In the high stakes world of the fast-food industry, brands are constantly jocking for customer attention by trying to one-up each other.
That can look like everything from boosting the bonuses of a rewards program to attract more attention and keep customers coming back, to inventing meals so outrageous that they make more sense as a post on Instagram to attract likes than as an actual thing you want to eat for lunch.
Many of these tactics work, which is why we see so much of them in the fast-food world.
And let's be honest: Many of them are entertaining too, like Yum! Brands' (YUM) Taco Bell creating an entire TikTok musical about the return of the Mexican Pizza.
Restaurant Brands International's (QSR)Burger King tends to lean heavily on being inventive with its offerings rather than going for social media spectaculars, whether that be serving up a tower of meat that could seriously hurt someone who consumed it whole or topping its burgers with genuinely horrifying toppings (think ice cream, bratwurst, and whole fish).
The company now seems to be executing that very same strategy with one of its newest Whoppers, which looks intense enough to give anyone into a case of the meat sweats, swiftly followed by a food coma.
Image source: Hungry Jack's
When in Doubt, Add More Meat
Burger King's newest Whopper is called the Pork Belly Deluxe, as reported by Chewboom.
As you may have gathered by now, it's a double cheeseburger topped with long slices of pork belly, sandwiched in a sesame seed bun.
It also has a special spicy sauce, along with the usual tomato and lettuce burger fans are used to.
This limited edition burger will be sold at Hungry Jack's in Australia, which is Burger King in all but name since that was already trademarked by another company when BK decided to expand its presence into the country.
The logo even looks the same, but "Hungry Jack's" is the meat between the buns, instead of "Burger King."
At 623 calories, this baby is not as gut-busting as it looks at first glance, although at nearly 40 grams of fat, it's likely not helping anyone's arteries.
But we don't eat fast food for health reasons, and after all, you gotta have fun sometimes.
Hungry Jack has done far weirder burgers than the Pork Belly Deluxe, however.
In January 2022 it launched a tropical line, which consisted of burgers and fried chicken patties topped with hunks of pineapple, bacon, and BBQ sauce.
It also created one of the wildest drinks any fast food establishment has ever seen by putting Warheads sour candy into frozen drinks.
In 2021 it sold both a Frozen Sour Watermelon flavor with Sour Apple candy (called "Bursties") and a Frozen Sour Grape with Watermelon Bursties.
Perhaps even more interesting, the drinks were so successful that the chain still carries them, and also allows you to add them to most frozen drinks you order.
So the next time you're in the mood for an extremely intense sugar blast, well, now you know where to go.
