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Big Mac turns 40

By Ashley M. Heher
Associated Press

CHICAGO — Few people would eat a 40-year-old sandwich.

But don’t tell that to the millions who flock to McDonald’s each year to chow down on a Big Mac.

The triple-decker burger, which helped breed America’s super-size culture and restaurants’ ever-expanding jumbo meals, is turning 40.

For some fast-food junkies, that’s cause for celebration.

“The flavors that come together — it’s like heaven in your mouth,’’ said April Kohlhaas, a 31-year-old Chicago resident. “It’s just tradition, like American comfort food.’’

The Big Mac was first introduced in 1967 by Jim Delligatti, a McDonald’s franchise owner in Uniontown, Pa. A year later, it became a staple of McDonald’s menus nationwide.

Since then, the sandwich has become a veritable pop culture phenomenon, spawning everything from an impossible-to-forget jingle (“Two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun,’’ anyone?) to a currency-evaluation index created by The Economist.

Along the way, more people in more than 100 countries have given in to Big Mac attacks, according to Oak Brook-based McDonald’s Corp.

“The Big Mac is certainly one of our most popular sandwiches,’’ said spokeswoman Danya Proud. “There is only one Big Mac and there will only ever be one Big Mac.’’

McDonald’s estimates 550 million Big Macs are sold each year in the U.S. alone. Do the math and that’s about 17 per second. Weighing in at nearly a half-pound, with 540 calories and 29 grams of fat each, it’s enough to make nutritionists cringe.

“When it was eaten once in a while there wasn’t anything wrong with it,’’ said Marion Nestle, professor of nutrition and food studies at NYU’s Steinhardt School of Culture, Education and Human Development. “It was just fast food, something fun once in a while. But then it became everyday fare.’’

Andrea Hawkins had her first Big Mac in high school and likes the treat so much she started the Facebook group “Big Mac-aholics.’’

She’s put her Big Mac attacks on hiatus while she gets ready for her wedding next month. But that’s not stopping her friends from building a cake-like tower of McDonald’s hamburgers for her upcoming bachelorette party. At the top, of course — a Big Mac.

“(The) first treat on the way to the honeymoon will be a Big Mac,’’ jokes the 25-year-old from Dayton, Ohio who prefers hers without cheese.

To celebrate the burger’s anniversary, Delligatti, 89, and his family opened a Big Mac Museum Restaurant last week in North Huntingdon, Pa., full of memorabilia, celebratory exhibits and “the world’s largest Big Mac statue.’’

Love them or hate them, the Big Mac has grown from its humble beginnings to become a cultural unifier, said pop culture expert and author Rachel Weingarten.

“You can live in Beijing or Brooklyn and you can enjoy as your favorite snack a Big Mac attack,’’ she said. “Maybe you didn’t grow up watching the same cartoons, maybe you didn’t grow up speaking the same language, maybe you grew up next door to each other and never said hello, but you suddenly have a point of reference — this warm, yummy, bad-for-you, sometimes-naughty thing.’’

Big Mac bio

Big Mac attack: The Big Mac was thought up in 1967 by Jim Delligatti, who owned a McDonald’s store near Pittsburgh. The sandwich sold for 45 cents. Today, the burger costs about $2.75.

Super-sized cravings: The Big Mac is now sold in more than 100 countries. Hungry Americans lead the way, scarfing 550 million each year. Japanese consumers are a distant second, eating about 150 million each year.

Global flavor: Around the globe, the Big Mac’s ingredients follow its catchy jingle: two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun. A notable exemption is India, where the burger is called the Maharaja Mac and is made with chicken.

Mac-ematics: A standard Big Mac contains 540 calories, 29 grams of fat, 10 grams of saturated fat, 1,040 milligrams of sodium and 45 grams of carbohydrates. That means Americans consume about 17,582 tons of fat from Big Macs each year, roughly the weight of more than 40 fully loaded Boeing 747 passenger jets.

Heavy-weight competition: The Big Mac spawned generations of bigger and bigger burgers. Wendy’s offers a “Triple with Cheese,’’ which has 980 calories and 59 grams of fat. Burger King has a 1,230 calorie Triple Whopper loaded with 82 grams of fat. Even McDonald’s has a double-quarter pounder with cheese, which has 740 calories and 42 fat grams.

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In this photograph released by McDonalds, Jim Delligatti poses with the world's largest Big Mac statue (14 foot high and 12 foot wide) during the opening of the Big Mac Museum Restaurant in North Huntingdon, Pa., Tuesday, Aug. 21, 2007. Delligatti, an early McDonalds franchisee, invented McDonald's Big Mac sandwich in 1967. (AP Photo/Henny Ray Abrams, McDonald's)

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