Every year, limited-time flavors for various items on most restaurant menus make a comeback, just like clockwork. There are many menus that follow this tradition, such as the change from standard coffees to pumpkin-spice and cinnamon flavors during autumn or the endless flavors during the Christmas season like peppermint or even eggnog. For St. Patrick’s Day, McDonald’s welcomed back a classic, yet controversial drink – the Shamrock Shake.
St. Patrick’s Day is notable for its usual association with the color green, which famous fast-food chain, McDonald’s, acknowledges by launching the seasonal Shamrock Shake, a green mint-flavored milkshake, along with their recent Shamrock McFlurry. Though it is a unique and different flavor that the restaurant has, the drink has received all sorts of support or backlash.
People who know of the drink think of it as one of the strangest items to have, especially at a fast food chain like McDonald’s, where the minty taste along paired with a serving of fries and a burger may not be the most appetizing or appealing, just like their very old mascot that promoted this drink, Uncle O’ Grimmacy.
The recipe has gone through a couple changes before getting to the signature status we drink today. Back in the 1970s, there was no mint flavor, and it took on a more aggressively sour flavor, with it actually being lime flavored instead. Years later, the drink was changed to have no flavor at all, meaning that it was purely just a vanilla milkshake with green food coloring. Soon enough, the current version of the drink came to life, the original green colored vanilla milkshake with a mix of mint.
The reviews for the drink are very mixed, especially with its strange appearance and taste. There are the customers who positively enjoy the minty milkshake due to the smoothness of the mint and the overall festivity of the holiday. However, many do not share the same gratitude as those who enjoy the drink, as their thoughts are actually quite contradictory.
The drink has built its reputation for being particularly strange for its ingredients. The drink doesn’t just have a refreshing minty taste, but it actually is quite the sweet concoction, even for avid sugar enthusiasts. For soft serve vanilla ice cream blended together with a mint flavoring, it makes a lot of sense as to why the drink may not be for everyone.
With that sweetness, many argue that the overload of sugar ruins the drink entirely. The reviews are extremely mixed, as for some the drink comes off too bland, or for others there’s just too many flavors all at once. People are even disgusted by the color of the drink, with its association of something gross or trashy, or it’s just naturally a color that you don’t see often in a sweet milkshake, let alone the flavor.
Despite its controversial stance, it still remains a big part in McDonald’s culture to bring back this limited-time item yearly for its month-long celebration. And with all the limited items that have come and gone in the past, this limited-time item has became a tradition to bring back into their menus, and it will still come back every February for many people to enjoy. The Shamrock Shake is still available at McDonald’s until March 23.
