As a friend recently said to me, we are living in an age where the Big Mac is now going the way of the Marlboro — McDonald’s is transforming its menu to accommodate the rising concerns with healthier lifestyles and obesity in this country. You may believe they did this before when they began offering salads in the first place and when they began offering apple slices in place French fries for happy meals.
McDonald’s latest twist to match the more modern way of thinking where food and activity is concerned is their new Go Active™ Happy Meal ® for adults. That’s right, a happy meal for us. It debuted on April 25th and I decided to go and check it out yesterday.
The Go Active™ meal consists of one of their premium salads and a Dasani® water. Like a child’s happy meal, you also get a prize with your food. Yep, that got my attention too. The prize in this case, however is a customizable workout DVD and there are going to be four or five of them, so depending on where you are – you’ll get one.
What interested me was the fact that the workout DVDs are about 15 minutes in length and feature the trainer Maya from Yourself!Fitness. I reviewed this program a few months ago. The Yourself!Fitness was designed for the Playstation 2, the Xbox and the PC – now McDonald’s is providing fitness videos using the virtual trainer that includes Yoga, Core, Strength and Cardio workouts.
There is also an information booklet that comes with each DVD that features a message from a Doctor Dean Ornish who is working with McDonald’s to combat coronary diseases. There is also a $5 coupon in the booklets to buy the Yourself!Fitness program that is more interactive than these DVDs.
As a major push and effort towards combating obesity and improving fitness, McDonald’s is making an extremely positive effort. As for their new Asian Salad that I got to eat yesterday – it’s really, really good. The chicken in the salad was grilled with an orange glaze. There were snow peas, mandarin oranges and red bell peppers as well as 16 types of fresh greens. There are also almonds and Paul Newman’s Own ® dressing that comes with it. If you want to see more about the salad, you can check it out at a McDonald’s virtual experience on their website.
All in all, I am giving McDonald’s two thumbs up for effort and content. The salad was good. The DVDs are interesting and the coupon offer and explanations are great. So go McDonald’s.
For those of you who still want your Big Mac and fries, you can get the DVD for $2.99 no matter what you order.