Full disclosure: I hate the Shamrock Shake – always have. It has two things in this world that I can’t stand: ice cream and mint. (Well, ice cream is a relative term, as I believe the shakes at McDonald’s have never had ice cream within 100 miles of them… but I digress.) The only thing I hate at McDonald’s more than the Shamrock Shake is the McRib. But, the fact that I hate the Shamrock Shake has nothing to do with my complaint about it.
Why is is so difficult for the marketing geniuses at McDonald’s to understand that people don’t want you to fuck with their food? Am I the only one who gets that the reason people go to McDonald’s is because of the consistency of the product line? You want to have the same crappy Quarter Pounder that you had when you were 16 – – it’s a comfort thing, not a quality thing. I’m no corporate marketeer any more, but I’m willing to bet that 90% of McDonald’s sales are the same core products: hamburgers, cheeseburgers, Quarter Pounders & Big Macs. (Maybe throw Chicken McNuggets in there somewhere, as it was probably the last food introduction that the American public embraced with any enthusiasm – in 1980 – and I’m sure most of those sold are to kids.) It’s fairly obvious that we don’t want to go to McDonalds and have salads, burritos, pizza, soup, sloppy joes or filet mignon.
So, it is in this vein that I was incredulous when I saw the recent ads touting the yearly return of the Shamrock Shake, only to see that they added whipped cream and a cherry to it! WTF? It’s not a fucking Starbucks latte! And, for some reason, the boneheads at McDonald’s have seemed to forgotten that people are very, very attached to this crappy product. Hell, before the internet, they had snail mail fan clubs for the Shamrock Shake complete with t-shirts and newsletters. I have a feeling that fucking with the Shamrock Shake is not going to go over well with Shamrock Shake enthusiasts. I haven’t seen much about it yet, as I think they just returned (to Chicago anyway) this week. But, again, McDonald’s doesn’t seem to get that they should just keep churning out the same old shit and we’ll be happy.
Don’t fuck with the Shamrock Shake!!!! You have been warned.
nachounderpants.com 
I read something recently about some McDonald’s subbing out pistachio for the mint. Because they are both green, nobody will be able to tell the difference? Blech.
I tried to order one without the whipped cream and cherry at O’Hare last week, and I was told by the $7.00/hr Assistant Manager Beeeoch that they don’t sell them that way. The whipped cream takes up about 1/4 of the glass, wtf? So I stopped at Wendy’s on my way home and got a Frosty brain-freeze instead.