08 December 2023 , 13:03
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A former McDonald's chef has revealed why the chain's milkshake machine always seems to be 'broken'. Mike Haracz, who was a corporate chef at McDonald's until 2019, has been sharing behind-the-scenes secrets on his TikTok channel. One of these includes the reason why the fast-food chain's milkshake machine is often out of order.
In one of his recent videos, he quotes a viewer's comment: "I work at McDonald's. They [the milkshake machine] is most probably not broken. We just don't want to add the mix if it's busy. If it's not [busy], then they're just hating." Serving a milkshake or McFlurry when the machine needs refilling requires a crew member to fetch the right mix from a fridge at the back of the store, add it to the machine, and run it until it comes out as expected.
This can take quite a bit of time, and isn't ideal when customers are waiting both in-store and at the drive-thru. That's when you're likely to hear 'Sorry, the milkshake machine is broken'. But this isn't the only reason an employee might fib about the machine's status. It could also be undergoing a cleaning cycle, or they simply might not know how to put it back together after its cleaning cycle the night before.
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Mike, a former McDonald's corporate chef, explained: "I'm a former McDonald's corporate chef and let's talk about the ice cream machine. So a lot of times it's not broken. Either the person who knows how to assemble and disassemble it is not there. If they are there, it's probably during peak time. So you know, 2am would probably be a great time to clean the ice cream machine but with a minimal kitchen staff at that time, they're probably really busy and really can't do it so they'll do it during more peak times."
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"If it is not assembled appropriately, it is not going to work. It's my understanding that the cleaning cycle takes quite a while. Running the cleaning cycle and doing everything involved in that is probably not getting done at 2am or 3am because staffing levels at that time are so low. They're busy doing other things. So a lot of times, it's not broken, it's either cleaning or somebody has no idea how to reassemble it and get it up and running."
One user commented on his video: "Here's a crazy idea, a second machine that gets cleaned at a different time." Another user, who works at McDonald's, added: "If the mix levels are too low; the cleaning cycle will fail and have to start over. People forget to fill it all the time."
One frustrated customer complained: "The one I go to, in my town, has been "broken" for over a year. And they just went through a massive renovation. I prefer Wendy's." Another user, who used to work at the fast-food chain, shared: "The model my store had was so hard to take apart and clean properly. Flushing it was pretty easy just putting the valves back together was the worst."
* An AI tool was used to add an extra layer to the editing process for this story.