Everyone has a soft spot for their favorite fast food restaurant, but it's not exactly surprising
that behind the drive-thru windows and shiny counters, all is not always as it appears.
Here are some of the juiciest secrets that the average consumer wouldn't know.
We all know the smell of Subway bread. Its deliciously sweet scent can be sensed
from a mile away, whether you’re walking down the street or browsing the mall food
court. But there's a reason that bread smells so delicious and is incredibly
addicting — it's actually full of sugar, which makes up 10% of its overall composition. Yup,
this is even true for the super savory Italian herb & cheese bread. Tragic. But Ireland actually
has standards for any bread sold within its borders; it has to clock in at less than 2%
sugar. So Subway can't actually call their bread "bread." They use the name "sub rolls" instead.
If you were wondering how this even came about, a franchisee in Galway,
Ireland tried to challenge a takeout food tax, arguing that it didn't apply to his
Subway restaurant because bread was a quote "staple food." Five judges concluded that
Subway bread doesn't count as a "staple food" because it isn't actually bread at all. The
takeaway from this story? Maybe we should raise our food standards here in the States.
If you were a child of the suburbs, chances are you made quite a few visits to Panera
during your youth. Moms love it for the variety of options to satisfy any picky kid, and the broccoli
cheddar soup became a staple in the diet of many American kids raised in the early 2000s. However,
a former employee revealed that Panera's soup isn't as fresh as you might think.
Those delicious bread bowls are actually filled with soup that arrives frozen in a bag
and is thawed in a sink with a special heating system that is rarely cleaned.
But that's not all. The same employee shared that sometimes the bagged soup would burst in the sink,
and the soup that survived would still be cut open with scissors found in the
manager's office or in the prep line. If that's not bad enough,
it's transported from the sink to the soup line in a pitcher that's rarely ever cleaned.
Yes, we all know guacamole is extra, but even if you skip the guac, did you know that you're
probably paying too much for what you actually get at Chipotle? A former employee shared that the
chain’s tacos and burritos contain significantly less food than the bowl. Instead, they recommend
ordering a bowl with all your favorite fixins and free tortillas or taco shells on the side.
That way, you can build your own tacos or burrito and get the most bang for your buck.
Also, if you ask for half and half meat, such as half chicken and half pork,
the employee might be nice enough to give you full scoops of both, which ends up being double
the meat. And depending on how much you eat, you might be able to get two meals out of the bowl.
Prices vary by location, but that comes in at around $4-5 per meal, which is pretty exceptional.
After eating Domino's buffalo wings, you may never order a pizza from the chain again without
a side of wings. The meat practically falls off the bone and they're served
with a generous amount of sauce, making them perfectly spicy, saucy, and delicious. However,
one Dominos employee revealed that the only difference between their "mild" and "hot" wings
is the quantity of sauce. They just put more of the same buffalo sauce on their hot wings.
It seems like a weird method, but we can get behind it if that means super saucy wings.
Speaking of sauces, the employee shared another revelation:
"Very rarely do we take notice of 'no garlic,' 'light/extra buffalo
sauce,' or 'well/lightly done,' so if you order with any of those things,
keep in mind that drivers usually prepare the food and box it out of the oven.
Unless specifically told, it's difficult to spot the instructions given by a customer."
In other words, if you want something made exactly to your specifications,
it might be best to just call in that order.
Dunkin' recently went through a rebrand, but we all remember the OG Dunkin' Donuts.
There were probably a bunch of reasons why they wanted to change the name, but the biggest one
might be that the donuts and other baked goods at Dunkin' aren't actually baked in the store, as the
name might imply. One employee took to TikTok to expose the secrets of the coffee chain, showing
frozen baked goods and breakfast items that didn't even look like what they were supposed to be.
The employee, who goes by hannz57 on TikTok, made a series of videos exposing Dunkin's secrets
behind the counter after she decided she was quitting and put in her two weeks. In the videos,
she shared that the pink velvet and French vanilla syrups are the same with different food coloring,
and that the avocado for avocado toast comes pre-packaged and quote "tastes like tuna."
"America runs on Dunkin'."
If you do a quick Google search, you'll learn that several people have shared that
Taco Bell's Cinnamon Twists are just deep-fried corn noodles coated in cinnamon sugar. Seriously.
Before frying, the cinnamon twists look like rotini noodles going in and puff
up after the frying process is complete. Their ingredients include wheat flour, yellow cornmeal,
rice flour, and salt. You could say that Taco Bell was way ahead of the pasta chip TikTok trend.
And while we're talking about Taco Bell, it would be a shame not to mention the biggest
not-so-secret of all: Taco Bell's meat is only 88% beef and it arrives at the restaurant in a bag.
But honestly, the other 12% isn't all that alarming. It contains a mixture of onion powder,
sea salt, chili pepper, and other spices, as well as some preservatives and other additives. But
the most surprising ingredient of all has to be cocoa powder, which they claim they
use sparingly for color richness. Basically, Taco Bell gets really creative with their ingredients.
The next time you find yourself walking in late with a latte from Starbucks,
remember that size doesn't really matter there. Actually, all of the grande and venti espresso
drinks have the exact same amount of espresso. A grande is 16 ounces while a venti is 20,
and many of us definitely forget which one is which every time, to the disappointment
of our baristas. Either way, that's four more ounces of milk that you're paying for.
After a former employee shared this on Reddit,
people were quick to reply with their takes. One Reddit user claimed,
"This is true for almost every coffee joint, including the bougie roasteries
that pride themselves on their special hand-crafted bean juice."
Another mentioned that they should specify that this only applies to hot drinks, not cold ones.
A venti iced latte gets three shots of espresso while a grande iced latte gets two.
There's nothing quite like the power that Pizza Hut has over us with their cheesy stuffed crust
pizza commercials. They somehow make it look so cheesy and melty and delicious that we
want to order one immediately. But you may be surprised to learn that Pizza Hut and Little
Caesar's stuffed crust pizzas are actually just string cheese sticks rolled into dough.
"Is it an other-worldly spirit compelling these people to eat their pizza the wrong way?"
Throughout the years, Pizza Hut has experimented with specialty crusts, starting in 1995 with
their original stuffed crust, which is still going strong today. But in the past,
the chain has tested out crusts featuring garlic knots, hot dogs, and more, including a mini
cheeseburger pizza that was briefly available in the Middle East. At this point, Pizza Hut
is challenging all pizza crust norms, and their wildest ideas are probably still yet to come.
Picture this. It's the weekend, you wake up a bit groggy from the night before,
and nothing is going to cure your woes like a McDonald's breakfast.
A former employee shared a hack for getting fresh items on your breakfast sandwich, if,
of course, you're willing to wait a few more minutes. They claim,
"If you want something fresh on your breakfast sandwich,
order anything with rounders on it. Those were eggs cooked fresh
in a little ring mold on the grill. The bright yellow folded eggs were frozen."
In their post, they also explained why McDonald's is so strict about
switching between breakfast and lunch times — and why they can't just make
a breakfast item for you at 5 pm unless you have an in. They said,
"The grill needs to be set on a different temperature for breakfast than lunch/dinner.
That's why they have a breakfast cut off time. Better hope someone doesn't
change the grill back to breakfast to make something for a friend,
then never set it back, leading to dozens of undercooked burgers that day."
Have you ever wondered whether employees can see you when you're ordering at the drive-thru?
How do they know you're there? Well, it depends on the chain,
but many fast food restaurants do have cameras at the menu board for order efficiency. Previously,
they were used to help sense when a car was there, but most restaurants now use the same technology
as traffic lights that detect an oncoming car from magnetic sensors, not a camera. This makes
a sound in the headset, and the employee then presses a button to activate their microphone.
Luckily for us, most fast food employees do not care too much about the video feed,
and they definitely don't care about what you look like;
they are probably doing a million other things besides looking at you.
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