The Thing You Should Always Ask For In Your Five Guys Shake

The fast food chain Five Guys is known for its fresh, never-frozen burgers, its genuinely delicious fries, and a robust secret menu that's packed with a plethora of free toppings. But as it turns out, one of the very best secret menu items involves Five Guys' super-tasty milkshake — and a rather unusual add-in.

As you probably already know, Five Guys began selling its delicious milkshakes in 2014 — and you better believe this was big news at the time.

And best of all, diners get to add 10 free mix-ins to maximize all that deliciousness. Not a bad deal, right?

Five Guys milkshakes are made with a fairly straightforward list of ingredients — milk, sugar, and whey. Beyond that, there's less than one percent of thickeners, preservatives, and artificial flavors. That's not at all bad for a fast food chain!

But another simply ingredient is bound to take your vanilla milkshake to a whole new level of tastiness — and it's as savory as it is surprising. Okay, brace yourself: It's bacon. You heard that right: The answer is bacon.

To kick your Five Guys milkshake up a notch, simple add some crumbled applewood-smoked bacon to your milkshake and you're well on your way to Tasty Town. This is bound to add a sweet and salty twist to your ice cream treat. And then you can turn your milkshake into an even more elaborate temptation by combining your favorite mix-ins.

For example: To make an Elvis-inspired milkshake, combine the bacon with banana and peanut butter. Or why not maximize the sweet-and-salty taste by adding in some good old-fashioned salted caramel?

At the end of the day, you can combine over 40,000 different flavors with Five Guys' 10 different mix-ins, but we can't guarantee that they're all going to taste particularly good. Honestly, a bacon cherry coffee milkshake doesn't sound too terribly tasty, right? Perhaps that's just us.

Meanwhile, you're probably wondering: Bacon usually costs extra when you add it to your sandwich at a deli or restaurant, so how much does it cost when you add bacon to a milkshake at Five Guys? After all, the chain's bacon cheeseburgers cost more than its regular cheeseburger, right? Surprisingly, it's an altogether different story when you order a milkshake at Five Guys — all the mix-ins including the applewood smoked bacon are totally and completely free.

No doubt about it: Free bacon in a milkshake should be music to your ears, especially since you can combine it with nine other tasty mix-ins to boot.

Your bacon-infused Five Guys milkshake is certainly going to taste good — but that's not to say it's remotely good for you. Sure, bacon contains protein, but it certainly doesn't have a reputation for being healthy. In fact, some doctors warn that processed meats like bacon might cause cancer. And putting bacon in your milkshake will significantly bump up the already huge calorie count.

A plain Five Guys milkshake contains 670 calories, 32 grams of fat, and 360 milligrams of sodium. Adding bacon adds 80 calories to your shake, as well as 7 grams of fat and 260 milligrams of sodium. That means a single bacon milkshake from Five Guys contains 750 calories, 39 grams of fat, and 620 milligrams of sodium. Oh, and that's without the whipped cream and any add-ons, we're sorry to say.

If you're eating 2,000 calories a day, the daily reference intake of fat in your diet should be 44 to 77 grams of fat, according to Cleveland Clinic. With its 39 grams of fat, a Five Guys bacon milkshake puts you well on your way to maxing out the daily threshold of fat intake. Plus, the shake doesn't include any "healthy" fats either, like the fats found in avocados, olive oil, and salmon.

What's even worse? You're only supposed to eat 22 grams of saturated fat each day, but a Five Guys bacon milkshake contains a whopping 24 grams.

Of course, that doesn't mean you should never indulge in this salty-sweet frozen pleasure. But like so many of the finest things in life, this is one delectable snack treat you'll want to enjoy in moderation.

#FiveGuys #Milkshakes #FastFood