WFTV sent the photo to McDonald's. Here's their response: "Thank you for bringing this to our attention. We have taken swift and immediate action to resolve this matter. Nothing is more important to us than the safety and quality of our food."
McDonald's sent a different email to the picture-taking customer: "The machine was cleaned that morning. They sanitized the bucket to capture milk and after the repair work was done they put the milk back in the machine. This was an isolated incident."
WFTV says the McDonald's in question has had numerous sanitary violations in the past. For those of you in the Orlando area, it's the McDonald's on "Narcoossee Road in the Lake Nona area."
Yuck.
Alleged Milkshake Mistake Turns Stomachs, Prompts Questions [WFTV]
(Photo:WFTV)
Here's a good one (from Maddox):
I'm loving it = I am loving it
Rearrange the letters and you get:
Ailing Vomit
]]>It's like Michael Scott saying "I didn't get both of your messages."
]]>"what about the container the milk came in"
The mix comes in bags which are next to impossible to pour into something high up.
]]>Although WTF is definitely more appropriate... The TV station at the top was actually WFTV...
]]>I have to wonder how common this is. A couple years ago, we stopped at a Long John Silver's (our first, and last time ever), and the woman in front of us ordered a milkshake. An employee went into the back room and brought out a jug of milk and began pouring it into the milkshake machine. The jug was labeled "NO GOOD" in large red block letters on the side. The woman told him, and he apologized profusely and left. The manager then came out and apologized. We and several other people walked out.
Stay away from fast food milkshakes. Imagine if she'd been in the drive-through.
]]>Again as a brewer I would like to point out that plastic easily scratches, especially non-food grade. Bacteria grow in the scratches in the bucket because you cannot clean that surface anymore when you wipe down the inside. You either have to be very careful with your plastic, or use all glass, which is what I brew in now.
]]>Thats like taking the shit out of your toilet while you clean the toilet and then putting it back in and calling it sparkling.
]]>Noted and yuck
]]>Why can't they buy a NEW bucket?
Why do they have to sanitize the "soiled towels only" bucket to use for the milk?
Why can't they have a special 'milkshake cleaning only' bucket?
]]>For all those who think that using just any recently cleaned bucket is fine, there are differences in plastics and it matters when they come into contact with food.
" Plastics To Avoid
If you know that a plastic container or bag is not made of food grade material, you should not use it. If you cannot determine the food grade status of a container or bag, you should assume it is not food grade and not use it.
Examples include:
* HDPE white plastic containers of unknown food grade status
* Garbage cans or pails
* Mop buckets
* Laundry detergent or kitty litter buckets
* Dry pet food buckets
* 5-gallon utility buckets from the home center
* Household storage containers
* Garbage bags
* Any container, even if made of food grade plastic that has been used to store non-food items like chemicals, paint, or detergent."
@OKH: Exactly!
What about the container the milk came in? They didn't have empty plastic bottles of milk, juice, or anything they could have used?
]]>@MEGMARCO & Chris Walters
Maybe a dead dog at work thread? Mine involves a dog, a little old lady and a lot of weird phone calls.
]]>WHY WERE THEY REUSING THE "CAPTURED" MILK???????
grrrrrrooooossssssssss.
]]>This is why I don't eat at fast food places while travelling in the US. It's been my experience that pretty much all restaraunts in the United States are compeltely filthy when compared to their Canadian counterparts.
Disgusting.
]]>@enm4r:
My guess is it wasn't an issue of finding another bucket. My guess is the first guy put the shake mix in the bucket. Then the last guy put the shake mix back, and they preiously used the buckets to clean floors, so they had sanitizing stuff in there previously. Therefor, I will never eat at fast food again (I don't anyways but yuck.)
@RvLeshrac: "I'm also sure that the bucket *WAS* sanitized. Properly cleaned, it would be safe enough for a baby to drink out of."
LOL. NO matter how clean it was, babies aren't supposed to drink out of buckets. It's a drowning hazzard.
Seriously though, everyone has different tolerances for what they want in their food. That's why , if you are in the restaurant business, you have to do things that aren't only safe, they are perceived as safe if you want your customers to trust you.
]]>as a past mickey d's employee, i'll tell you to never, i repeat NEVER get any ice cream or shakes. i'll sum up my story about it in a nut shell.....maggots! yup! have you ever been told the machine is "down"? its when they went to "fix" it that it was discovered to be a fly breeding haven.
]]>And that it had only been found when the machine clogged.
Don't know if it's true, and it was a long time ago, but ....bleh.
Your customer is an idiot.
]]>One more thing - I brew my own beer and if there's one thing brewers know is it that you CANNOT sanitize those plastic buckets because they scratch so easily. They can say they sanitized them all they want, it doesn't make it so.
]]>that being said, i had a delicious milk shake from a mcd's just last week.
]]>It depends on the jurisdiction, but generally the bacterial cycle is broken either nightly or weekly. What this means is that while the machine is sanitized every night in all locations, the shake mix that is in the machine at the end of the night is used the next morning after starting the machine on fresh mix. This is called rerun. Now, this is just a precaution for food contamination reasons, as the shake mix is refrigerated below 40 degrees at all times. The mix is no more susceptible to anything in a bucket or in the shake machine.
Perception is everything, but a bucket is just a bucket. If it's clean, it's fine.
]]>@enm4r: I just don't think that reprimanding Skippy McWageSlave is going to help that much in this situation. Totally agree that management should be fired, but next time is there going to be a worker's revolt where the fry cooks stand up for proper sanitary procedures? Doubtful.
And I'm not saying that poor training excuses what happened, merely that an employee in that situation isn't likely to risk job termination by being insubordinate in order to do the right thing.
]]>MisterE
I'm Hatin' it.
]]>Am I missing something? It's like taking a bath to put on the same dirty clothes you just took off (which then put some of the filth right back on you).
]]>@Beerad: I don't care how they're trained. It would have taken about 5 seconds to find another bucked if they really did normally follow procedure. Because no one around was willing to take 5 seconds, that suggests obvious flaws in their management, and that it was in no way an isolated incident. Workers should be reprimanded as a way to remind them that they are responsible for their actions, and management that supervised the entire operation should be fired. Improper training is not an excuse.
]]>@Chris Walters:
Two comments on that:
1) That is freakin' hilarious....
2) No way they paid you enough to pick up a dead dog.... Gross. I'd likely have quit over that.
One day, a dog was hit on the nearby road, and I was asked to remove its carcass because it was right next to the drive-through entrance. The only thing I had with me to put the dog into was an empty "___'s Tamales" box, so that's what I used. Everyone who drove by just saw this guy putting a dead dog into a tamale-branded box and walking back to the tamale factory.
If only The Consumerist (and cell phone cameras) had been around then.
]]>At the local fair this summer, the dairy board that serves milkshakes to promote their dairy products. They were using the fake milkshake mix in the cartons. Blech.
]]>"Nothing is more important to us than the safety and quality of our food"
Really? Given the picture, that sounds like an empty statement.
]]>Both stations are owned by the same company. The owners claim to be shocked.
A real station with the call letters WTF would have to be east of the Mississippi River.
]]>Has anyone ever seen the inside of a chicken processing plant? I'll tell you, it makes a soiled-towel milkshake sound like two hours at Le Bernardin.
]]>Just the way mom used to make it!
]]>hmmm
]]>@enm4r: Why do I doubt that a minimum wage employee is going to stand up to Ronald McManager and say "Sir, it would be a violation of health codes to do what you've just asked me to do!" I mean, there's a reason McDonald's relies heavily on icons and pictures for training their front-line employees.
If the bucket was sanitized before use, that doesn't change the fact that the restaurant clearly doesn't have separate food-safe containers for stuff like this, which suggests big problems. If it wasn't sanitized (or, if I had to guess, sanitized by rinsing it out with hot water), well, that's an even bigger problem.
]]>@Nowin
A McDonalds franchise is a rather low-margin business, actually. Costs are *extremely* high, and company stores won't hesitate to run you out of business. You need runaway sales just to avoid closing.
While the thought is nasty, if it is properly cleaned and rinse I seriously doubt that bucket is worse for you than anything on the McD's menu. Some of you guys are so hypersensitive!
]]>Worse, the bucket was made in China.
]]>Wait...they use milk in their milkshakes?? I thought it was just water and some mix. Maybe its milk and some milkshake MIX! Ahhh its all becoming clear now.
]]>@vanilla-fro: foul
]]>"just put it all in a bucket"
Can I be concerned about the chemicals here?
Honestly, this is really fowl not to mention dangerous. The nasties that could be on a soiled towel at McD's have to be the worst. Just think of how soiled the towel must be before it is placed in the soiled towel bucket.
]]>@RvLeshrac: I'm sure someone will come along and say that the employees should be sacked, but their job doesn't include questioning the management. Sad, but true.
Yes it does, when they receive orders to do something that blatantly violates code or procedure. Don't tell me if management had their employees harm employees you'd stand by that too...obviously not. And it's not a questionable line that needs to be drawn, the line is already drawn.
Management, I assume the one watching the entire process to "make sure it gets done correctly" should be fired, and the employee should be reprimanded as well. There is no excuse for that, they didn't have another bucket to use that wasn't in unsanitary conditions 99% of the time?
That said, a properly sanitized bucket would be completely fine to eat out of, but that doesn't excuse their actions, nor does "this was an isolated incident." You can make firing the manager in the picture an isolated incident as well...
]]>Yea, /normally/ they don't sanitize the bucket.
]]>Big difference!!! Not worth taking the risk.
]]>Why the hell would they reuse the milk anyway? they should've thrown out the milk that was in the machine esp if the machine was in need of cleaning. Wouldn't you be putting dirty milk back into a clean machine?
]]>Many of the franchise-owned McDonald's locations in Orlando are host to some shockingly filthy conditions. I'm not sure who owns these franchises, but they need to get nailed and nailed hard. No amount of complaints over the course of two years to McDonald's corporate complaint line ever resolved the chronic ailments I noticed.
]]>Yuck.
At one of my bars we used orange home depot buckets to refill the ice bins. They were cleaned and sanitized nightly. One time a customer stopped me and told me it was disgusting that we were using a construction bucket to refill the ice.
So I replaced the orange home depot buckets with plain white ones that I subsequently labeled in large letter - ICE ONLY.
Perception is reality. This is gross.
You can't necessarily tell if someone is overweight by looking at them. If raw size was all that mattered, Vin Diesel in loose clothing would be obese.
]]>Actually after googling WTF TV, (sounded like a good name for a video site) turns out there is a WTF-TV in Las Vegas... do you want to tell them or should I?
]]>We have a McD in the next town, and the owner has 2 franchise shops (the other about 15 miles away), and his family and crew works their butts off to keep it ship-shape 24 hours a day.
If I were the McD exec, I'd pull their franchise on the spot. But again, that's just me....
]]>All the crud in the bucket made it easier to make oreo mc'fluries. Mmmmmm....
]]>Since when did McDonald's use milk in the shakes? I'm thinking someone made a mistake in the letter to the customer.
I highly doubt that the non-dairy milkshake mix went bad while sitting out.
I'm also sure that the bucket *WAS* sanitized. Properly cleaned, it would be safe enough for a baby to drink out of.
That said, using the "soiled towels only" bucket, even if properly sanitized, is poor procedure, and the store manager (present in the photo) should be fired.
I'm sure someone will come along and say that the employees should be sacked, but their job doesn't include questioning the management. Sad, but true.
]]>On topic: Yeah, even if the bucket was boiled in hot water its still YUK!
Walrus: MkkyDeez haz mah bukket?
]]>@CumaeanSibyl: I don't remember if it was blue or if it was red. And that scares me.
]]>A good reminder to get milkshakes at places that know how they're made; i.e., by scooping ice cream and pouring cold milk into a blender. Not by releasing a tap.
]]>@newlywed: NOOO they be stealin mah milkshake
]]>oh thats just naaaaasty
]]>And just let me say, ewwwwww.
And let me also say, call the local health inspectors on any restaurant that pulls this kind of crap. Restaurants take the inspectors very seriously because they can cause BIG financial pain, but the inspectors need tips to help them.
Oh, and has anyone considered: perhaps McDonald's milkshakes are MADE FROM soiled towels only? See, perfectly innocent action -- they were just topping it off with raw materials.
]]>I DO NOT CARE.
There is a reason the bucket is labled "Soiled Towels Only". Why should anyone believe it was even possible to sanitize the bucket so it would be safe to hold milk in it? Hell, the milk probably went bad sitting out in a bucket during the repairs anyway.
They're insane.
]]>"I'm lovin' it!" Disgusting.
]]>