Who in their right mind would eat this rubbish?
Do you really believe a hamburger with a prawn on it to be "Japanese"?
It's called a marketing ploy to appeal to Japanese tastes. They also serve spaghetti with some bizzarre western toppings, but that doesn't make it Japanese either.
There are plenty of authentic and inexpensive places to eat - but some people just want the familiar, I suppose?

Me ^

What is it, then? (Besides "rubbish.") It may not be traditionally Japanese, but it's still something you would be hard-pressed to find anywhere else.

Wirelessly posted (Nokia N97 / Palm TX: Mozilla/5.0 (SymbianOS/9.4; Series60/5.0 NokiaN97-3/10.2.012; Profile/MIDP-2.1 Configuration/CLDC-1.1; en-us) AppleWebKit/525 (KHTML, like Gecko) WicKed/7.1.12344)

Good or bad.... I crave the stuff every now and then...

Me too.

Mmmm..... Sausage Biscuits!

Reading this thread is making me want to go to McD's right now...regular hamburger, small fry and a Dr. Pepper...yummmm.

Dr. Pepper...... I havent had one is over 20 years....

(not sure if I would like one to be honest)

^

Here's the In-N-Out nutritional info if someone wants to compare with McD's...

I actually prefer Diet Dr (note: no period after the "Dr") Pepper.

And that makes the meal healthy.

Slightly off topic but I ate at the Sedona, AZ McDonalds this weekend which is noteworthy as being the only McDonalds with green arches. They also had a soft serve cone for $.50. IT was a great day for CMK10!

An ebi burger (which is made of prawns - it isn't a burger with a prawn on top of it) seems just as authentically Japanese to me as ebi gratin. It's a fine example of modern 'yoshoku' - as joejones says, it's not like you'll find it anywhere else.
I don't see how anyone can find pizza topped with nori or natto or any other of the bizarre combinations available in Japan to be comforting and familiar - those options are for travellers way more adventurous than I am, a lunchtime kaiseki-style menu is way less challenging!
Yoshoku is a very important part of Japanese cuisine and one's understanding of the food and culture suffers tremendously by ignoring it.
(Not perfect, but this article will familiarise you with the term if you're unaware of it)

As for the other foods I mentioned

The perhaps sad truth is that with the Alvalle gazpacho available from McDonalds, visitors do actually get a taste of what many Spaniards now think of as authentic Gazpacho Andaluz.
In two recent unrelated internet discussions I've seen fellow Spaniards recommend this exact brand to English speakers saying it was "just like their mother's" or "better than that served by many restaurants". These same people may not be aware that it's the brand served by MacDonalds... but I am.

And Quorn is a very popular food in the UK, but it would be completely natural for most visitors to remain completely unaware of its existence. A moot point now, as it isn't served by McD's anymore this is a genuine local food, designed for the demands of the local culture, that few tourists will get a chance to try.

ebi burger.... hmmmm ^

why the green arches...?

According to Wikipedia "The McDonald's in Sedona, Arizona is the only one in the world with teal arches. They are not yellow because the city thought they would mesh poorly with the surrounding red rocks. The first color McDonalds offered was teal which the city accepted."

Has anyone else noticed this too? See below.

I'm a flight attendant and I often don't have a lot of time to eat when I'm on duty, so that leaves fast food options as one of my primary forms of sustenance, unfortunately. I've noticed that Burger King and Wendy's have aggressively tried to corner the fast food burger market at many, if not most major airports... but the number one fast food chain in the USA, McDonald's, seems to only have a perfunctory presence at certain key airports, while often not having any at all, even at some of the busiest airports in the country!

Does anyone know why this is?

Or at least venture a guess? I've wondered this for years now why airport Burger Kings always seem to outnumber McD's even though obviously McDonald's outlets do outnumber any other fast food establishment many times over nationwide.

Here's an informal survey I've taken (mostly from experience and memory, so I'm not going to make any guarantees that it is 100% accurate - any feedback from your experience is appreciated):

Out of the 50 or so of the busiest airports in the US, the following (I'm pretty sure) do not have any McDonald's locations at all.

SEA
LAS
SLC
CLT
PHX
MCI
AUS
PDX
MIA
IAD
STL
BNA
SFO
HNL
OAK
RDU
TPA
SMF
MEM
CLE
MKE
RSW
HOU
SJC
CMH
MSY
FLL

That's 27 (over half!) of some of the busiest airports in America, with no McDonald's! Seems almost un-American, doesn't it?

So that leaves the following airports that i've confirmed DO have at least one McD's on premesis:

MSP
DEN
LAX
ORD
ATL (concourse E only)
SNA
IND
DFW
SAN
BWI
CVG
LGA (US Airways Terminal only)
EWR (Terminal C only)
JFK (Terminals 1, 4, 7 & 8)
PIT
IAH
BOS (Terminal B only)
SAT
MCO
DTW
PHL
DCA

I have noticed this as well, mainly because 80+% of the meals I eat in airports are breakfast, and McDs has IMO the best BY FAR of the fast food chains. I have only eaten McDs at DEN, ORD, LAX, SAN, and DFW.

And welcome to Flyertalk!