Review: Arby’s Meat Mountain

Yesterday, Thursday, April 13, 2017, at 11:40 am, at 4100 University Dr. NW in Huntsville, AL, I verified that Arby’s will indeed sell you a $10, limited-time-only sandwich called the Meat Mountain.

(I’m also relieved to report that when you ask the fellow at the counter for it, there aren’t spotlights, sirens, and a big booming voice that says “one Meat Mountain to go, please! And you really look like you need one, fat ass! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!“)

On a star-cut bun, the Meat Mountain includes, top to bottom: pepper bacon, roast beef, cheddar cheese, Angus beef, smoked brisket, corned beef, pit-smoked ham, Swiss cheese, roast turkey, and chicken tenders.

(Burger King used to have a web site that would let you build whatever you wanted with the restaurant items’ ingredients, and I had some fun with it. But this is an actual item.)

Across a broader fast food context, the Meat Mountain may be even a little disappointing in its supposed excess. The nutrition information smacks you in the carotids with 51g fat and 1,030 calories—definitely not on the DASH diet—but (alarmingly?) not so far out of line with what’s already being passed through several other windows across the land. Burger King’s Double Bacon King packs 69g fat and 1,040 calories, while Dave’s Triple at Wendy’s hits you with 72g fat and 1,090 calories. And these are regular menu items.

Hey, clearly the Meat Mountain is the sensible choice!

So how to deal with this? Well, I’d already sort of decided to pick the chicken tenders off and eat them separately, because they didn’t really “go” to me. I used Arby’s new (to me) three-pepper sauce for those. They were fine, and I like that sauce, though it was sweeter than I expected. For the rest, I’d gotten both Arby’s and horsey sauce. I alternated between them, just dabbing a little on per bite rather than trying to apply it to the whole sandwich.

Was it good?

Well, how could it be bad, really? I mean, you have to work very hard to screw up meat and cheese, you know? It was fine. I ate all of it. There were a lot of subtle flavors going a lot of different directions, however, and beyond the baseline meat-and-cheese vibe, it was kind of a muddle. I don’t think I would get another one just for the taste. I would have enjoyed it more had it been all roast beef, or perhaps all beef ‘n’ cheddar.

But, it was definitely fun. It was fun for me to chuckle at having Ving Rhames ringing in my ears during my lunch (at one point I imagined he was standing right beside my car and yelling “WE HAVE THE MEATS!” in at me), and it was fun to get this post out of it. But I think any future $10 sandwiches I eat won’t be Meat Mountains.

5/10

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1 thought on “Review: Arby’s Meat Mountain”

  1. When faced with fast food for lunch, I always ask Google to find the nearest Arby’s. The turkey sandwich on whole wheat is fantastic – red onions and bib lettuce. The bread is good, too. This is coming from a non-cold-sandwich eater. Also, the onion rings at Arby’s are delish.
    I’m amazed that the calories in that monster you ate wasn’t higher. I know this is blasphemy at Arby’s, but I would have picked off the roast beef. That’s the only meat at the establishment I don’t care for.

    Reply

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