(WSVN) - McDonald’s is bringing back its wildly popular Szechuan dipping sauce after a year of public outcry.
It will be served at every location in the United States starting next Monday, Feb. 26 until the supply runs out.
McDonald’s originally released its Szechuan dipping sauce as part of a tie-in promotion during the release of Disney’s “Mulan” in 1998. However, the sauce quietly disappeared from the menu shortly afterward.
It wasn’t until April of 2017, when interest in the sauce once again piqued after a character on Cartoon Network’s “Rick and Morty” television series professed his love for the discontinued sauce, citing it as the impetus for all his time-traveling actions.
https://twitter.com/McDonalds/status/966734378213826562
An original, unopened packet of the sauce sold on eBay for nearly $15,000 last year. Even now, multiple auctions on the site list the McDonald’s Szechuan sauce for over $1,000 a packet.
McDonald’s apparently is learning from its disastrous roll-out last year, when it announced that the cult-favorite dipping sauce would be available for one day only — Oct. 7, 2017 — at participating locations. However, McDonald’s neglected to mention that each location would only have a very limited number of sauce packets, and quickly ran out. In some cases, the patrons became rowdy after learning of the shortage, and police were called to the restaurants to disperse crowds.
“Last October, we truly meant well when we brought back a super-limited batch of Szechuan Sauce, but it quickly became apparent we did not make enough to meet the expectations of our fans,” the company said in a statement. “We did not anticipate the overnight crowds, the cross-state travel and the amazing curiosity, passion and energy fans showed.”
For this latest release, the fast food chain says 20 million packets will be available across all U.S. McDonald’s restaurants. The company noted it would only be “while supplies last (which this time around, we hope is a while).”
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