Eat Your Way through a Flight

Recently (as of the time of this writing), Burger King unveiled the Million Dollar Whopper competition. Whopper fans were invited to submit their burger combinations, whatever toppings they were interested in having on a Whopper, to the burger maker to try and find the best, most interesting new Whopper ideas. The winner would (presumably) get (cue Doctor Evil voice) one million dollars (although I can’t find the details of the contest at this point so I’m just guessing on that fact), and the Whopper would become a part of the Burger King menu (or something, as, again, can’t find the details and I’m too lazy to really dig that much further at this point).

Whatever the exact nature of the contest, the three finalists in the contest have been announced: Maple Bourbon BBQ, Fried Pickle Ranch, and Mexican Street Corn. These three Whopper selections are now available in stores, and if you wanted you could even pick up a “flight” of all three. So I did. I ordered the full flight online from my local store, brought them home (because eating in a restaurant post-COVID just feels weird), and I sampled all of them so we could discuss them in this article:

Maple Bourbon BBQ Whopper

The first of the burgers I tried, just going in a random order of what I pulled from the bag, was this barbecue sandwich creation. As per the Burger King site, the burger comes topped with “maple bourbon BBQ sauce,” crispy onions, crispy jalapeños, smoky maple candied bacon and American cheese. Now, seeing “maple bourbon BBQ sauce” in quotes left me feeling just a little bit of dread because you know that means they used a bunch of substitute ingredients. It’s like the Holy Roman Empire, which was neither the seat of the Roman Catholic Church, nor did it include Rome at all, and it wasn’t an empire but a conglomeration of city-states (thus, neither Holy nor Roman nor an Empire). You assume this sauce is neither Maple nor Bourbon nor real Barbeque. But still, we have to try it.

And actually, this burger is pretty great. It’s not hard to see how a barbeque burger will work well from Burger King. They regularly have specialty burgers that have barbeque sauce on them, so this feels like less of a stretch than other Million Dollar Whopper offerings. Plus, putting crispy, fried items on a burger is par for the course now at fast food restaurants. But the resulting burger actually tastes surprisingly controlled. The maple barbeque sauce is tangy but not overpowering, and it complimented the salt of the fried items well. It was salty and sweet but never too much, creating a very tasty burger that I found myself eating and eating.

What I will note, though, is that some ingredients feel lost on the burger. I couldn’t really pick out the candied bacon or the spice of the jalapeños. Both of these ingredients read like the crispy onions in my mouth, adding to the savory, salty flavor. And, sure, maybe the candied coating on the bacon added a touch of sweetness, but still not enough for me to really notice. The whole of the burger was great, and the overall flavor and mouthfeel was solid, but it was hard to get any specific textures for the burger out of “burger”, “sauce”, and “crunch”. If you want to feel more of each ingredient in your mouth from this overstuffed burger, you might consider this a bad thing. I liked it, but I can see people expecting more from it, too.

Fried Pickle Ranch Whopper

The second of the Whoppers I pulled from the bag was the one doubling down on pickle flavor. Topped with “creamy pickle ranch,” fried pickles, bacon, lettuce and Swiss cheese, this burger promises to be a pickle lover’s delight. The fried pickles on the burger proved so popular in initial testing that they’re even offered as their own side item you can just buy, which I also did because the taste test of everything didn’t feel complete if I didn’t grab all the items on offer. So you would expect this burger to knock it out of the park.

It didn’t. In fairness, this isn’t a bad burger, but it’s certainly not as pickle-fied as one would expect. Like with the Maple Bourbon BBQ Whopper, a lot of the ingredients here get lost in the mix. I didn’t taste the swiss, I barely noticed the lettuce, and the bacon was so muted it could have been removed from the burger entirely. The biggest shocker, though, was that I didn’t even really taste the fried pickles on the burger. Somehow everything on this grilled slab of beef ran secondary to the ranch.

I will note that the ranch was not too heavy or overly globbed on the sandwich. It wasn’t dripping and I didn’t feel like I was swimming in sauce. It’s just that the dilly pickle ranch, from Hidden Valley Ranch I assume, overwrote all the other flavors and made this taste like a ranch burger. It’s a good ranch burger, for sure, but not anything so exceptional that I’d go out of my way to get it again. It’s pretty basic, a normal Whopper with a bit of ranch on it. If a burger with ranch sounds good, this is likely a burger for you. But anyone expecting a pickle lover’s ranchy dream, this one fails hard.

Bonus: Pickle Fries

Since they come on the burger, but are also available as a side, we had to try them on their own. The pickle fries resemble Burger King’s chicken fries, and even come in a similar serving box. But, of course, instead of meat inside, it’s pickles. Good pickles, too. I really enjoyed these dippers, both on their own and with the ranch sauce they bring along with. I actually felt like I could just eat them on their own as they were flavorful enough that I didn’t need the ranch. The sauce did add some extra moisture, but even then it wasn’t needed. These fries were moist enough on their own.

If I had any note it’s that, both because these are pickles and they’re fried, the fries are pretty salty. It’s not so bad at the start, but as you eat and eat them it gets more noticeable. I was glad I shared these fries with my wife as I don’t think I could have eaten a whole of them on my own without feeling pretty gross after.

Mexican Street Corn Whopper

The last of the three from the bag was Burger King’s Mexican Street Corn creation. This is certainly the weirdest sounding of the three, and considering this is coming from Burger King I didn’t have high hopes. It’s got a lot of ingredients – creamy street corn spread, lettuce, tomato, crunchy tortilla crisps and “spicy queso” – many of which fall outside Burger King’s usual fare, so I went into this sandwich with a high degree of doubt. These flavors could work coming from a Mexican restaurant, but could they work when Burger King uses them?

The answer is a resounding yes. Of the three burgers, this was the out-and-out winner, hands down. The flavor combination was so good, with the sweetness of the corn spread combining with the tang of the queso and the salt of the tortilla crisps. All of these worked really well together with the burger, and they absolutely sang. This didn’t taste like a Burger King sandwich at all, honestly; it tasted better. I mean, that sounds like a backhanded compliment to Burger King, and it is since their food isn’t always that great, but in this case this burger was absolutely fantastic.

What I liked best about this, and what was missing from the other two burgers that made it out of this competition, was that I could detect all the ingredients on the burger as I ate it. I noticed the bright, fresh pop of the veggies. I got the crunch and savory salt of the crisps, which are basically just little Fritos. The corn dressing and queso each added moisture, but they had different (not competing, just different) textures. It all just works, and works well together. I was frankly impressed.

This is a burger that shouldn’t, by any rights, work. Especially from Burger King. But it does, and when it comes to this competition I don’t think there’s any other obvious choice as to who should win. This Mexican Street Corn creation takes the lead by a country mile.

In Conclusion

The thing I will note is that if you want to try any of these burger options you’re going to want to do so now. These are all limited time creations and there’s no guarantee all of them will stick around after this event is over. And you don’t have to get them as a flight (like I did); you can order them individually. But whatever you choose to do, I do suggest giving one or more a taste. The pickle burger wasn’t amazing but it was a solid, basic burger. The barbeque burger was delicious and I’d get it again. And the Mexican burger was amazing. If It were on the menu three months, or even years from now, I’d still be getting it.

If this sounds fun, try it for yourself. These are tasty and there’s no reason to not see what all the fuss is about.