A cheeseburger halfway across the world is turning heads, stomachs and its eater’s walking path straight to the cabinet with the Tums and Pepto Bismol.
On July 9, Burger King Thailand announced via its social media channels that it was promoting a new menu item that is as orange as it is bizarre: the “Real Cheeseburger.”
Instead of meat, the “burger” — which technically is more of a sandwich — has 20 slices of American cheese, placed cocktail napkin-style in a pile between two buns. And from the looks of photos of it online, the cheese is not melted like it is in the promo photo.
“Not for fun, this is for real! Real cheeseburger from Burger King! 🍔,” reads a translation of a Facebook post from Burger King Thailand. “Carrying up to 20 slices of American cheese!!! 🧀”
The post then goes on to say the sandwich is being offered right now for “only” 109 Thai baht ($3.13); it would normally cost 380 baht ($10.93).
The reception of the sandwich in Thailand and abroad ranges from pure, unadulterated horror to grim fascination, with folks both peckish and petrified reacting online.
“You should mark this as sensitive content,” tweeted one person.
“What in the f--- is going on with burger king thailand,” tweeted another confused user, to which someone else replied, “I could put down like 10 of these no sweat.”
“That’s not a burger. It’s a portable heart attack,” wrote another Twitter user.
Folks in Thailand have posted on social media sites like Instagram, Facebook and TikTok to share their own experiences with the cheesy monstrosity.
“When it comes out, it’s cheese. There is no surprise inside,” reads a translation of an Instagram post by @eating_dha, who cut the sandwich in half to show its deck-of-card-like layers.
“Cheese lovers must try!!” Instagram user @letseatthailand wrote in Thai, showing an image of their order. “🍅Dipping in tomato sauce adds flavor.”
“At first I thought it was a joke, but it was actually sold to me,” said TikTok user @nutapiwich in Thai, in a video that has more than 400,000 views. A translation of the video indicates that the TikToker enjoyed the sandwich. “Pretty delicious.”
Other TikTokers in the country have posted themselves enjoying the menu item, with one TikToker, @thefadd_official, housing the entire sandwich on camera.
One commenter on Burger King Thailand’s Facebook post, Assarita Norrarat, suggested that customers “melt it and dip it in hash browns,” she wrote, attaching a quartet of images to demonstrate.
When Burger King Thailand responded to her menu hack of sorts by writing, “This is great,” she replied, “Visit me in the ICU.”
