Why eat ordinary french fries when you can eat genuine, brand-name McDonald’s French Fries at Yester World? Looking for breaded, deep-fried chicken chunks? With a little effort, you’ll find genuine McDonald’s Chicken McNuggets.

Let’s go on a McDonald’s culinary tour at Yester World.

There’s only one place to get McDonald’s French Fries at the Studios park—Fairfax Fries. The menu here is limited to McDonald’s French Fries and Coca Cola products, including Dasani bottled water.

The famous Los Angeles Farmers Market, the inspiration for the park’s Sunset Ranch Market, is at Fairfax Avenue and Third Street in Los Angeles. The name Fairfax Fries is a nod to Fairfax Avenue and the style of the building is nod to the Farmers Market.

There’s also only one McDonald’s location at Epcot. It’s Refreshment Port in World Showcase near Canada. In addition to McDonald’s French Fries, you can also get genuine Chicken McNuggets and genuine McFlurry desserts with your choice of Nestlé Crunch, Nestlé Butterfinger, or Orange blended in. There are the usual Coca Cola beverage products, but you can also get Nestlé products: Nescafé Coffee, Nestlé Frothé Cappuccino, Nestlé Hot Cocoa, and Nestlé Hot Tea.

Our next stop is the Animal Kingdom, where the cleverly-named Petrifries in Dinoland sells—you guessed it—McDonald’s French Fries.

The menu is rather limited, but—psssst—there’s more McDonald’s food just around the corner. Unlike Hollywood Studios and Epcot, this park has two locations selling McDonald’s food.

You’ve hit the jackpot. Restaurantosaurus sells McDonald’s food that you probably can’t find at your local McDonald’s.

How about a Dino-Sized Double Cheeseburger? Or a Hot-Dog OSAURUS? Or a Vegetarian Burger? How about Fruit Punch Gelatin for dessert?

Would you like McBeer with that?

Okay, it’s not really McBeer. It’s Bud Light or Safari Amber. By the way, Safari Amber is brewed by Anheuser-Busch exclusively for Disney’s Animal Kingdom, Disney’ Animal Kingdom Lodge, and the African-themed Outpost at Epcot.

Our final theme park stop is the Magic Kingdom, where we begin at Frontierland Fries, located between Pirates of the Caribbean and Splash Mountain. It’s your basic menu of McDonald’s French Fries and Coca Cola products.

If you want a few more items on the menu, head over to Fantasyland. The Village Fry Shoppe also sells hot dogs (with McDonald’s French Fries, of course), carrot cake, and Jello. There’s also milk—even soy milk—in your choice of regular or chocolate.

This concludes the McDonald’s park-hopping tour. If you ate a large order of French Fries—and nothing else—at each of the six locations, you just ate 3,000 calories, 150 total grams of fat, and 2,100 milligrams of sodium.

The six locations selling McDonald’s-branded foods at four Walt Disney World theme parks were one of the results what McDonald’s Corporation and The Walt Disney Company called “an unprecedented global marketing alliance.”

On May 23, 1996, the two companies issued a press release that included these paragraphs:

The alliance, which will begin in January, 1997, partners the two worldwide leaders in their respective industries in a 10-year multi-divisional, multi-national relationship.

Under terms of the alliance, McDonald’s will become Disney’s primary promotional partner in the restaurant industry, sharing exclusive marketing rights in more than 93 countries, linking McDonald’s 18,700 restaurants to Disney theatrical releases, theme parks and home video releases.

Michael D. Eisner, Disney chairman and chief executive officer said, “This is the most ambitious promotional effort ever developed between two of the world’s best-known family-friendly brands. The agreement we announce today is a true McDisney production.”

McDonald’s Chairman Michael Quinlan said “Disney and McDonald’s share equal billing as the world’s leading family-oriented brands, and this relationship now guarantees that the magic of Disney will touch the lives of our 33 million daily customers on a continuing basis, in every corner of the globe.”

It seemed like a good idea for both companies. But ten years is a long time. McDonald’s was contractually bound to promote Disney duds such as Treasure Planet, Atlantis: The Lost Empire, and Home on the Range.

When the ten years were over January 1, 2007, the global McDonald’s-Disney alliance was allowed to expire. McDonald’s and Disney could still work together when it made sense for both companies, but the companies now had more flexibility. McDonald’s quickly signed a deal with DreamWorks Animation SKG to promote 2007’s Shrek 3. At the Walt Disney World theme parks, the McDonald’s presence was phased out by the end of 2008.

The Disney agreement also led to two large, full-line McDonald’s restaurants at Walt Disney World, not in theme parks. The first opened at Downtown Disney in 1997. It was joined by the second between Blizzard Beach and the All-Star Resorts in 1998.

For a while it looked as if both remaining McDonald’s restaurants at Walt Disney World would remain open.

In fact, the location near the All-Star Resorts completed a major refurbishment in summer 2009. Its former cartoony look was gone, replaced by a stylishly contemporary look, inside and out.

However, the McDonald’s at Downtown Disney closed permanently on April 30, 2010, to be replaced in fall 2010 by a new restaurant offering Pollo Campero chicken and Fresh A-Peel healthy foods.

Now the only Golden Arches food at Walt Disney World is at the full-line McDonald’s near the All-Star Resorts.

The former Fairfax Fries at Disney’s Hollywood Studios is now the new home of Toluca Legs Turkey Company. The name is a nod to Toluca Lake, an affluent Los Angeles neighborhood where Walt Disney’s brother and business partner, Roy Oliver Disney (1893-1971), built his family home in 1934. The former location of Toluca Legs in the park’s Sunset Ranch Market is now Fairfax Fare, with a good variety of counter service fare.

At Disney’s Animal Kingdom, the former Petrifries is now the even-more-cleverly-named Trilo-Bites, selling smoked turkey legs, frozen lemonade, and Coca Cola products. Around the corner, Restaurantosaurus still serves essentially the same menu, just without McDonald’s branding.

At Epcot, Refreshment Port is still called Refreshment Port. You can still get french fries, but only as a side dish when ordering Chicken Breast Nuggets, a Chili-Cheese Dog, or as part of Chili-Cheese Fries.

When Frontierland Fries closed, Disney didn’t simply change the menu. They built something entirely new in its place. The new Golden Oak Outpost, which opened in January 2009, looks like a weathered old adobe building in the Old West—a big improvement over the unconvincing cook’s wagon of Frontierland Fries. The name of the new eatery is based on Golden Oak Ranch, Disney’s movie studio ranch near Newhall, California; you’ve seen it in countless Disney and non-Disney movies and television shows.

In Fantasyland, the former Village Fry Shoppe is now Friar’s Nook. The menu is similar and the exterior is unchanged. The Friar even sells fries.

Now, please continue on to McDonald’s at Dinoland U.S.A.

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McDonald’s Dinoland U.S.A. Pocahontas & Forest Friends Home

© 2009-2012 Werner Weiss — Disclaimers, Copyright, and Trademarks
 
Updated July 20, 2012.
 
Photo of Fairfax Fries at Disney’s Hollywood Studios: 2008 by Werner Weiss.
Photo of Refreshment Port at Epcot: 2007 by Werner Weiss.
Photo of Petrifries at Disney’s Animal Kingdom: 2007 by Werner Weiss.
Photo of Petrifries Menu at Disney’s Animal Kingdom: 2007 by Werner Weiss.
Photo of Restaurantosaurus exterior: 2007 by Allen Huffman.
Photo of Restaurantosaurus menu: 2007 by Werner Weiss.
Photo of Frontierland Fries at Magic Kingdom: 2007 by Werner Weiss.
Photo of Village Fry Shoppe at Magic Kingdom: 2008 by Werner Weiss.
Photos of McDonald’s near All-Star Resorts: 1999 by Allen Huffman.
Photo of McDonald’s near All-Star Resorts: 2009 by Werner Weiss.
Photo of McDonald’s at Downtown Disney: 2009 by Werner Weiss.
Photo of Toluca Legs at Disney’s Hollywood Studios: 2009 by Werner Weiss.
Photo of Golden Oak Outpost at Magic Kingdom: 2009 by Werner Weiss.