A few weeks ago, I chanced upon a show on the Travel Channel about The World’s Most Unique McDonald’s, and this particular McDonald’s in Dallas is in the top 10.  So when my family was in Dallas last week, we made sure that one of our meals will be at McDonald’s.

Everything about this McDonald’s is supersized as far as it’s architectural design is concerned.  Check out that giant Big Mac over the main door!  Here’s a closer look in case you missed it.  Hee hee!

It was just too bad that it started to drizzle (which eventually turned into a downpour) as soon as we got out of the car.  So I didn’t get to take decent photos of the other side of the building, which is far more interesting than the the side I was able to take photos of.  I did try to steal some shots while inside a moving car.  These will have to do for now…

A giant Happy Meal box needs gigantic food (gigantic weight loss pills, anyone! not!) …fries, check….

…drinks, check…burger, check.

I love that the drive-thru window is under gigantic fries.  I would have loved to go through the drive thru before we finally headed home.  Maybe next time.

An exterior as unique as this needs an interior that is equally unique as far as your regular McDonald’s is concerned.  And true enough, I wasn’t disappointed…

Chandeliers galore (with incandescent lighting to boot!) above what I hear are  mahogany booths!

Each of the booths had a lamp, too!

There were artifical floral arrangements in various sizes all over the place.  I would have preferred fresh flowers, then again, that might be asking a bit too much already.  Hahaha!

The giant Happy Meal box houses the playscape, which is two-storeys high, too.  It has supersized sculptures of Ronald…

and the Hamburglar (or is it Hamburgler?)…

As for the food, it’s still the same bland burger that can be had at any McDonald’s outlet the world over.  :D

It’s ironic that the happy meal isn’t in a happy meal box.  Hee hee.

I’m glad we stopped by this McDonald’s.  My little girl had fun, plus, the visit gave me something to blog about.  :P  You can read more about this unique McDonald’s HERE.

Have a wonderful weekend, y’all!  Cheers!

“You’ll forget the sun in his jealous sky; As we eat the foods of gold.” Hee hee. Sorry, Sting!  I just had to borrow these two lines from one of your hit songs.

This week’s Lasang Pinoy, Sundays’ theme is “Fried/Golden”.  Let’s face it, a lot of the best tasting, tummy tickling, finger-licking foods out there are the ones which are fried to a golden brown.  Why?  I don’t know really.  Sad as it may seem, but there’s something about greasy, sinful food that just appeals to everyone who couldn’t care less about calories, fats and slimp pants.  And that includes this blogger. Hee hee.

Here are some homemade goldies…

Camaron Rebosado (100% Made from Scratch)

Breaded Pork Chop (I used a storebought breading mix for this one!)

Here are golden food treasures from fastfoods and restaurants…

French Fries and Chicken Nuggets

Jollibee Fried Chicken (Give me some skin!)

Mixed Tempura

It’s a good thing that I’m still much too full to be craving any of the above listed food.  That might not be the case a few hours from now.  Hee hee hee.

Enjoy the rest of the weekend, y’all!

This week’s photo hunt theme is “Road“.  I dug into my photo archives for these photos.  These photos were taken at Sonic, a popular US drive-in food chain.  We’re not exactly crazy about their food but we end up in here anyway whenever we are on the road and in a hurry.  The food isn’t so bad really but there are better options.  Anyway, anything to keep the tummy from rumbling. Hee hee.

The dessert menu board on was by my window.  Tempting!

Hubby enjoying his burrito.

I believe I had a burrito, too.  Abby is munching on some fries.

I have another Photo Hunt entry HERE.  Visit other photo hunters here.

Have a great weekend! :)

What McDonald’s is to the US, Jollibee is to the Philippines.  Jollibee is the number one hamburger/fastfood chain in the Philippines.  It has 23 outlets outside the Philippines and 12 of these are in the US.  Unfortunately for us, the US outlets are concentrated in the West Coast, specifically, California.  There’s one outlet in Nevada and another one is set to open in New York some time this year.  I consider our dinner at Jollibee when we were in California a month ago, to be the highlight of our CA holiday, at least, where food is concerned. ;)

We went to the Jollibee West Covina outlet.  And I tell you, it was like we were home.  :D

2-dollar weekday treats? Not bad. I would have paid $5. But that’s just home-sick l’il ‘ol me. :P

If McDonald’s has a Ronald McDonald, Jollibee has, well, Jollibee!  :D

Abby had a one-piece chicken joy kiddie meal. I loved the pail that came with the meal! Too bad we forgot to bring it back home to Texas.

I’ve already decided what to order long before we left Texas: chicken joy and palabok (noodles with yelloworange-colored sauce). In the photo is a one-piece chicken joy and palabok meal (my aunt’s).  Normally, this would have been enough for me.  But after more than a year of Jollibee free existence, I wanted MORE.  Hahaha!

Both Hubby and I had a 2-piece chicken  with lots of gravy. Forget the mashed potato. Forget the biscuit. Forget the coleslaw. Hello rice! Hahaha! The rice serving, by the way, was as big as a hamburger bun. Huge!

Hubby was happy to finally have fried chicken with rice. Fried chicken without rice is just not the same. And I’m speaking for both Hubby and me. :D

Don’t I look positively and absolutely happy? 

Hubby and I also shared an order of pancit palabok.  Yummy! :)

I could have eaten at Jollibee everyday during our 9-day stay in California.  Really!  Nevertheless, I’m glad we didn’t.  I’d probably end up seeking solace in diet pills after a daily diet of greasy chicken.  Kidding. :P 

Fly with Abby here, my other WS entry. :) Have a great week ahead! 

Several weekends ago, we had a grand time lunching (is there even such a word?) at Mighty Fine Burgers, Fries, Shakes. If you love burgers, then may I just warn you that this entry might just make your mouth water. :D

Note: The words in block quotes were taken from the Mighty Fine website. :)

The Burgers

As per the menu board:

Mighty fine’s premium Texas Style burgers are made from 100% fresh all-natural beef that is ground on-site and hand-formed.

You gotta believe them. Burgers are indeed ground and hand-formed on-site! :D

Here’s what they have to say about their burger add-ons:

Mighty Fine’s commitment to quality and freshness is carried over to every product we serve. The lettuce, vine-ripened tomatoes and onions are hand sliced on site each day. We use real American cheese and our buns are baked fresh daily.

This photo that just about proves the above words. I gotta have that tomato slicer!

Oooh, juicy burger. Hubby and Abby loved it. Your mouth’s gonna be stretched to its limit from the first to the last bite. Hee hee. California is all the raves with its In-and-Out Burger. Hubby dares say that its match here in Texas is Mighty Fine. ;)

The Fries

When it comes to fries, Mighty Fine re-wrote the book. We serve the only fresh cut, crinklecut fry in Texas and quite possibly the entire nation. We start with fresh potatoes shipped straight from the farm. We then hand-cut and crinkle each fry with a special machine before frying them in 100% trans-fat free peanut oil.

I’m loving their potato cutter/crinkler machine. Is that what it’s called? Hee hee.

From cutting/crinkling to frying…

Yummy and irresistable crinkle fries! Abby loved it!

The Chili Dog

Mighty Fine calls their chili dog – Spicy Chopped Chili dog…

This unique chili recipe contains the same Coleman all-natural chuck we use for our hamburgers. Our proprietary 100% all-beef franks are sliced rather than served in whole links. This creates a chili dog with a “one-of-a-kind”taste and one that is both less messy and easier to eat.

Just please take my word for it. This tastes better than it looks.

You might just want to stick to the burgers though, only because you’ll end up envying the people in your party who were smart enough to order the burgers, which are huge, juicy and yummy.

The Shake(s) and Lemonade

To top it all off, we offer guests delicious hand-dipped milk shakes and hand-squeezed lemonade. Our shakes are made with Blue Bell premium vanilla ice cream. We believe a high quality shake should always be hand-dipped and hand-spun, we do both at Mighty Fine. Even our chocolate sauce is made from scratch daily.

The shakes was just too good. I don’t know if I just imagined it, but I had the impression Hubby was hoping Abby wouldn’t finish her chocolate shake. Hahaha!

Our hand-squeezed lemonade is only made with the freshest hand-cut Sunkist lemons plus an added “secret” ingredient that results in a unique, Mighty Fine taste.

Etcetera

Besides the shakes, lemonade and soda (from the vendo machine), Mighty Fine has beverages which come in glass bottles. I’m sure the environment appreciates this very much. :)

This one, I truly truly appreciate. They use Sea Salt! Woot Woot!

Abby is showing off her clean hand. :) Mighty Fine has this ultrasonic hand washing machine. You put your hands through a stainless contraption and automatically, your hands will be sprayed with water, soap and brushed gently by the machine. Cool! Abby loved it. After that, you earn the right to a sticker which says “I have clean hands”. ;)

What can I say, everything about Mighty Fine is, well, mighty fine. ;)

Abby was only 18 months old when we made that trip and meal times turned out to be such a challenge.  She didn’t eat much most of the time and the only meal she would ever eat with gusto were the chicken nuggets from Mc Donald’s.  Go figure!  In that trip, we were able to visit a total of 5 countries and for sourvenirs, we had Happy Meal toys to show for…from each of the 5 countries. Really!

This photo was taken at the Mc Donald’s located at the Frankfurt am Main Hauptbahnhof, the main train station.  Abby’s Happy Meal drink is milk referred to as ”Bio Milch”.

Aside from the chicken nuggets, Abby enjoyed the fruit yogurt that came with the meal as well.  We were at this Mc Donald’s location for lunch  two days in a row.

This was at a Mc Donald’s in the city of Metz in France.  The toy that came with the Happy Meal was a mini radio, which upto now, Abby still loves playing with.  It’s her all-time favorite Happy Meal toy.

We were very thrilled with this radio because it features Billy Crawford who, at one time in his life, was a child actor in the Philippines.  Hee hee.  Small world?

These are our family friends, Uncle D and Aunt H.  I don’t know if they’d mind having their photo out in cyberspace so I had to put sunglasses on them.  :D  Anyway, I had to publish this photo if only for the heart-shaped chicken breast.  It was very apt for the Mc Donald’s tagline that time which was “Lovin’ It” (translated to different languages). 

I simply bought a Happy Meal for take out for this Mc Donald’s in Maastricht, Holland.  We just needed our souvenir toy!  Hahaha!

Finally, Mc Donald’s in Luxembourg.  We actually ate at another burger place called Quick.  But we did still buy a Happy Meal, which Abby ate at Quick.  Hee hee.

As much as possible, we try to sample the local cuisine of the places we visit whenever we travel. That didn’t quite happen on this trip. I don’t really mind though as that would be a perfect excuse to revisit these beautiful cities. ;)

One of our favorite places for quick eats, primarily because of its proximity to our house, is Tropical Smoothie Cafe.  We normally just walk to the place.  Now that we’re starting to really feel the summer heat, I’m betting more and more people are trooping to TSC. 

On our last mother-daughter date, Abby and I each had a smoothie, she, her usual Choco-Banana smoothie, made with Ghirardelli’s finest chocolate and bananas, and I, Orange Dream, which is made with Ghirardelli’s finest white chocolate and low fat yogurt.  Abby ended up liking my smoothie than hers.  I’m not surprised.  That happens all the time.

A typical TSC meal for Abby is the Cheese Quesadilla & Chips Combo.  She only finishes two slices of the quesadilla at most.

My current favorite is the Tuscan Turkey sandwich (half order)  made with Turkey, spicy pepper jack cheese, crisp romaine lettuce, vine-ripened tomatoes and balsamic vinaigrette.

I could use an Orange Dream Smoothie just about now. *sigh*

Wordless Wednesday

I have another WW entry here. :)

Cold Stone boasts of highest quality ingredients and ice cream that is made fresh in-store everyday. One can customize a creation by first choosing from a wide array of unique ice cream flavors and then choosing 1 mix-in, which includes nuts, chocolate chips, gummy bears, crushed cookies, and almost every possible mix-in possible. After the choices have been made, the ice cream and mix-in of choice are prepared and mixed together on a frozen granite stone, a Cold Stone signature process. Of course, CSC also has a variety of delightfully sinful special creations to choose from. Those on “health watch” need not fret. CSC has sorbets, light and fat-free ice cream flavors available. CSC also has shakes and smoothies on their menu board as well as ready and custom made ice cream cakes.

Guess whose creation this is! :D This is Abby’s. It’s a flavor only a kid like her would love. Hahaha! Yes, it is creamy but a little too sour for me. Hubby swears he can taste a hint of jello. Abby finished her ice cream save for a few pieces of gummy bears.

Hubby’s creation is a Ghirardelli chocolate (being offered for a limited time only) and cookie dough combo….a very rich indulgence indeed!

As for me, my personal creation was a combination of cake batter ice cream and white chocolate chips. It did taste like cake batter, which may not appeal to a lot of people. Who eats unbaked cake anyway? Hee hee hee! But it’s a flavor that grows on you. Promise! ;)

After every last drop of ice cream has been spooned, and before making a quick dash to the car, Abby just had to do this for the camera…

…green-tongued and proud. :D

Have a great weekend, y’all! ;)