Photo credit to Hans Last

I’m a little late to sampling and reviewing McDonald’s Cinnamon Melts because it seems not to have arrived in Canada except nearly a year after it appeared in the States. Thus, one of my favourite snarky food reviewers, The Impulsive Buy, reviewed them 11 months ago.

I entered the restaurant yesterday morning because I happened to have taken an earlier ferry and enjoyed a Cinnamon Melt as the dessert to my cereal+fiber breakfast. That’s where it’s convenient: McDonald’s out-number the cinnamon bun stands.

The lovely icing, of which there is ample drizzled over and pooled under, is indistinguishable to me from that of Cinnabon or Cinnzeo. Then the pastry itself was warm and fluffy, also indistinguishable to me from that of the cinnamon bun franchises. What was different, however, was the petal-like arrangement of the “bun” for if you tugged only lightly, you could pull off a bite-sized morsel. Meanwhile, you need to wield a fork and knife to eat the spiral-shaped cinnamon buns of Cinnabon/zeo. Perhaps a downside is that you don’t end up savouring it for as long!

At the end of the day, spare change was burning a hole in my pocket and I reasoned with myself that I had only spend $1.88 on a cinnamon treat that spending another $1.88 only brought me up to the cost of a full-sized cinnamon bun from Cinnabon/zeo, n’est-ce pas? I was riding the ferry again and it was easy to eat it (way too fast) with it balanced on my lap.

But what about the caloric content? I’ve got the information from two sources.

McDonald’s Cinnamon Melts (from TIB’s review)
460 calories / 19 g fat (9 g saturated) / 32 g sugar

Classic Cinnabon Roll (from calorie-count.com)
730 calories / 24 g fat / 114 g carbohydrates

In that context, Cinnamon Melts are worse than the Cinnabon version. Classic example of how very little money can only buy you something bad for you!

Price: $1.79 + tax
Vendor: McDonald’s