themselves had a history making soft serve ice cream machines, in fact, they arguably invented it! The company was founded in 1926 by Charles Taylor, a third-generation ice cream maker from Buffalo, New York, who invented an automated countertop ice cream freezer which allowed restaurants to manufacture their own ice cream from mixes themselves. He later created a machine that stored liquid ingredients in a hopper and freezed them in another chamber. By using blades it scraped the frozen product off the walls and sent it to a nozzle. It was possibly the first soft serve machine and became a hit with restaurants.
Now while I'm sure the Taylor machines worked better back in the 50's, unfortunately it’s not the same now. Which is why I say McDonalds needs to either upgrade to a better Taylor model, or ditch them, because this is ridiculous!
So, if you can’t get something, you do it yourself! And that’s what I did. One trip to Ho’s for a cup, some Ben and Jerry’s Mint Chocolate Cookie Ice Cream, some 1% milk, a 2 spoons, a knife, and a straw, some angry grumbles and some hand mixing later, I was left with this:.
I mean, it was alright, but my mixing was not optimal to get that desired thickness and tis missing that green color. If this was made with a blender and some green food coloring, Id probably have a winner. But alas, I'm stuck with a inferior liquid substitute for seasonal minty treat. Im hoping next year will be better but until then, Happy St. Patrick's Day, and Thanks for reading! See you next time!