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Comment by jeza | Hacker News Reader

In Australia 10pc is the largest serving of chicken nuggets you can get at McDonalds, with the other sizes being 3 or 6 (I don't know the prices because they're not listed on their website and I don't often go to McDonalds; https://mcdonalds.com.au/menu/chicken-mcnuggets). Could this be the key though, if 10 is the largest here, then that suggests it is more than what most people can really eat. Having 20 at the same price might just be a decoy to make McDonalds look generous as they'll give you 20 for the same price if you really want (but you don't really want). Might be good value to get 20 if you're sharing but then you'd probably be tempted to get drinks for each person with a most certainly high margin.

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As an Aussie living in North America I can tell you that portion sizes over here have absolutely zero to do with what people can actually eat.

Even though they've eliminated Super Size (since the movie) the large coke at McDonald's USA is still massively bigger than the large in Australia

More is more.

BuzzFeed did a short video on this and the US and Australian McDonalds large are very similar.

http://i.imgur.com/UJMBMEA.png

It is BuzzFeed though -- so who knows.

Hmm, that's odd. When I was in the US, fast food restaurants tended to have much larger cup sizes - with hard plastic rather than a paper cup in the large size, presumably for stability (like [1]). In that comparison image, the small would be an Australian medium, the medium a Large and a US large size only available at cinemas who have enormous cups.

[1] http://i.imgur.com/g8qLjAQ.jpg

The largest size purchasable in Germany at McDonalds is 400ml, less than one pint.

I wish they'd textually labeled the countries. Maybe I'm geographically illiterate.

Japan, India, HK, UK, Australia, USA, Canada, Singapore

Tiny city-states are not known for being particularly recognizable unless you've been there.

In Australia, the Large is the biggest size you can purchase. I believe in the US there's another, larger size?

There used to be. Now it's just S/M/L (plus a very small children's size) which are 16/21/32 oz.

This is also another pricing curiosity. Who buys a large when there are free refills? I guess I don't understand it, but I gave up drinking everything that is in a fountain many years ago. When I eat out I usually just don't drink anything except coffee or water.

You raise another important point - Australia doesn't have free refills, for any size.

You buy a large if you aren't staying in the restaurant. Drive thru and to go!

Something it took me a week or so to realise in the US is that at restaurants, no one really expects you to eat the entire meal - portions are such that you couldn't possibly go home hungry, which seems to lead to a lot of wastage.

Restaurant portions are much smaller in Australia (as you'd know), but generally people will eat the entire plate, and maybe an entrée (starter) too.

This doesn't really apply to fast food, though - since if you want less food you can just order a small. My girlfriend and I would order two burgers and share a small chips & drink in the US because the portions were so large.

Small nitpick: s/wastage/waste

Smaller nitpick ;) https://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/wastag...

Thanks! I thought I had checked. I learned something today!

> no one really expects you to eat the entire meal

True. It is completely accepted to take leftover food home from all but the highest of high class restaurants. A typical restaurant dish will make up something like 1-3 servings.

A variety of reasons might be at play, but I think the lack of social inhibition for taking food home is part of it. Most restaurants will ask if you'd like a box if there is food remaining at the end of your meal.

Indeed. I believe this is so because restaurants here do not want anyone to go hungry. That includes people who are rather large. If you must guarantee that people up to say 400 lbs always go home satisfied by giving them enough food, there will be way too much food for someone who is 100-200 lbs. This does place the burden of portion control on the eater, which can be problematic for the eater, but is not so for the restaurant. A much worse fate for the restaurant would be losing customers permanently because they did not serve enough food. There is only one restaurant in the US that I've ever been to that didn't provide enough food and I will never go back to it. (I'm around 200 lbs so I'm not expecting a whole ton either.)

Some fast food restaurants, including many if not most standalone McDonalds do more business through the drive-through window than in the seating area. So, if people decide they want more of something, or want a dessert, they can't really go back. Since the cost of the actual beverage or French fries is negligible compared to the other sunk costs, it just makes sense to give people a quantity that is "sufficient".

FWIW, in Germany they sell 4, 6, 9, and 20 pieces.

Here in Spain it is the same, 4, 6, 9 and 20 pieces

It's rather difficult to avoid posting a Pulp Fiction quote on this thread.

I think the most interesting global evil megacorp franchise country might be Japan. On one hand, the Americana brand is very strong, on the other hand there's no way US sizes would work in Japan.

In the end (if things haven't changed in ~13 years) McDonald's/Burger King end up being almost as raw a deal in Japan as in Norway. Of course in Japan, you get much better service. That's just the way Japan works.

Can you really get a beer with your burger in Amsterdam?

You can in Germany but the decision to offer it or not is left to the individual restaurants and I never noticed them advertising it or even listing the price but I may just have missed it or been in a restaurant not offering beer every time Pulp Fiction crossed my thought while being there. So I guess you could probably get one in Amsterdam even if not in all restaurants.

You can in Paris, it's about the cheapest place to get a beer on the Champs Elysees

You cannot in Amsterdam, disappointingly.

>Can you really get a beer with your burger in Amsterdam?

You can in Spain, although unfortunately it's only available if you choose to eat your meal inside the restaurant ;P

The in depends on the franchise, I can take the beer even if i eat outside the restaurant or if I take it away yo home.

I talk McDonalds in Barcelona province. The only problem is that the beer is Cruzcampo :P

Come to Portugal. We'll serve you beer with your burger!

Another reason to try to make it to Boom! festival next year!

These replies are fantastic, thank you everyone! :-)

I don't know if you can buy beer in Amsterdam but in Spain and France yes.

I think you can't in Italy

But the largest drink size here is 40cl, which is less than a pint.

But the prices are in euro.

I'm writing this just to illustrate my point: why "but"?

You make it seem like your statement is contradicting mine, yet I fail to see the connection.

Your statement makes it seem as if "Super Sizes" would be common here, too. Well, they are sometimes, but not always. It’s a weird limbo state, where you can buy 4 McNuggets, or 20, but the largest drink is 40cl, while in the US the largest McNuggets serving is 20, but the largest drink 118cl

Wait, people actually use cL in Germany? I thought most metric countries would say "400 mL" instead (that's what we do in Canada anyway). It seems so arbitrary to me - if not sticking to powers of 3, then why not just say 4 dL?

(Not that there's anything "wrong" about this - I just don't understand why.)

well, normally people use ml for everything, but cups and bottles from US companies are sold in cl sizes. Coke glass: 50cl. IKEA glass: 200ml. McDonalds cup: 40cl. Glass in a local restaurant (if not coke glass): 200ml.

Germans are better at math so you have to throw more curve balls.

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