A New Report Ranked Burgers, Fries, and Chicken Sandwiches According to the DOH’s Nutrient Profiling Method — Here’s What It Found

By now, it’s fairly common knowledge that fast food isn’t exactly the best choice when it comes to your meals. However, sometimes, you just need something quick or are craving a favorite burger. And that’s totally OK. It’s key to remember that no food is “bad” or “good.” It’s all just up to you.

For those looking to stay informed on the nutritional content of their fast food choices, PlushCare, a virtual primary care website, has named the most and least healthy options in its latest report titled “The Most Unhealthy Menu Items at America’s Fast-Food Chains” — detailing rankings for five “classic” orders at America’s fast food joints: burgers, chicken sandwiches, chicken nuggets, French fries, and vanilla shakes. 

“Fast food is not traditionally associated with healthy eating,” the team stated in their findings, which it shared with Food & Wine. “However, to reflect growing health awareness among consumers in recent years, fast-food chains have added salads to their menus and reduced sodium and calorie content.” 

But, it added, “healthy options remain just that: alternatives to the main menu. Chains like McDonald’s have cut healthy options since the pandemic, citing the need to streamline during the pandemic and now blaming consumer demand.” 

To figure out which spots offer the least and most nutritious options, the team analyzed the nutritional value of five classic fast-food items — a cheeseburger, chicken burger, regular fries, regular vanilla shake, and nuggets (10 pieces) — across 24 chains.

It looked at each chain’s nutritional menu to collect the calories, sugar, saturated fat, and sodium values for its available products. Then, PlushCare used the Department of Health’s nutrient profiling method to assess the “relative unhealthiness of each item on our list.” Each item then received an individual score based on the nutrition information, and each spot was given an overall “unhealthiness score.”

After all that data mining, it named the cheeseburger at Five Guys as the unhealthiest burger option. The chain’s burger scored a 50 as its “unhealthiness score” due to its 984 calories, 26.5 grams of saturated fat, 8 grams of sugar, and 1050 grams of sodium per burger.

Of note, Five Guys also sells the least healthy fries of any chain, according to the findings. The burgers at Whataburger came in as the second unhealthiest option, followed by Smashburger, Carl’s Jr., and Sonic rounding out the top (or bottom, depending on how you look at it) five. 

On the flip side, the healthiest burger option went to Culver’s Butterburger, which clocked in with 390 calories, 7 grams of saturated fat, 6 grams of sugar, and 480 grams of sodium. However, the McDonald’s cheeseburger wasn’t far behind, with 300 calories, 6 grams of saturated fat, 7 grams of sugar, and 720 grams of sodium. But, again, get what you want. Just keep this information in your back pocket in case you want it.