I’ve never wondered what a sponge that’s been used to clean a frying pan tastes like. But thanks to the grease-soaked donut used as a bun for Great Value’s Late Night Cravings Donut Cheeseburger, now I know.
You may think the paragraph above is hyperbole, but the translucent paper towels in my kitchen’s trash think otherwise. Every time I picked up the burger and put it down, the soggy cake donut made my fingers look and feel like they’re combatants in a baby oil wrestling battle royale.
If that’s not enough to encourage you to avoid this microwaveable burger, then maybe the amount of saturated fat it has will cause you to think twice. ONE burger has 90 PERCENT of your daily recommended intake of saturated fat. Not even eating one-fourth of a stick of butter will get you to 90 percent.
Now if that’s not enough to make you say “whoa” to buying this donut cheeseburger, then maybe the way it made my kitchen smell like grease and burnt meat as it was being heated up in the microwave will.
And, if not that, maybe saying the donut hole looks like a butt hole will.
Do you still want to buy it?
I’ve made a few donut cheeseburgers over the years when the food stars align because someone happened to bring donuts to a cookout. I’ve also eaten a few microwaveable cheeseburgers because if you run a blog about processed food for over a decade, you’re bound to eat a few. Both are serviceable, but this microwaveable donut cheeseburger is not.
Besides the grease-soaked cake donut, the cheeseburger comes with a slice of American cheese, hot pepper berry bacon jam, and chopped beef steak. Yes, “chopped beef steak” appears to be a fancy name for beef patty because it tastes like a beef patty, albeit a thin, dry beef patty.
The cheese doesn’t do anything flavor-wise, but its color prevents the burger from looking even more depressing. It adds a little contrast. Without the cheese, looking at this burger’s doom and gloom colors of brown, black, purple, and grey would’ve brought me down to a level of depression that makes me wonder if I should ask a psychiatrist if Zoloft Is right for me.
The one ingredient that gave me the most worry before putting the burger into my mouth was the hot pepper berry bacon jam. But it ended up being the least scariest ingredient of the whole burger. The topping tasted more like a sweet barbecue sauce and it, along with some sweetness from the cake donut, helped make the sandwich taste like a BBQ burger and somewhat tolerable. But it’s not enough to overcome the soggy, greasy cake donut.
As much as I didn’t enjoy Great Value’s Donut Cheeseburger, I applaud the smart, and I assume munchies-driven, folks who developed it. Creative. Yes. Will I eat the second one that came in the box? No.
(Nutrition Facts – 1 sandwich – 610 calories, 350 calories from fat, 38 grams of fat, 18 grams of saturated fat, 1 gram of trans fat, 85 milligrams of cholesterol, 1040 milligrams of sodium, 270 milligrams of potassium, 47 grams of carbohydrates, 1 gram of fiber, 21 grams of sugar, and 20 grams of protein.)
Purchased Price: $6.44
Size: 2 sandwiches
Purchased at: Walmart
Rating: 3 out of 10
Pros: Hot pepper berry bacon jam tastes like barbecue sauce. Creative.
Cons: Greasy, soggy cake donut. One has 90 percent of your daily saturated fat. Donut hole looks like a butt hole. Makes my kitchen smell like grease and burnt meat.