By the time Sue Grafton’s A is for Alibi was published in 1982, and Kinsey Milhone began chomping her way through the alphabet as she chowed down on quarter pounders, the now iconic fast food burger had only been on McDonald’s menu for less than a decade.
In the U.S., street vendors started serving burgers more than a century ago, making them a favorite among blue-collar workers; by the early 1900s, the hamburger’s place was cemented in popular culture. No small town was complete without a Mom & Pop burger stand or a drive-in restaurant where you could enjoy a burger in your car.
Ray Kroc, an (overly) ambitious businessman, realized the burger’s greater potential as early as 1955. After his takeover of McDonald’s in 1961, hamburgers became a staple of American cuisine and spread around the globe.
By the 1970s American appetites were no longer satiated by simple burgers. A better burger-to-bun ratio was introduced in 1973, with a quarter-pound patty (pre-cooked weight) served on a sesame seed bun. This burger upgrade fast became a touchstone of American culture.
Weighing in at 520 calories, more than double that of the basic hamburger, it cost a whopping 60¢ when first introduced; 70¢ if you wanted cheese. Since then, billions have been sold. According to the company, 2.5 billion quarter pounders are sold per year worldwide (now at ten times the original cost).
The quarter pounder sizzles in poetry by Jeffrey Miller, who uses the fast-food burger as a metaphor for love, consumerism, and nostalgia in his collection The Heart is a Quarter Pounder. It takes the heat in Phil A. Neel’s critical “Quarter-Pounds of Flesh” essay and was, of course, a featured menu item in the movie Pulp Fiction. Who among us can’t quote this dialogue word for word:
JULES: You know what they call a Quarter Pounder with cheese in Paris?
VINCENTt: No man, they got the metric system. They wouldn’t know what the f**k a quarter pounder is. They call it a Royale with cheese.”
We don’t necessarily have a beef with the quarter pounder, but it is interesting to note that the prevalence of obesity in the United States began to increase significantly in the 1970s, around the same time the basic hamburger doubled in size. Obesity rates increased by about 50%, nearing 15% by 1980, and have continued to rise and are now above 40%. Maybe it’s time to exchange the quarter pounder for a penny pounder?
Burn some calories twisting with Travolta and Thurman and Chuck Berry’s “You Never Can Tell” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WSLMN6g_Od4
Chuck Berry wrote another great hit, “Roll Over Beethoven,” to get his sister to stop playing classical music on the piano so he could play the blues. If you, unlike Berry, appreciate Bach and Beethoven and the rest of the old masters, you’ll enjoy the Baroque quintet in WayWord’s Murder in Milan, which Midwest Review calls: “a mystery lover’s delight from start to finish.”
To learn More About Murder in Milan: click here
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