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Food and Drink
Rina Torchinsky, NPR

McDonald's will expand testing of its meatless McPlant burger to 600 new locations

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This June 25, 2019, photo shows the sign outside a McDonald's restaurant in Pittsburgh.
This June 25, 2019, photo shows the sign outside a McDonald's restaurant in Pittsburgh.
Gene J. Puskar/AP

McDonald's has announced big Valentine's Day plans.

The fast-food giant is bringing its McPlant burger to 600 locations in the San Francisco Bay and Dallas-Fort Worth areas starting Feb. 14, according to a statement from the company on Thursday.

And what says love quite like a patty derived from peas, rice and potatoes?

The patty, developed in partnership with BeyondMeat, is served on a sesame seed bun with lettuce, tomato, onions and American cheese and is topped with ketchup, mayonnaise and mustard.

"It has the iconic taste of a McDonald's burger, because it is one," McDonald's said ahead of the menu item's initial launch.

The plant-based burger was first introduced last November at eight U.S. restaurants in California, Iowa, Louisiana and Texas. Before its arrival in the U.S., the McPlant burger was introduced overseas in Austria, Denmark, the Netherlands, Sweden and the U.K.

The announcement comes at a time when several other of the nation's biggest fast-food chains have been expanding their offerings to include more plant-based menu items.

Burger King launched its Impossible Whopper, a burger built with a plant-based patty, in August 2019. And other fast-food giants have joined the meatless movement this month.

Last week, KFC debuted a plant-based Beyond Fried Chicken nationwide, for a limited time. The company says it was the first quick service restaurant in the U.S. to introduce plant-based chicken when it piloted the product in Atlanta in August 2019, according to a press release.

In the first week of January, Chipotle added plant-based chorizo to menus across the country. The chorizo is combined with chipotle peppers, tomato paste and paprika. The product is free of preservatives, grains, gluten and soy.

Fast food aside, demand for plant-based proteins are on the rise. A Bloomberg Intelligence report predicts sales of these alternative protein sources to increase fivefold by 2030.

Copyright 2022 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.