How to Eat at McDonald’s When You’re Monumentally Broke

We’ve all been there. It’s the day before payday, your checking account is running on fumes, and your stomach is as empty as your wallet. So you go to McDonald’s, a somewhat popular fast-casual restaurant with a business model predicated on consistent, cheap food that, at minimum, gets you fed.

What do you order to make the most of your limited resources while maximizing, say, caloric intake? Or net weight?

Two weeks ago I pulled the nutritional table from the McDonald’s website and combined it with 88 menu-item prices from #HackTheMenu, a fantastic, crowdsourced fast-food price-reporting site. It’s possible that prices may have changed in the interim, as it is crowdsourced.

Here are the top 15 food items based on net weight per dollar:

Item Price Grams G/$ 1 Bacon Cheddar McChicken $1.00 171 171 2 McDouble $1.00 151 151 3 Fruit ‘n Yogurt Parfait $1.00 149 149 4 Buffalo Ranch McChicken $1.00 145 145 5 McChicken $1.00 143 143 6 Double Cheeseburger $1.29 165 128 7 Fruit & Maple Oatmeal $1.99 251 126 8 Fruit & Maple Oatmeal (no brown sugar) $1.99 251 126 9 Sausage Biscuit $1.00 117 117 10 BBQ Ranch Burger $1.00 116 116 11 Grilled Onion Cheddar $1.00 115 115 12 Sausage Burrito $1.00 111 111 13 Sausage McMuffin $1.00 110 110 14 Daily Double $1.99 194 97 15 Cheeseburger $1.29 114 88

Here are the bottom:

Item Price Grams G/$ 79 Egg White Delight $2.79 134 48 80 Southwest Salad (no chicken) $4.79 230 48 81 Southern Style Crispy Chicken Sandwich $3.89 159 41 82 Filet-O-Fish $3.49 142 41 83 Chicken McNuggets (10 piece) $4.29 162 38 84 Southern Style Chicken Biscuit $3.89 143 37 85 Apple Slices $1.00 34 34 86 Mighty Wings (10 piece) $9.69 314 32 87 Mighty Wings (5 piece) $5.59 157 28 88 Mighty Wings (3 piece) $3.69 94 26

If you want as many calories as possible, here are the top 15 based on calories per dollar:

Item Price Cals. Cals./$ 1 Bacon Cheddar McChicken $1.00 480 480 2 Sausage Biscuit $1.00 430 430 3 McDouble $1.00 390 390 4 McChicken $1.00 360 360 5 Sausage McMuffin $1.00 360 360 6 Buffalo Ranch McChicken $1.00 350 350 7 BBQ Ranch Burger $1.00 350 350 8 Double Cheeseburger $1.29 440 341 9 Grilled Onion Cheddar $1.00 310 310 10 Sausage Burrito $1.00 300 300 11 Cheeseburger $1.29 300 233 12 Bacon McDouble $2.00 460 230 13 Large French Fries $2.19 500 228 14 Daily Double $1.99 440 221 15 Ranch Snack Wrap (crispy) $1.59 350 220

And the bottom:

Item Price Cals. Cals./$ 79 Premium Grilled Chicken Classic Sandwich $3.99 350 88 80 Mighty Wings (5 piece) $5.59 480 86 81 Premium Bacon Ranch Salad with Crispy Chicken $4.59 390 85 82 Mighty Wings (3 piece) $3.69 290 79 83 Premium Southwest Salad with Grilled Chicken $4.79 290 61 84 Premium Bacon Ranch Salad with Grilled Chicken $4.59 230 50 85 Premium Bacon Ranch Salad (no chicken) $4.59 140 31 86 Southwest Salad (no chicken) $4.79 140 29 87 Side Salad $1.00 20 20 88 Apple Slices $1.00 15 15

To review: The McDonald’s Dollar Menu offers pretty good value. But with Mighty Wings and Apple Slices, you’re overpaying.

I’m pretty sure that eating like this regularly is terrible for you. You’d be spending your dwindling cash on, say, Bacon Cheddar McChickens, and each one is packed with half of your daily recommended amount of sodium.

Update: We’re getting reports that the Bacon Cheddar McChicken is now priced at $2. This would knock it down substantially. Congratulations to the McDouble and Sausage Biscuit, which become the most cost-efficient menu items at McDonald’s by weight and calories, respectively.