Herb Peterson didn’t invent breakfast - but in 1971 he came up with the hugely popular Egg McMuffin, the item that helped bring breakfast to the McDonald’s restaurant chain.
So it was no surprise that Peterson’s death at age 89 on March 25 was noted in newspapers and blogs around the world.
“It’s with sadness that I write this post,” began Adam Kuban of the website Serious Eats, as he broke the news of Peterson’s death to his audience of people devoted to good food.
And the Egg McMuffin really is good food, suggested Kuban, who went on to praise the version with sausage. (The original has Canadian bacon.)
“All the textures seem to work perfectly together,” Kuban wrote. “The muffin offers enough chewy sponginess to keep things interesting but is soft enough that your bite-through experience is somewhat consistent with that of the egg and sausage.”
Kuban’s post drew some negative comments.
“McDonald’s is gross. No one should eat there,” wrote someone with the sign-on Soup_dumpling.
However, several people praised the Egg McMuffin, a serious revenue-driver at McDonald’s, as more than half a million are sold each day.
One poster noted that it is one of the lower-calorie items on the McDonald’s menu. Another wished it were available after 10:30 a.m.
The sandwich’s inventor came to McDonald’s via the world of advertising. In the 1960s, he was a vice president of D’Arcy Advertising Co. in Chicago, the agency that had the McDonald’s account.
Among other things, he helped design the suit for Ronald McDonald, the company’s trademark clown. He is also credited with creating the company’s first slogan, “Where Quality Starts Fresh Everyday.”
According to the Santa Barbara Independent, Peterson became friends with McDonald’s founder Ray A. Kroc, who suggested in 1968 that the ad man set up a McDonald’s franchise in California.
They decided to do this in Santa Barbara, and by the early 1970s, Peterson had three McDonald’s restaurants. However, he was frustrated that they couldn’t open before 11 a.m., as they had no breakfast items.
“Being the eggs Benedict fan that he was, Peterson came up with an idea to make an eggs Benedict sandwich you could pick up with your hands and eat,” the Independent reported. “He commissioned a local blacksmith to make a Teflon-coated iron ring to keep the egg round for a sandwich.”
Peterson wrote a memo to Kroc about the sandwich, and Kroc gave the item the go-ahead in 1972.
After extensive test marketing, the product - which was named by the wife of a McDonald’s executive - was launched and McDonald’s was in the breakfast business.
Now 30 percent of the company’s revenue comes from breakfast choices.
By the time of his death, Peterson and his son, David, owned six McDonald’s restaurants.
According to The Wall Street Journal, Peterson never received any extra money for the Egg McMuffin, but he enjoyed being in the company of other inventors.
“It’s a kick to have people say, ‘That’s the guy who created the Egg McMuffin,’ like I was Marconi or Thomas Edison,” he once told a trade magazine.
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