501: The Guy Who Visited McDonald's in 56 Countries with Gary He

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0:31If you complain that McDonald's is like formulated in the lab, what did they formulate? They formulated something that's extremely delicious. It's kind of like pop music, right? And so you can't not nod your head to pop music. And it's McNuggets and McDonald's French fries and their sandwiches and burgers are kind of in that same vein. This is Taste. I'm your host, Matt Rodbard. Gary He wrote the coolest book. Gary is an accomplished journalist and photographer, having contributed memorable stories at Eater for years. But his book about McDonald's, McAtlas, is truly groundbreaking in its scope, telling the story of the Golden Arches from Mexico to Denmark to India and Japan.

1:17On this episode, we talk about Gary's travels to McDonald's in over 50 countries on six continents, and how specialty menu items change with the culture and terroir. It's a fascinating deep dive into one of the world's most iconic brands. And finally, we hear from the multifaceted chef and bon vivant Alexander Smalls as he talks about working with a talented group of chefs to create his new cookbook, The Contemporary African Kitchen, Home Cooking Recipes from the Leading Chefs of Africa.

1:57Gary He, welcome to This Is Taste. What's up, my man? Going well. We've hung before. We've had meals in. I like this idea that this is your first podcast because it seems like you're a veteran already. No way. But if you take it easy on me, then we're going to have a good time. You're ready for it. We're going to talk about McAtlas, which is an amazing book. I got to see a very early pass of it. It's not the final version, but you're generous to send me a beautiful first or second or third cut. It's really, really, really cool. We're going to get all into it. Gary, you've written deeply reported stories about the New York and American restaurant scene.

2:35You're a photojournalist. You're a tech entrepreneur. You're a photographer of the highest level. And I love the blend of skills. It's really rare, and your work speaks for itself. You've won multiple James Beard Awards. Let me ask you, why are you, you've won one. Okay, you're fact checking me. Let me round up for you. We'll say multiple in the future. Are you optimistic about the health of New York City restaurants? Well, you know what? We have these conversations all the time, right? Those of us in food media. And I think currently we're complaining that there really isn't anything exciting.

3:11And the golden era was five, ten years ago. But I feel like that's an attitude that's prevalent across all eras, right? Like there's always this, Woody Allen did a movie, what was it, Midnight in Paris, that kind of spoke to that, right? This golden era kind of mentality. But if you really think about it, those restaurants that we just talked about, like Kisa, Masara, there are exciting new openings happening, not just on the high end, but across the spectrum that are really enjoyable. And so, yeah, I mean, I think that there is always going to be that entrepreneurial spirit in New York City and exciting new openings.

3:52And so I'm excited to be in the industry covering which direction it goes in in the future. Love the sentiment. I hear optimism. I hear pragmatism. I like it, too. I agree. I think we are at a level, we're at a period where we could say a lot of negative things about the restaurant industry, especially with pricing. I think pricing and inflation has hit New York so hard. But I have to say there's so many cool openings still happening. The creativity is so strong in New York. Gary, what makes a Gary He story? Well, I think the problem with journalism in any kind of vertical, not just in food these days, is that there's not enough money and there's not enough time.

4:35Right. You have beat reporters who have to grind out multiple stories a day and they don't have time to kind of work on those long swing projects. And so for me, I kind of look at a story and see if I can bring something to the table by being able to spend more of my time working on it. Right. And there's obviously multiple reasons to work on a story and to bring it to the public. And you've mentioned kind of the beards earlier. And so even those pieces that have been recognized for me, you know, you know, I one of them I did to memorialize a very famous restaurant. And I spent three months there.

5:16And the average beat reporter is not going to be able to commit that much time to working on a piece like that. And then there's also service journalism during the pandemic when other journalists weren't out there like that. That speaks to me. And of course, just kind of having fun and entertaining readers, which was what the campaign trail story was. That that kind of stuff, you know, I spent a good six months on the campaign trail. And so I think for me, it's about investment of time that perhaps other journalists aren't able to spend and to be able to kind of work on those longer stories and really tell in-depth stories.

5:55When you were on the campaign, this was in 2020, this great photography of President Biden that you were shooting while he was a candidate or while he was doing his thing. What did you observe about a presidential candidate when they're on the road and their relationship with food? I mean, are they, is it all virtue signaling and all optics and like trying to be like, this is the like local beer and the local sandwich and I need to be presented? Or did you actually find candidates were actually into food? Yeah, so I think the problem with a lot of the regular coverage is that it is very performative, right?

6:31When there is an entire press corps there photographing, recording, asking questions, like, yeah, they're going to chomp down on the local food. But that's why I wanted to spend more time with the candidates and kind of see what they're like in person, right? Like what they're really eating. I spent like three days on the campaign trail bus with Andrew Yang. And, you know, all he was eating was like Jimmy John's subs. Bless him. He's got my vote. I love Jimmy John's, man. Yeah. So I don't think that was really performative in any sort of way, similar to like eating corn dogs at the Iowa State Fair, for instance.

7:13But I thought that was extremely authentic. And that's not something you would have seen if you only went to the campaign event in Iowa. You really had to kind of ride around with these people and kind of hang out with them. I will say, though, that Joe Biden really does love ice cream. And that is not an act. The man eats ice cream on a daily. What's he hitting? What flavors? What was it? Jenny's ice cream? Didn't he say that Jenny's ice cream was his favorite brand of ice cream? But he'll eat anything. I mean, Ohio, like definitely like one of those states that could go either way. So he's got a little politics.

7:45I'm just kidding. Jenny's is a good flavor, a good brand. I mean, were there any like meals that you saw where you're like, wow, that's like a really great call by the candidate. I think even with that kind of insidery look into the campaigns, it's still pretty well orchestrated. And so that's why I kind of put the campaign trail coverage into the, oh, it's fun and entertaining for readers. I think it's difficult to kind of find a bigger meaning in that coverage, right? Even though, you know, we talk about it in the way we talk it up and obviously we say like, oh, yeah, this says something about these political candidates.

8:26And does it, though? Right. Exactly. Don't take don't take the beard away. No, it was really important. I think you've hit it on the head when there's like service journalism, there's entertainment journalism, there's like hardcore covid coverage and health coverage. But back to my original question, Gary, what really makes a Gary He story? and I mean this like to lead a little bit because I think because you are such a talented photographer because you can write because you have observation you can talk to people you've got this like blend of skills but what do you seek out I look for stuff that other people aren't doing that is visual right I I don't know I don't I don't really I don't really see myself as this like great arbiter of journalism, right?

9:11And so it's... You're not an arbiter. I'm not putting that kind of pressure on you, but I do think you've got incredible respect, myself included, in the industry, and we love the craft. I see a real eye for detail. I see the ability to write leads. I know your editors have something to do with that, but also I just think there's a real inquisitive nature to your writing. Yeah, I think that, you know, obviously the visuals come first, right? If it's not a visual story, that it's difficult for me to kind of go in there and spend some time and do these long photo essays. And so that's the base of everything is like making sure that we can get really nice photos.

9:53But, you know, obviously, you know, there has to be interesting characters like Helen during the pandemic, the way she was running her restaurant, even though she opened two days before the pandemic hit. But those kind of human stories that tug at the heartstrings or that people can kind of relate to a little bit, because I'm sure there are so many stories of that out there. People who they were about to do something big. They were going to take a vacation. They were going to retire. And then all of a sudden, this thing happens. And they lost everything. You're referring to Saigon social, correct?

10:24Yeah, exactly. And now she's thriving. And so I think that combination of visual and also kind of compelling character for the interviews, if I can find those two things and put them together, then you have like a so-called Gary He piece. Love it. Third person is the best. Now, I wanted to ask you these to build up to McAtlas, which to me is your magnum opus so far in your career. McDonald's is the largest restaurant chain in the world with locations in over 100 countries and six continents. It's almost 42 ,000 stores serving in excess of 65 million customers a day to the tune of 130 billion in a system-wide sales.

11:06The scale of McDonald's and the penetration of the brand makes this an obvious story. And we're going to get into what you discovered in what I would say is the most original account of this global franchise. First question, though, do you actually like eating at McDonald's? Oh, I really enjoy it, especially overseas. Right. And I think people who don't like McDonald's in the year 2024 are like trying to go out of their way to like formulate that opinion because they think it adds to their personality or something like that. I mean, it's it's it's delicious. Right. If you complain that McDonald's is like formulated in the lab, what did they formulate?

11:48They formulated something that's extremely delicious. It's kind of like pop music, right? And so you can't not nod your head to pop music. And it's McNuggets and McDonald's French fries and their sandwiches and burgers are kind of in that same vein, right? They have tested all these recipes and have created an extremely delicious product. And the record shows, right, they are the largest chain in the world with all of those statistics that you just brought up. And so it's not just them pulling the wool over people's eyes and saying like, oh, yeah, eat this. It's, you know, it's delicious. It actually is delicious, which is why it's so popular around.

12:28Yeah. Anecdotally, I'd say at least domestically over the past, I would say, five years. We're talking about just about the time the pandemic started. The quality got better. Something about the quality of McDonald's, the quarter pounders, just like there was like a freshness to it. This is just anecdotally. Am I making shit up or did they actually change some C-suite folks there and make it actually better? I think it's probably been more than five years because I think, you know, in the late 90s, early 2000s, there really was this backlash against fast food and McDonald's specifically. You had this movie where a guy ate McDonald's for 30 days in a row.

13:09And then you also had this amazing reportage from this writer for The Rolling Stone, who kind of delved into the nation of fast food. And so the company responds to that. They have been fighting this battle for a really long time against this idea that they're unhealthy, that it's not good food. And so I think that especially in France, right, like there were all these protests happening where a guy was like knocking down stores in protest for in protest of how bad the food was. And the CEO of McDonald's Europe actually said, you know what, this guy helped us out because he brought to the forefront these issues that we had with the product.

13:56And we decided to market it as a local product and also use more and more local ingredients in order to have a better product for our customers. And so the product has improved since the heyday of like the 90s and the 80s of like complaining about, oh, yeah, this is like junk food or bad food. That being said, I mean, I don't think I would eat McDonald's every single day, but I enjoy it and I eat it quite often. Right. I'm loving that you you're into the product. This wasn't just like stunt journalism. And I wouldn't want anyone to think of it as because it really is a deeply reported work. Gary, let's talk about the scale of the project.

14:36I think it may be even understated in some of the initial press you've gotten how much work you put into this book. Talk about the number of countries you went to, how many days you're on the road and how many actual restaurants you visited. Well, the project kind of started out before in the project started out in 2018. Right. And I was kind of tacking trips or tacking trips to McDonald's stores on the back end of like work trips. And then during the pandemic, obviously, there was a travel freeze. And that's when I did a lot more research and realized that, like, if I wanted this project to ever come to fruition, I needed to focus just on the McAtlas.

15:20And so as countries opened back up, I had all this research ready. And I started just hitting, like, France, Italy, you know, all the ones that were opening up. And then obviously, once Asia started opening up, I think they opened up a little bit later. we started visiting those countries. And in all, I visited 55, 56 countries. That's unbelievable. That's 56 countries. Wow, 56. I'm really tired. Well, you're finishing the book as we were recording this in mid-July and you're right at your deadline. I know the feeling. So, I mean, how many restaurants did you visit? I didn't even keep track because some of those you just go in to sit there and observe people interacting and how they're using the space because that's an important part of like kind of the sociological and cultural study of the book.

16:11But then, you know, there are some locations that have been localized, like the ones in the UK where they've kind of taken over old pubs. And so I visited those. And so I would say for the bigger markets, you know, You have somewhere between half a dozen to a dozen per major market, and then the smaller ones, maybe two or three. So it's in the hundreds of stores. Well, it's clear after reading the book that McDonald's is no monolith. The beauty of this project is that you're documented with photography and beautiful essays about how each of these countries you visited has a really different take on McDonald's.

16:50My first question, though, is, is there a constant in the 100 countries that McDonald's is present that you observed? Is there like a menu item that is literally every McDonald's? Is there some constant? Oh, yeah. They have core menu items, right? And those core menu items like McNuggets, Big Mac, French fries, that accounts for 70 % of sales globally, right? And then the localized menu items, which we'll get into, I'm sure, in a few minutes, they account for 30 percent. But you're talking about a company that makes$130 billion in system-wide sales a year. And so that 30 percent of that, that's not chump change.

17:30That is a very important thing to analyze, which is why I kind of decided to undertake this project. You opened the book, Gary, with this beautiful essay about Saudi Arabia of all places. And this this the stat kind of jumped out in Mecca alone, this this historical city, there are over a dozen McDonald's. It just shows that this brand is literally everywhere. Why is the kingdom so wild about McDonald's? I think overseas, people see and use McDonald's in a different way than we see it here, right? In the United States, we associate McDonald's with speed of service, affordability, low prices, right?

18:13And overseas, especially in the 80s and 90s, as we were coming out of the Cold War, the US won, right? And so it was this symbol of Americana, of modern modernity. And so a lot of people in foreign countries kind of saw McDonald's as their way of getting a taste of that, of being able to say, hey, we've arrived. We got a McDonald's. I still remember reading this story about the first McDonald's on the eastern side of the Iron Curtain. It was the first McDonald's in Serbia and in Slavia Square. And after that, McDonald's had opened during soccer or football matches between the Balkan countries, because Serbia was the only Balkan country to have a McDonald's.

19:10they would chant like slurs about how or, you know, disgusting phrases about how they had McDonald's. And we were better. We were a better country than you because you don't have McDonald's. Right. And it was like a Serbia versus Croatia football match where they would be shouting these things at each other about how, you know, Serbia had a McDonald's and Croatia didn't have a McDonald's. And so, you know, I think it's something that people wanted before, you know, obviously we kind of expended our goodwill in various military adventures after 9-11. Way to put that. It's a delicate way to put it.

19:51The McBaguette. Let's talk about it. In France, it seems like they take the pride of local McDonald's special menu items to a higher level. And this dish reminded me that actually McDonald's in France has a lot of pop culture references to, noting Pulp Fiction. Is that one of the better countries doing McDonald's? uh france is the largest market uh for mcdonald's in europe um it has the most stores out of any european country and it certainly uh makes the most money um and they have a nickname for mcdonald's there they affectionately call it mack though um i'm not sure if i did that right but sounds good to me yeah uh so they've had uh localized menu items there uh for a really long time.

20:43I mean, they have the McBaguette, right? They have the Croque MacDo, which is a play on the Croque Masseur. And they also have a rotating line of burgers that have local cheese, right? They have like Roquefort, Camembert. You never know what you're going to get when you walk into French McDonald's, right? But it goes back to this idea that they needed to present themselves after these protests in the late 90s and early 2000s as a local institution. And in order to do that, they needed to have local cheeses, needed to advertise that they had local beef, local bread. And so in that way, the French McDonald's product is extremely interesting, right?

21:34And it's worthy of study. And there's probably about 20 pages of coverage in the book I love it so much. So what's the McBaguette then? What is that? The McBaguette is a limited time offering that they brought back a couple of times, including for a promotion for that Netflix show, Emily in Paris. I believe she does like marketing for McDonald's France, where she tries to like advertise the McBaguette. But they served it in stores while that promotion and while that show was running. and it's not a full-length baguette. It's kind of like a squat, maybe like a foot-in-length baguette with beef patties and lettuce, and they have a variety of sausage.

22:20They have a Bernays steak sauce. Wow. In one version, they have this mustard, and they also sell it in a chicken format occasionally. So they've brought it back a couple of times, And so you never know when you're going to be able to get the baguette. It took me about three visits to France after knowing about the item before I actually got to try it. But it was extremely joyful because it also comes in the sleeve similar to how you would get a baguette from a bakery. Yeah, that's beautiful packaging there. Speaking of limited menu items, I have a deep fondness for the Shamrock Shake. It truly has been part of my life since I was one or two.

23:03Yeah. Tell me a little bit about the history of this iconic March staple. The Shamrock Shake was invented by a franchisee in Connecticut. Hal Rosen, I believe his name was. And, you know, this was back in the day in the Wild West days of McDonald's when, you know, franchisees would just come up with their own ideas and just do them. And then sometimes they get yelled at and sometimes they would become added to the menu in a limited way or nationally. And so for the Shamrock Shake, it was only available in certain markets. But to your point, it was extremely popular. And so at one point, McDonald's had to release an app that allowed the Shamrock Shake fan base to search which stores had this menu item so they would be able to get it.

24:07And so I think the number of stores that carry it has greatly increased over the years. But I think it still has a fervent fan base, yourself included. Yeah, I mean, if there's a McDonald's that doesn't have it in March, I'm like, that's like off my list. I don't think of the East Coast I've ever found one that didn't have it. Yeah, you might be right. I think it's pretty prevalent now. But at some point, they really did have to help people search for the franchises that were carrying it. I love your story about Swedish McDonald's and a deep love of Mexican flavors there. Talk about the dish that was introduced in Sweden.

24:48This was bizarre because the first time I visited the Nordic countries, which is all controlled by all the McDonald's franchisees in the Nordic countries are controlled by a master franchisee. But I had something called the El Maco, you know, or is it called El Maco? Is it supposed to be pronounced like taco or is it supposed to be pronounced like Mac? I don't know. I think it's like Mac-O, like McDonald's taco, exactly. Yeah, it's a Tex-Mex-flavored burger. But there's also variant products, El Maco products. They have fries slathered in this Tex-Mex sauce called the El Maco fries. And they also have powder, flavoring powder that you can shake up in a bag with fries in order to create El Maco-flavored fries.

25:37fries. But this is popular in the Nordic countries because there was a thing called cozy Fridays, which is a tradition where you're supposed to get in your pajamas and kind of sit around the home, watch TV and get cozy. It's like a version of Hygge. Remember the Hygge trend? Yes. Back in like maybe like eight years ago. Same part of the world. Yeah, exactly. I think it's like a version of Hygge, but this is more like the Netflix and chill version of Hygge. Yeah. And so at some point in the 90s, you know, I think old El Paso started marketing their products there. And so Tex-Mex products became extremely popular.

26:15Cozy Fridays kind of became Taco Fridays where you're supposed to do all those cozy things, but also eat tacos. And so if you go into supermarkets there, there's all sorts of Tex-Mex flavored products for this occasion. And also, if you go to like Subway, they'll have salsa and salsa flavored sandwiches and Tex-Mex flavored sandwiches. It's a thing. It's delicious. So interesting. And Gary, what's cool about your book is that in between these essays and photo essays about these very cool products and photography throughout, you really dig into the corporate history a little bit. And something that really jumped out is Ray Kroc, the founder of McDonald's, that's a general term.

26:59And I love the movie The Founder, by the way. That was just great movie. Isn't it great? Super underrated. I love that. In 1971, Ray Kroc visits Japan. And this this is, you know, an early time to be in Japan for an American company. But it was a pivotal time for McDonald's. Talk about what this visit meant. Yeah, I think up until that point, there hadn't been an American chain in Japan, right? It was a land of like still sushi, noodles, rice. And so they called this their litmus test, right? Because at that point, they had expanded into Canada, Australia, Puerto Rico, all places that, you know, could conceivably eat burgers.

27:44They did not eat burgers in Japan at the time. And so in 1971, Ray Kroc shows up and the local franchisee that they had chosen there, he's now a legend of Japanese business. But back then he was like an international handbag salesman, just bringing international luxury products into Japan. His name was Den Fujita. And he had, instead of placing the first McDonald's in Japan in the suburbs, which is where all the McDonald's in America were placed at the time, He said Ginza was where everything happens and I'm going to place my McDonald's in Ginza. Except, you know, real estate in Ginza was super expensive even back then.