Monster Meals: Suffering Through $5 Fast Food “Big Box” Lunches
If you’ve been paying attention at all to fast food advertising in the last 8 years, then you know that $5 is a magical number. There’s just something about this price point—it’s been designated in the cultural consciousness as the unofficial “value tipping point.” A $5 meal? That’s reasonable. $6? Get the hell out of here, you robber baron!
If you’re looking for someone to blame, blame Subway. Their “$5 footlong” promotion kicked off in 2008 with no particular fanfare, but unexpectedly blew up to become the biggest promotion in the history of the chain. Even though it was just a sandwich (no drink/chips), it captured some untapped aspect of the fast food market and inspired its own mini-mania. In the years that followed, dozens of other fast food chains have tried to tap into that by creating “extreme value” meals that tip the scales right around the $5 mark. Many of those are so-called “big box” meals.
The goal of any given big box meal seems to be the same—how much food can we, as a brand, afford to give you for roughly $5? How many calories and grams of saturated fat can we send straight to your ass while staying under budget? Brands like Taco Bell or Hardees have turned this into a science of gluttony. Just take an average one offered in the past from Hardees, which contains two double cheeseburgers, fries, an apple turnover and a drink for $5. Nutritional sum totals? 1,650 calories, 91 g of fat, 18.5 g saturated fat, and a whopping 3,110 mg sodium … oh, and that’s assuming you got a DIET Coke for your drink, by the way.
In honor of Paste’s October Monster Issue, then, I can see no more fitting tribute than partaking in as many of these Monster Meals as possible and documenting the results. For each one I consumed, we’ll describe the contents of the meal, the execution of said meal, and answer the all-important question: How much did this meal make me want to die? Let’s get into it.
KFC $5 Fill-Up Box
Contents: Two pieces of extra-crispy chicken (leg & thigh), mashed potatoes and gravy, biscuit, cookie, drink
KFC knows that when you’ve worked hard—when you’ve worked through your extra crispy obligation to down two pieces of chicken, mashed potatoes and a biscuit—then you have EARNED YOURSELF A DAMN COOKIE. Anything less would be a travesty.
The KFC I visited was in the middle of an epic lunch rush. The kind of lunch rush that makes a comically harried woman behind the counter loudly exclaim to anyone listening: “Jesus Christ superstar, that was a rush!” when it’s over. Still, that’s a positive, if it means fresh chicken, right? The box does note that the chicken is “freshly prepared by cooks.” I’m just glad that it’s apparently being prepared by cooks and not the custodial staff, as I’d always assumed. In reality, it’s perfectly serviceable chicken—as are the mashed potatoes, although KFC’s gravy has never driven me into an Eric Cartman-like state of chemical dependence. But you can do worse (and I did far worse, in the course of this experiment).
Did I finish this meal: All but a couple bites of a substandard biscuit.
Adverse effects: Kidney palpitations, spontaneous combustion (of human dignity).
How much did this meal make me want to die? I remained blissfully free of the desire to die until right near the end of the meal. I fully expected to hit the “What the hell am I doing here?” wall, but was foolish enough to think I had entirely avoided it, until … the cookie. Because when you’ve just eaten an entire KFC meal, and then you’re presented with a chocolate chip cookie as the reward for a job well done, then the only reasonable emotion is to want to go outside behind the building, crawl into the dumpster and lay there with the rest of the garbage until the world is a cold, dead husk.
Wendy’s 4 for $4 Meal
Contents: Junior bacon cheeseburger, 4-piece chicken nuggets, fries, drink
The latest trend in fast food is a subversion of the $5 gold standard that is aimed at both “health” and “value” as twin pillars of consumer motivation. What this means is simple: $4 meals! And even (gasp) $3 meals, as we’ll also see. Just imagine that all of the fast food franchises are Harland Williams in There’s Something About Mary, trying to pull the rug out from under 8 Minute Abs by cutting one minute out of the program. “Zounds, ye wastrel!” they proclaim. “I have saved thee a buck!”
NOTE: I physically journeyed across Atlanta in the course of this piece to BOTH a Hardees and a Sonic location, two chains that had recently been doing “$5 box” promotions, only to find that each of them had recently ended said promotions. So go to hell, Hardees and Sonic; thanks for screwing up the breadth of my piece.
Wendy’s 4 for $4 meal is mostly notable for its seemingly reasonable nature—this is more or less what I would order on any given trip to Wendy’s, which doesn’t make me feel any better. As a chain, Wendy’s does seem to have a vested interest in presenting itself as a semi-sensible, classier alternative to the likes of McDonalds or Burger King, so perhaps the idea of outlandishly excessive meals on some level goes against the image they’re trying to craft for the company.
Did I finish this meal: Yes, with frightening ease.
Adverse effects: Existential dread at how normal this meal appeared to be for a human being to engage in.
How much did this meal make me want to die? No more than the daily realization that I must face the light of the world for another 24 hours.
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