McDonald's Chef: The Most Influential Cook in America?

Meet the most influential cook in America. Dan Coudreaut is the creative mind behind the salads and wraps that helped update McDonald's greasy image. Now he's even playing with the Big Mac

Simon Hayter / Getty for TIME

McDonald's chef Daniel Coudreaut is rethinking the food part of fast food

Correction Appended: Feb. 12, 2010

On some level, the very idea of a McDonald's chef sounds preposterous. Burgers, fries, the McRib — is this really the work of a chef? The food at McDonald's tastes partly of nostalgia and partly of marketing; the rest is surely salt.

And yet — have you eaten at a McDonald's lately? In the past five years, the company has started to serve genuinely edible salads, unlike those dry iceberg-and-carrot things it used to offer. The Southwest Salad, which appeared in 2007, comes with a lime wedge and a credible corn salsa. Similarly, the new Angus Third...

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