The One Way McDonald's Workers Are Never Supposed To Make Your Eggs

Many folks would agree that when a quick breakfast is called for, McDonald's is hard to beat. Yet as satisfying as it is, people are always looking for ways to order an upgraded Egg McMuffin with seemingly simple requests. For some, that means attempting to order the eggs less than fully cooked. Because McDonald's iconic Egg McMuffin is always made with freshly cracked eggs, it wouldn't seem like too much of an ask to get them prepared with a luscious, runny yolk. But according to chef Mike Haracz, it's not going to happen.

Haracz has close to 350,000 followers on TikTok, where he spills the beans on corporate secrets like how McDonald's burgers are cooked and how to recreate the Big Mac sauce at home. As a former manager of culinary innovation for the Golden Arches, he has detailed insider knowledge about how the company operates. In one of his TikTok videos, he answered a question about why McDonald's always breaks the yolk before cooking eggs for breakfast sandwiches.

The reason is simple — there is a possibility that an undercooked egg could make a customer sick. Yes, the odds may be low, which could lead some to believe that's an overly rigid policy, but McDonald's is just playing it safe. Although the chances of that happening are small, Haracz explains that given the billions of eggs McDonald's slings every year, the statistical potential becomes greater, and the company has no interest in having a customer contract a foodborne illness from its food.

Being in the customer service business, McDonald's has an obligation to both satisfy a patron's desires and keep them safe, but sometimes it can't serve both masters. Undercooked eggs increase the chances of a customer getting Salmonella. The FDA indicates that eliminating the risk of Salmonella in eggs requires cooking both the whites and the yolk until they're firm, which means over-easy eggs are off the table. Symptoms from Salmonella can vary from person to person, but diarrhea, fever, and vomiting to different degrees of severity are common. Not exactly things you're hoping to get along with your Egg McMuffin.

Though people have reported getting the McDonald's sandwich that changed breakfast forever with runny yolks in the past. Sometimes it's just a happy accident (if you like your eggs prepared that way) committed by an employee who didn't follow protocol. However, there is a very small chance that asking nicely might get you eggs cooked the way you want. A person claiming to be a former McDonald's employee on Reddit said, "If there is no line or generally just slow, we liked special requests like this, made us almost feel like real cooks." Still, that's the rare exception to the rule, and technically, the workers are not supposed to fulfill such requests. If a McDonald's breakfast sandwich is calling your name, don't set yourself up for disappointment by assuming the employees might cook you runny eggs, because usually, they won't.