Burger King

Update Review, October 2023

It had been a while since I last had a burger from Burger King or McDonald's, but when I wound up with a free Whopper loaded on my account, I of course had to go claim my freebie.  I went with zero expectation of actually liking it, armed with my own drinks and side dishes (because, I was there for the free thing after all!), and ended up leaving very pleasingly satisfied.  I won't be rushing back to get a fast food burger anytime soon, but, I liked it considerably more than I expected.

Whopper (low carb). $7.69.

"America's Favorite Burger, The Whopper Sandwich is a ¼ lb of flame-grilled beef with juicy tomatoes, crisp lettuce, creamy mayonnaise, ketchup, crunchy pickles, and sliced white onions on a toasted sesame seed bun."

I never care for Burger King's buns, so I ordered mine bunless, or, "low carb" they call it.  Note that you cannot order online or in the app with no bun, it isn't in the customization options, but if you order in person, they don't blink an eye, and the receipt comes out saying "low carb", so, clearly this is an easy and moderately common thing.  I wish they'd add to the app.  

I did not ask for no ketchup/mustard/mayo, and those are generally slathered on in the regular sandwich version so I expected them too, but alas, mine came bare.  Luckily I realized it before I was out the door, and went back to ask for some, and was given packets of all three.

My low carb burger came in an amusingly large platter this time.  It was fairly attractively presented, with the pickles and onions atop the burger patty, and lettuce and tomato on the side.  5 pickles, 3 onion rings, 2 slices of tomato, plus a pile of shredded lettuce.  I wonder if these are the same standard portions used when constructing into a burger?  The toppings are not really enough to make a salad of it, so if you are intending to enjoy this as a burger atop a salad, bring more base mixed greens.

I actually brought my own large slices of green leaf lettuce to make lettuce wraps (and sauteed mushrooms and fresh heirloom tomato slices to put in with the burger, and a small salad and cole slaw to have as sides).  I assembled my wraps, added condiments, and dug in.  I was immediately pleased.  The burger patty wasn't anything special, certainly not a big fat juicy medium wagyu burger, but it wasn't too tough, and was reasonably well seasoned.  It went oh-so-well with the pickles, onions, and condiments.  Really, it is all the bits together that combine to give a very classic burger taste.  

The onions were crisp and harsh, but, that works here.  The pickles lightly acidic and juicy.  The ketchup and mustard as generic as can be.  Put that together?  Such a familiar taste.  The lettuce was pretty boring pieces of iceberg, but they were fresh enough, and not browning.   The tomato was actually fine, not too mealy.

Overall, with my additions as burger lettuce wraps, I truly enjoyed this.  Would I pay $7.69 for it?  No.  But, it was satisfying and free, and totally worth the venture to BK.  ***.

Update Review, April 2022

A year ago, I became a fan of Burger King.  Yup, it took me 40 years to really truly love Burger King (besides the crowns, of course).  I genuinely enjoy their Impossible Whopper, which I've reviewed several times before (below).  Honestly, **** burger.

But this time, I headed to Burger King for something else.  Dessert.  Not just any dessert.  Ice cream.  Somehow, in all my soft serve eating, I had never had a cone from BK before.

Soft Serve Cone. $1.49 (or 250 crown points).

"We didn't invent soft serve, but with one taste of our cool, creamy, and velvety Vanilla Soft Serve, you'll think we perfected it. Served in a cone."

This was my first time having Burger King soft serve.  I didn't expect anything special, but, it was ridiculously warm out, totally ice cream weather, and I had some "crown points" burning a hole in my pocket.

So I splurged, redeeming 250 of them for a cone (a cup is also available), normally $1.49.  Only the one flavor is available, never actually listed as "vanilla" just as "soft serve".  No toppings are available.

It was, well, fast food soft serve?  About as I expected.  The consistency was good, in the fake ice cream kind of way, and it melted perfectly on the warm day.  It was not grainy nor icy. The flavor certainly wasn't vanilla, almost more like a white chocolate, just, sweet.  It didn't taste too artificial or plastic-like though.

The cone was the part that actually surprised me as it wasn't stale in any way.  Even decent ice cream shops can suffer from stale cones.

So overall, the consistency was good, the flavor was fine, and the cone not stale.  Would I pay $1.49 for it?  Well, given other options, probably not, but it wasn't bad, and once I added my own sprinkles it was much better.

***.

Update Review, February 2021

Well, I've become a Burger King fan.  I'm really, really into their Impossible Whopper, which I reviewed once before.  And now, I've hacked it even further.

Impossible Whopper. $7.29.
Extra Onion, Extra Cheese, Low Carb. ($0.50, $0.80).

"Features a flame-grilled patty made from plants topped with tomatoes, lettuce, mayo, ketchup, pickles, and onions."

I finally, finally, finally took my own advice.  I am not low carb, but I dislike Burger King buns.  I had started bringing my own iceberg wedge to do lettuce wraps, and always thought about asking for no bun.  

So, I did it.  "No bun," I said, and the cashier without hesitation said, "Ok, low carb."  They have a button on the register for it even.  I asked if that meant it would be a lettuce wrap or just no bun, but she didn't seem to know nor care.  The answer?  Basically just no bun.  Perhaps they threw a little extra lettuce in?  It also came packaged totally differently, in a square plastic container (what they use for side salads?).

I left in all the standard toppings (tomato, pickles, lettuce) but upgraded to extra onion ($0.50!) because I adore their onion.  As always, I adored the onion but its a bit hard to justify $0.50 for just 1 (maybe 2?) extra round of onion, as I think it usually comes with 3.  It is so harsh though and I just really like it with my burger.

The lettuce was standard shredded iceberg, which is not my lettuce of choice normally, but is entirely appropriate with a burger.

The pickles I don't normally care for, crinkle style, but I actually didn't mind them this time, the little bits of pickle really do complete the "burger" experience.  That said, these are certainly not pickles I like much at all.

The tomatoes I always plan to leave out, but I'm glad I left them in this time.  Yes, they were awful, two slices of not juicy, not even red, clearly out of season tomato, but again, its all about the burger "experience" and the juicy tomato is kinda key.

I also added cheese, because, well, cheeseburgers are delicious?  More on this soon.

I wondered what they'd do with the ketchup and mayo, which come standard on the burger, and are key elements for me.  I hoped that they'd just put them on the burger patty itself.  Looking in from the top gave no indicator though (where *was* that actual burger?).  Sadly, the answer was "leave out entirely", but I was able to ask for packets instead.

I actually really, really, really enjoyed my burger this way.  I brought additional large hunks of iceberg to make a wrap, and I'm glad I did, although really you could just make a pretty tasty cheeseburger salad bowl from this (and their base salad?).

It was crazy satisfying, gave me a legit burger experience, and was everything I wanted it to be.

****.

Impossible Whopper Patty & Cheese.

The Impossible Burger patty was hiding under the toppings in the bottom of the container.  It came with what my receipt said was "HEAVY CHEESE", 2 slices, but, when I asked, they told me this was the normal amount.  I would have thought 1 slice was normal?  And I asked for regular.

Anyway.  The cheese was ... um, entirely not melted.  Oh, I'll also note that my burger was ready before I even reached the pick up area, so, clearly it was already cooked and the cheese just set up on top.  I guess that is normal?  I generally forget to order the cheese, and generally go to McDonald's, where they do usually melt it on ...

The cheese was fine, artificially bright orange "American" cheese, which, you guessed it, I liked to help complete "the burger experience".  But ... I really wanted it melty, so I'd probably leave off in the future.

Impossible Burger Patty: Grill Marks.

At some point, the burger patty I guess was actually grilled, and you could see the grill marks clearly on it.

The patty however, yeah, lukewarm at best.

This didn't detract me from enjoying it, but clearly it would be better actually warm, and actually freshly cooked.

Impossible Burger Patty: Inside.

And here you can see what the inside of that patty looks like.  It really, really did look like beef.  It tasted like beef.  Honestly, more than the last one I ordered.  I ... can't say that I'd be surprised to learn that they just didn't care and gave me a real patty.

It wasn't thick, it wasn't juicy, but ... it tasted like beef, and it was exactly what I wanted at the time.  Slathered with way too much mayo, ketchup, and mustard (from packets since they didn't add on), with all the other "essential" toppings, I really loved it.

****.

Update Review, November 2020

Oh T-Mobile Tuesday.  How I love you so.  I love random freebies. Particularly, it turns out, while living in a more rural area, staying with my parents in New Hampshire for a while during COVID for fresh air, summer, and greatly reduced COVID rates, and, it turns out, a way higher number of places that actually show up as T-Mobile freebies.  Maybe I'm biased because I was just soo happy to see Dunkin' Donuts on there regularly (where I discovered a great new favorite donut, actually, review coming soon - but previous reviews of baked goods here, drinks here), and I usually miss out when it is the weekly feature, as alas, no Dunks in San Francisco.

Anyway, T-Mobile Tuesday featured a free Whopper from Burger King, and I could pick regular or Impossible.  I've had my share of free Whoppers from Burger King, always mostly out of amusement/getting my free things, but I really do love their lettuce/onion/mayo mix (I know, I know), and I was eager to try out this Impossible burger.  

Yes, I actually ... was excited to visit Burger King.  My mother warned me as I left the house that I was likely to be disappointed.  Thanks, Mom!

Impossible Whopper Experience.

My visit was via the drive-thru, as it was in the depth of COVID, and the dining room was closed, even for takeout.

My burger was hot, seemed freshly made, was ready as I approached window, toppings were applied well, and the patty? Definitely better than I expected.

I was actually very pleased with the experience.  I wouldn't seek out a Whopper ever in general anyway, but if I found myself wanting one for some reason, I'd certainly get this again.

Impossible Whopper. $6.39.  (Packaging)

"Features a flame-grilled patty made from plants topped with tomatoes, lettuce, mayo, ketchup, pickles, and onions. *For guests looking for a meat-free option, a non-broiler method of preparation is available upon request."

The Impossible Whopper comes in a standard wrapper, branded with the IMPOSSIBLE name.  The standard prep actually makes it not technically entirely meat-free, as they cook it on the same broilers are the beef burgers, which, outrages real vegetarians, I know.  No dedicated Impossible burger grills at BK.  You *can* ask to have it prepared fully meat-free, and I think they microwave it that way ... Since I am not a vegetarian, I didn't care, and wanted the better, broiler experience anyway.

The same toppings as regular Whoppers are applied unless you ask for changes: lettuce, tomato, mayo, ketchup, pickles, onions.  You can add cheese or bacon, or add extra of anything normally included (most for a fee), and remove anything, obviously.

I left everything as-is, except I added extra onions (because I love them!) and extra pickles (because free!).

Bun.

The bun is the same standard Whopper bun.  Quite large, soft and fluffy on top, grilled on the inside top bun, slathered with the mayo mix on top, nothing on the bottom, thinner bun.

I never care for these buns, they are fine, but very generic, and I'm not much of a bun girl in general, if not a brioche or something special, so I never use them.  I actually went prepared this time with an entire half of an iceberg lettuce, and used the outer leaves to make a lettuce wrap, which worked remarkably well.  So juicy, fresh, and helped cut all the heaviness of the burger, and, um, my favorite part, the mayo.

But yeah, standard Whopper bun.

Toppings: Regular tomato (2 slices), lettuce, mayo, ketchup
Extra: onion, pickles (5 slices).

For toppings, I left the regular ketchup and mayo, as I adore the mayo at Burger King (just something about it!) and they apply it quite generously.  And ketchup really does go great with beefy taste, so I left that, and did not add mustard (free to add, but, not standard).  I was quite pleased with the sauces, again, that mayo is just ... awesome, I really think it tastes soooo very good with their lettuce and onions.  And they really do smother it in it, literally, 160 calories of the burger is *just the mayo*, even with the standard order.

For once, I left the tomato, finally willing to at least try it.  The regular amount is two slices.  They actually weren't that scary, looked decent, and were a solid "fine", what you might expect from a fairly generic tomato.  Not pale, not mealy, so, at least not that.  But I wouldn't get them again.

I also left the lettuce at regular, although I do like their lettuce, just shredded iceberg, but adding more is an additional charge, and I brought an entire half an iceberg head with me anyway.  I did like it as always though.

I added extra pickles, which meant 5 slices, crinkle cut, because it was free, and I could give to someone at home (along with bun), to use for their own purposes.  I did try one, and can confirm, that yup, I just don't care for BK pickles.  Something about the taste.  I like McDonald's pickles though!

And lastly, the onion, extra, which meant quite a bit, all different sized rings.  I really like their onion, again, I know, nothing special, just white onion, but I love the crispness, harshness, and way it combines with lettuce and mayo.

So, pickles and tomatoes given away, but everything else, exactly as I was hoping, and I truly enjoyed the lettuce/onions/mayo in my burger-wrap.

***** onions/lettuce/mayo, **+ tomato, *pickles.

Impossible Burger Patty.

The Impossible Whopper is assembled just like a regular Whopper, the patty under all the veggies, ketchup squirted on top, nothing under it besides the bottom bun, which had no sauces.  It had classic, visible grill marks, and looked like any standard beef patty from a fast food restaurant - fairly thin, cooked well done, no pink really inside.

I tasted a bit of the patty, sans anything else, and was reasonably impressed.  It wasn't nearly as good as other Impossible Burgers I've had, thicker, juicer ones, but it wasn't dry, it didn't taste funky, and certainly didn't taste like a veggie burger.  The texture was pretty close to that of a standard *fast food* beef patty.

Once I combined it into my lettuce wrap with all the other traditional burger toppings, it worked very well.  I certainly liked it more than the Burger King regular beef patties.  It really did have the beefy taste, as much as any fast food burger, perhaps even slightly more.

I brought a chunk for my mom to try, and made her a perfect bite with all the toppings, and she was actually really impressed, and said she'd never know the difference.

Overall, I was impressed with what BK has pulled off.  I won't seek it out, but if I was getting a Whopper again, I'd certainly get the Impossible one.

The patty is 240 calories, 29 fewer than the beef burger, still has 14 grams of fat, and does pack in 19g protein.

*** (**** for fast food burger I guess?)

Update Review, June 2020

Yup, National Burger Day, 2020.  Burger King gave out free Whoppers.  Of course I stopped by.

I wanted to do my "salad sandwich" that I proposed to myself last time, with extra lettuce, extra onion, etc, but adding extra anything comes with a fee, and I didn't want that for freebie day! 

Whopper. Add mustard.
Free for National Burger Day.

So, regular Whopper it was, only mod was adding mustard, which I learned I *can* do, and had lamented not having last time.

My review is largely unchanged.  These things are pretty consistent.  Burger King does have that going for htem.

Bun nicely toasted inside, soft, but, just a really boring bun.  Its also huge!  My partner also commented "wow, a Whopper is way bigger than I remember!"  Beef patty was thin, cooked all the way, and tasted like ... processed beef, and wasn't great.  Ketchup and mustard just in the center, not tons, and not spread around.  I didn't have the horrible looking tomatoes, and gave him the pickles as he likes them more.

I did like the onion, crisp and harsh, and the iceberg (no brown in sight), and I do love their mayo.  It was extremely generously slathered with mayo, all along the top bun.

It was what it was.  No more, no less, a Whopper.  Nice for free, but I mostly just gave it away.

**+.

Update Review, January 2020

When I was growing up, McDonald's was always my fast food of choice, and the Quarter Pounder with Cheese, or sometimes Big Mac, was my burger.  I always felt sad when the field hockey bus pulled into a Burger King instead, as I just never liked it nearly as much.  I settled for a Whopper Jr. with Cheese, but always wished we had picked McDonald's (and McDonald's had better fries, and McFlurries ...).

As an adult, I have not sought out fast food burgers all that often, although I did go through some years of excessive burger eating, running a dining club that got burgers every single Monday night.  I started my blog after those years, but you can read about some of my burger adventures here.  Let's just say I ate a lot of burgers, and plenty of them were fast casual style.

I never went to Burger King though, except when I went to try the new Satisfries (not tasty!), or, uh, when I went to Burger King in Munich explicitly seeking out the waffle ice cream sundae (ok, really good!).  Until now.  I think it had easily been 20 years since my last BK burger.  I won't mind if it is another 20.

Packaging.

My Whopper took a few minutes to assemble, and was handed over without a word: "A Whopper", is all she said, not even saying my number.

Signature Whopper paper, decently well wrapped.

Whopper.

"Our WHOPPER® Sandwich is a ¼ lb* of savory flame-grilled beef topped with juicy tomatoes, fresh lettuce, creamy mayonnaise, ketchup, crunchy pickles, and sliced white onions on a soft sesame seed bun."

I opened it up to reveal the contents.  It looked pretty good, nothing falling out, nothing mushed ...

The bun was nicely toasted inside, soft, and seemed fresh enough.  A large, kinda oversized bun though, I realized that I always got a Whopper Jr. in the past, not a regular one.  It is, uh, kinda a Whopper?  Just comparing the buns, the Whopper bun is 230 calories, the Whopper Jr. is only 120, so it really is nearly half the size, at least, the bread component.  The regular burger uses the same bun as the Whopper Jr.

Whopper: Inside.

It is the insides I was interested in though of course.

The top bun was slathered in mayo, creamy, generic mayo, that I really did love.  It went great with the lettuce and onions.  The lettuce, torn shreds of iceberg, was ... moderately fresh.  Crisp, but I did see some brown bits.  The sliced white onions gave a hit of harshness and pop of flavor, and I appreciated them.

Pickles are always one of my favorite parts of a burger, but I wasn't really into the BK ones.  Wavy style, and fine, but, I really prefer McDonald's and Subway style.  I didn't try the pale looking tomato, two slices.

Ketchup was somewhere in the mix, it seemed to be between the pickles and tomatoes, and was not well distributed.  This was easy to fix with an additional ketchup packet.  I also forgot that a Whopper doesn't include any special sauce, nor any mustard, so the ketchup and mayo really is it.  I prefer a McDonald's Quarter Pounder for the mustard, but, I do love mayo ...

I also forgot that a Whopper doesn't come with cheese by default.  Oops.  I certainly would have wanted that.

And finally the patty.  "¼ lb* of savory flame-grilled beef " ... yeah, it was barely warm, it was not juicy in any way, but at least it wasn't tough, and did have lovely grill marks?  It was basically, as expected.  No worse, but certainly not a burger you get to taste and enjoy the beef.  Again, comparing to the Whopper Jr. what I always used to get, that patty is just 100 calories, vs the 240 calories here, so this patty is actually nearly 2.5 times bigger, and I could tell.  Although it was very thin, it was a large patty, in diameter.  I guess they named this thing for a reason!

Overall, it was exactly as I expected.  No better, no worse.  It has a place in the world, but it is certainly not anything I plan to seek out again ... at least for another 10-15 years when curiosity strikes?

**+.

Whopper #2.

I blame T-Mobile for this.  T-Mobile Tuesdays had free Whoppers.  How could I resist another freebie?

My review is largely the same.  Beef patty thin and not exactly a juicy quality burger, but it isn't *that* bad.  I still couldn't bring myself to try the tomatoes.  I really did love the generous mayo, the harsh onions, and the iceberg.  I can kinda imagine enjoying a "salad sandwich", a Whopper hold the patty, extra onions, extra lettuce, definitely add cheese ... uh ...  

**+.

Original Review, October 2013

Burger King has always had a larger selection of sides than McDonalds, but they've now taken another leap, and offer not one, not two, but THREE different types of fries: sweet potato, regular, and their latest offering, dubbed Satisfries ... the healthy, yet still satisfying, fries.  The marketing behind them is genius, boasting that they contain 40% less fat and 30% fewer calories.  I assumed that they were comparing against their own fries.  They aren't.  They are comparing against McDonalds!  The numbers aren't nearly as impressive when you compare against their own versions, but given that they use the same oil and fryers, I guess it is impressive.  They developed a coating that somehow magically absorbs less oil.  But, (spoiler alert!),  they didn't live up to their name.

Value Sized Satisfries.  $1.69.

My fries were hot and fresh.  I give them credit for that.

Unlike the standard fries, they are crinkle cut.  I've never really liked crinkle cut fries, and my family always ate tons of frozen crinkle cut fries when I was a kid.  These reminded me of those exactly, not just in look, but also in taste.  They tasted like cardboard.  The outside was crispy, but the inside was just mush.  It didn't resemble potato in any way.  Burger King claims the fries are cut from whole potatoes, but I'm pretty skeptical.  They weren't salted well either.

Definitely not a win.  *+.