So I was looking into fast-food fish sandwiches. And neither Wendy's cod fillet nor Burger King's Alaskan fish sandwich have cheese. It's basically just the fish, lettuce, and tartar sauce. Which makes sense, because who puts cheese with fried fish fillets? I mean, you don't associate fish and chips with cheese. Yet McDonald's puts slices of cheese in place of lettuce. Their sandwich of course came first, long before the other ones, but the "fish with cheese" combination is such a weird one that I wondered if folks knew where that came from.
I quite like fish with cheese sauce so I don't think that the fish/cheese combination as all that weird.
Have no idea why, but I always order without. American cheese on fried fish... eww. eta: damn, now I'm hungry for fast food.
It's about time Miscellaneous got to the bottom of the truly important issues. Anyway, here's the story of the Filet-O-Fish and when the cheese was first added (almost immediately after its invention): It's a big no no among a lot of Italian chefs, restaurants, and mothers to mix seafood with cheese (not that the Filet-O-Fish compares with those meals, but just saying): http://www.thekitchn.com/the-fish-and-cheese-debate-the-76178 However, the oldest surviving Sicilian recipe is a fish and cheese meal, so there's that: And in doing research for this very hard-hitting exposé, I think you're going to find that you're in the minority about the cheese on the Filet-O-Fish, because the vast majority of links on Google were articles and blog posts complaining about how McDonald's reduced the cheese to only half a slice. So, there you have it. More than anyone ever needs to know about the history of the Filet-O-Fish and cheese on fish dishes.
The "Hula burger"? It's a wonder McDonalds survived at all. Luckily Kroc had some better ideas than that one..
Seriously. Grilled pineapple with cheese on a cold bun. Yuck. Here's an article about some other failed McDonald's menu items: http://www.businessinsider.com/failed-mcdonalds-items-2011-8?op=1
Fish and cheese can be a wonderful combination. There was a restaurant that I used to go to that made a great grilled swordfish steak sandwich - add a slice of swiss cheese - perfection.
Fish and cheese generally don't mix well. Cheddar on fried fish would taste awful. Grated parmigiano on spaghetti allo scoglio is classified as a crime against humanity. So it's a good shorthand for the uninitiated to be told "never put cheese on fish". But there are many exception. So it's more "never put cheese on fish unless you know what you are doing". I never had a Filet-o-fish, so I can't judge it. But given it's McDonald's, I'm quite comfortable thinking it's crap.
No doubt there's probably even more failures than that list has. McLobster? That sounds like a case of food poisoning waiting to happen, though I'm surprised McDonalds can do fish without poisoning someone once in a while.
I've never had the Filet-o-Fish. Never appealed to me. As for some of the menu offerings that failed... I liked the McDLT and the Arch Deluxe. But pizza and spaghetti... that just... yuck.