McDonald's Australia announced the addition of onion rings to its menus in early 2021, introducing the crispy side dish to its Australian locations for the very first time.
During a limited time period, customers could request onion rings as a side with a Southern BBQ dipping sauce, or as a topping for the chain's Aussie Angus burger.
However, despite their fleeting appearance Down Under, onion rings have never been offered in McDonald's U.S. restaurants, as one former McDonald's chef recently explained on TikTok.
Mike Haracz, a former Manager of Culinary Innovation at the chain's headquarters, stated in a nearly two-minute recording that McDonald's is most profitable when it is most efficient and that efficiency is on a large scale.
"If McDonald's could sell only one thing, that would be great for them, so they actually [...] have reduced choice and have reduced options, more specifically in the United States."
Haracz also explained that if McDonald's introduced onion rings as a limited-time offer, fewer people would purchase its French fries, which are "extremely profitable" for the restaurant chain.
Haracz concluded his video by emphasizing that McDonald's makes such a profit on its French fries that the company would be reluctant to offer any side dish that could detract from their fry sales.
Incredibly, McDonald's once experimented with "onion nuggets," a fried side dish that can only be explained with a sigh and "it was the late 1970s."
According to Mental Floss, McDonald's first executive chef proposed a "deep fried onion mixture," but the chain's executives advised him to focus on a breaded chicken concept instead.
This eventually evolved into the Chicken McNugget, while the Onion McNugget was consigned to the McArchives.