McDonald's Salt Caramel and Mango Passion Orange McFlurry (product announcement)

When I was growing up, McDonald's had two ice cream options. You could have a shake or a pathetic little sundae made up of vanilla ice cream and some anemic chocolate sauce. Because I am not a fan of any fast food, and less of a fan of the golden arches than most other types of said cuisine, I hadn't really noticed the whole "McFlurry" business. I have a hazy recollection of when they were introduced and that they were either a collaboration with Dairy Queen or a rip-off of their "Blizzard" concept, but that's pretty much it. I've never had one in either Japan or America, but every nerve in my Spidey sense says they are probably pretty sweet.

The specimens above are new McFlurry flavors - salt caramel (252 calories) and a mixture of mango, passion fruit and orange (230 calories). If someone were to force feed me one of these, I'd go for the fruity one, though I have to say that the salt caramel one could be intriguing. The funny thing about these is not the flavors. Though they are somewhat unusual, the whole salty sweets thing has been a big fad for years now (it was in force when I left in March 2012) and passion fruit is the only slightly uncommon element in the fruit one. The bizarre thing is that McDonald's plans to offer these only between 10:30 a.m. and 1:00 p.m. It strikes me as weird that they'd choose such a time period as it makes these seem more like "brunch" options than a sweet treat. Personally, I think offering them from 1:00-4:00 would have been a better choice, but I'm guessing this limit is based on the effort and time it takes to make them than when consumer demand might be highest.