EVERY MENU ITEM AT MCDONALD'S—RANKED

If I said you could eat breakfast, lunch and dinner at McDonald’s for three months straight and lose a ton of weight, no doubt you'd laugh me out of the room.

But that's exactly what John Cisna did earlier this year. The science teacher challenged his students at Iowa's Colo-Nesco High School to think about everything they eat—showing them that, with smart choices, you could turn any establishment into a healthy one while meeting all your nutritional needs.

Call it the McDonald's Diet. Cisna, who also walked 45 minutes a day, lost 37 pounds. Talk about weight loss!

In that spirit, Eat This, Not That! embarked on the ambitious journey of ranking every single McDonald's Menu Item, so you can still enjoy MickeyD’s without the guilt. It wasn’t easy. In a normal world, you can pretty much tell which foods are good for you—fish, chicken, and salads—and which aren’t. But in McDonaldLand, a chicken sandwich can pack twice as many calories as a double hamburger, and a salad can deliver more sodium than a Big Mac.

So to help you unwrap (sorry, unMcWrap) the truth about what Ronald is serving up, and to avoid your becoming supersized, we’ve examined each and every item and ordered them by calories and nutritional content. Which favorites do you look for when you hit MickeyD’s? And to lose weight fast, don’t listen to Ronald—instead, read these 50 Best Eat This, Not That! Tips Ever!

BREAKFAST

FIRST...THE WORST

#6 Worst Breakfast at McDonald’s

Sausage Biscuit (Regular Size Biscuit)
430 calories, 27 g fat (12 g saturated), 1,080 mg sodium, 34 g carbs, 11 g protein

Sausage McMuffin with Egg
450 calories, 28 g fat (10 g saturated fat), 860 mg sodium, 30 g carbs, 21 g protein

Imagine putting five Jimmy Dean Fully Cooked Original Pork Sausage Links between a big ol’ slab of greasy bread, and holding the whole shebang. Because that’s the saturated fat equivalent you’re getting with this Biscuit and that is no way to lose belly fat. At least the McMuffin has 10 more grams of protein (yet is still a bit high in calories).

#5 Worst Breakfast at McDonald’s

Bacon, Egg & Cheese McGriddles
460 calories, 21 g fat (9 g saturated), 1,250 mg sodium, 48 g carbs, 19 g protein

Bacon, Egg & Cheese Biscuit
460 calories, 26 g fat (13 g saturated), 1,300 mg sodium, 38 g carbs, 19 g protein

It doesn’t matter if it’s wrapped between a pancake or a biscuit, the ooey, gooey goodness of a bacon, egg and cheese ain’t good for you. The McGriddle features more than half a day's sodium and nearly half a day's saturated fat—that’s as much saturated fat as 117 Funyuns! Meanwhile, the Biscuit has 83% of the day’s cholesterol, or as much as you’d find in 28 slices of bacon—and also more than a half day’s of sodium. You’ll need a drink after all that salt—just don’t make it a Coke. Click here for the 5 Amazing Things That Happen to Your Body When You Give Up Soda!

#4 Worst Breakfast at McDonald’s

Cinnamon Melts
460 calories, 19 g fat (9 g saturated), 370 mg sodium, 66 g carbs, 6 g protein

Mickey D’s calls this “the best part of a cinnamon roll” but it’s the worst thing for your waistline. You want to start each day with belly-filling protein, not a bowl full of cake topped with cream cheese icing. The Cinnamon Melts have 32 grams of sugar, far more than a Hershey’s Milk Chocolate bar.

#3 Worst Breakfast at McDonald’s

Sausage Biscuit with Egg
510 calories, 33 g fat (14 g saturated), 1,170 mg sodium, 36 g carbs, 18 g protein

Like the sandwiches above, these have way too much sodium (half a day’s) and almost three-quarters of your daily allowance of saturated fat. Unless you’re getting your McDonald’s sausage from a burrito, run. Looking for a breakfast that will help you lose weight? Try one of these 42 Best Breakfast Foods For Weight Loss.

#2 Worst Breakfast at McDonald’s

Hotcakes and Sausage
520 calories, 24 g fat (7 g saturated), 930 mg sodium, 61 g carbs, 15 g protein

Sugary bread and salty meat? You probably thought this would be #1. And with as many carbs as four slices of white bread, it could be, especially if you add the whipped margarine and hotcake syrup. Then you're looking at 740 calories and 106 g carbs, which is the carb equivalent of nearly seven slices of white bread. And yet there is one meal even worse coming up next. (Rather than eat either, stay home and whip up one of the quick 5-minute breakfasts among the 150+ weight-loss recipes in the Zero Belly Cookbook, based on the New York Times-bestselling Zero Belly Diet!)