Cutting the mustard

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I ate a McDonald’s cheeseburger here in Port St. Lucie and noted that it had mustard on it, as McDonald’s cheeseburgers seem to everywhere besides New York.

Curious, I searched Google and found only this post from Serious Eats, noting the same issue and asking commenters to describe the toppings on McDonald’s burgers in their region. Just about everyone from outside New York who responded said their burgers included mustard.

I asked Twitter, and @MaryL1973 suggested I contact McDonald’s. So I sent an email to everyone in the chain’s U.S. media-relations department asking why it was that New York-area McDonald’s don’t have mustard, where the dividing line is, and if there are any other regional variations on standard burger toppings.

About a half-hour later I received a statement from Jennifer Nagy, the McDonald’s Marketing Manager for the New York Metro region. It reads:

Approximately 85 percent of McDonald’s restaurants are owned and operated by independent businesspeople. As independent owners, McDonald’s franchise owners have the authority to make certain operating decisions as they relate to their McDonald’s restaurant operations. Because of regional preference, mustard is not added to the hamburgers in the New York Tri-State area, but customers are able to request mustard when ordering their favorite McDonald’s hamburger.

This reminds me of a Mitch Hedberg joke: “Every McDonald’s commercial ends the same way: Prices and participation may vary. I wanna open a McDonald’s and not participate in anything. I wanna be a stubborn McDonald’s owner. ‘Cheeseburgers? Nope! We got spaghetti, and blankets.'”

Anyway, there you have it: Individual franchise owners can make “certain operating decisions,” and apparently all the individual owners in the New York area have opted to serve their burgers without mustard standard. I suppose there’s some reasonable chance one guy or one group owns most of the New York-area McDonald’s and hates mustard, and that the few remaining McDonald’s not owned by that guy stopped serving mustard on burgers because too many New Yorkers complained. Something like that.

I suppose the big news here is that burgers without standard mustard are apparently a “regional preference.” I happen to like mustard on burgers (McDonald’s included), but probably not enough to request it at the drive-thru.

David Wright on sandwiches

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It has been widely reported that David Wright eats a ton of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. This report is, to paraphrase R.A. Dickey, erroneous.

Wright denied eating “a ton” of them and suggested that rumor was overblown, though he confessed he eats peanut-butter sandwiches often. Moreover, his sandwich of choice is not peanut butter and jelly, it is peanut butter, banana and honey, sometimes with oatmeal in the sandwich.

Oatmeal in the sandwich? Groundbreaking. But Wright is typically humble.

“I’m no sandwich connoisseur,” he said.

I suggested that the sandwich wasn’t terribly far off from Elvis’ favorite, and described The King’s peanut butter with honey, banana and bacon on bread grilled in butter.

“No bacon, no butter,” Wright said. “And I usually eat it on a wrap.”

Interesting. Wright said he makes the sandwiches himself and that he doesn’t have a preferred peanut-butter brand — “Whatever’s around.”

I explained that I am particular about my peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, that I always use Skippy on whole wheat bread cut diagonally. He seemed vaguely entertained and perhaps a little sketched out. I might have come on too strong, presenting myself as a sandwich expert and all.

“So that’s your go-to?” he asked. I told him it was, anytime I was heading into the office, at least.

“Hey, it’s good, and it stays fresh all day,” he said.

He’s right, you know. Portability and durability are big parts of the peanut butter sandwich’s appeal.

From Minor League camp

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Video producer Jeff and I spent the afternoon at Mets Minor League camp, banking a bunch of video and interviews that we’ll roll out over time. It’s not full camp yet for the Minor Leaguers — it’s the Mets’ Step camp (not sure if Step is an acronym or not), so it was just a select group of young players. It poured here, so the workouts were curtailed and we didn’t get to see much batting practice, but it’s nonetheless interesting to see some of the Mets’ prospects we hear about all the time in action.

Reese Havens, notably, looks pretty fluid and comfortable at second base. I guess because he hits for power I was expecting a bigger guy, but he’s built like a middle infielder.

Cesar Puello looks awesome doing just about everything. Not hard to see why Toby Hyde and a bunch of other prospects experts are so high on him. Also not hard to see why people think he’ll develop power. He’s got broad shoulders and seemed to be ripping the ball in the cage.

After just about every other player was done, Matt Harvey and Brad Holt stayed behind to work on bunting in the batting cage. So that’s cool.

Also, and perhaps most notably to TedQuarters readers: While we were standing in a conference room protecting our camera from the rain, Jeff called me over to the glass door that opens out to the batting cages. “It’s your boy,” he said.

Blocking the doorway was the enormous Val Pascucci, of folk-hero fame. He came to camp early knowing he’d be given opportunities in split-squad games like the one he got in Orlando yesterday. Extremely nice guy, it turns out. We talked for a while, a fraction of which you’ll see on video soon. He was aware of the Internet’s vehement Val Pascucci Lobby.

I asked Dickie Scott, the Mets’ new Minor League Field Coordinator, about Pascucci, and he said, “you know, he has hit everywhere he’s been.” As a matter of fact, I do know that.