It’s bigger than a regular burger and easier to eat than a Big Mac. It’s venerated in “Pulp Fiction,” a symbol of American gluttony in Morgan Spurlock’s “Supersize Me” and a source of endless hacks on TikTok.

Now, the McDonald’s Quarter Pounder burger is off the menu in 12 states after an E. coli outbreak linked to the raw onions on the sandwich killed one person and hospitalized dozens.

Could the deadly outbreak dampen Americans’ appetite for the Quarter Pounder? Not for long, experts say, because hunger for the iconic burger, which has been on the McDonald’s menu for over 50 years, will prevail in the end. The 4-ounce patty with slivered onions and pickles on a sesame seed bun is one of the chain’s most enduring items.

For now, you won’t find the Quarter Pounder in Colorado, Kansas, Utah, Wyoming, Idaho, Iowa, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Mexico and Oklahoma. Onions were removed from all menu items at an undisclosed number of locations.

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Quarter Pounder Born in 1971

In 1971, Al Bernardin invented the Quarter Pounder while managing a McDonald’s franchise in Fremont, California, The Oakland Tribune wrote after he died in 2009. Since then, after generations of marketing, the sandwich has become “iconic,” said William Hallman, a psychologist and a distinguished professor at Rutgers University.

“It’s been the same burger for forever, so it becomes sort of a comfort food for people,” Hallman said.

The Quarter Pounder has nearly twice as many calories as a regular McDonald’s hamburger but is less indulgent than a Big Mac, he explained. It also has a leg up on the Big Mac because it’s less messy and can be eaten with just one hand — ideal for people on the go, Hallman said.

“The Quarter Pounder is extremely important to the McDonald’s product line,” John A. Gordon, a chain-restaurant analyst, told Business Insider.

He said a hit to the Quarter Pounder’s reputation could negatively affect sales — and pose a challenge for the McDonald’s brand in the short term.

The Quarter Pounder also has a special place in popular culture. Vincent Vega, the smooth-talking hit man played by John Travolta in “Pulp Fiction,” famously ranted about how the metric system renders the name “Quarter Pounder” meaningless in Paris.

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“They call it the Royale with Cheese,” Vega told Samuel L. Jackson’s character, Jules Winnfield. “The Big Mac’s a Big Mac but they call it ‘le Big Mac.’”

The Quarter Pounder Has a Fan Club

There was even a Quarter Pounder Fan Club. Someone somewhere owns a heart-shaped locket with photographs of the burger inside and candles that smell like the Quarter Pounder’s ingredients. McDonald’s even sold stickers that said “I’d rather be eating a Quarter Pounder with Cheese.”

A&W, a competing fast-food brand, tried taking on the Quarter Pounder in the 1980s and learned that its one-third-pound patty was less popular because Americans believed a quarter-pound was bigger.

“The ‘4’ in ‘1/4,’ larger than the ‘3’ in ‘1/3,’ led them astray,” The New York Times wrote.

Famous Quarter Pounder fans include financier Warren Buffett, who once said he prefers McDonald’s burgers over a $100 meal, and, of course, Donald Trump.

At a CNN Town Hall in 2016, he lauded the chain’s cleanliness.

“I’m a person that — I like cleanliness, I like clean,” he said. “One bad hamburger, you can destroy McDonald’s.”

Well, about that …

McDonald’s success and the Quarter Pounder’s legacy will not be greatly impacted by the recent, deadly E. coli outbreak, said Jay Zagorsky, an economics professor at Boston University’s Questrom School of Business. The burger’s importance to customers and its place in popular culture has made it a billion-dollar product and one of the company’s best sellers, he said.

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“I don’t see this as really affecting McDonald’s dramatically,”Zagorsky said. “And I think Wall Street agrees to me because the stock is only down about 5%.”

Other sandwiches use onions — some are listed as chopped instead of slivered — but fresh slivered onions are primarily used on Quarter Pounders and not other menu items, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

In response to an email seeking more clarity, McDonald’s provided the company’s previously issued statements, but said that it was following the CDC and Food and Drug Administration experts for information on the slivered onions.

“Serving customers safely in every single restaurant, each and every day, is our top priority and something we’ll never compromise on,” an earlier statement from the company said.

The Quarter Pounder has grown and shrunk over the years, and gained sidekicks like strips of bacon and a second patty. But its essence — a consistently tasty, filling burger — endures.

After McDonald’s made the switch from frozen to fresh beef, which boosted sales by 30%, even a Food & Wine critic was impressed.

“The Quarter Pounder, if you’re asking, was pretty good, in the muted way that Quarter Pounders generally are — a classic, simple thing, with enough heft to make you feel like you’ve had a meal, without having to order fries or guzzle sodas,” David Landsel wrote. “Sometimes, simple is good.”

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This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

By Hank Sanders
c.2024 The New York Times Company