I risked outing myself as the worst type of person — an insufferable hipster millennial Rick And Morty fan — when I asked if my local McDonald’s had received its newest promotional condiment. With a half-hearted enthusiasm, the dead-eyed cashier said, “Yeah. We got the sauce.”

Now — this isn’t just any sauce we’re talking about here. The sauce I was clamoring for is the sauce that made one of the the most powerful companies in the world cave to the insistent ramblings of the millennial generation; the sauce that toppled both an intergalactic and interdimensional government; the sauce that (probably) guaranteed us another nine seasons of Rick and Morty.

Szechuan sauce came back at McDonald’s with 20 million packets available nationwide. But could this anticipated packet of salt, soy and sugar seriously live up to the hype?

Like most people, I first heard of the mythical Mulan Szechuan McNugget sauce from Adult Swim’s Rick and Morty. Tales of its greatness were commonplace on the internet with people claiming to have tasted it during its original short circulation in 1998 to promote Disney’s Mulan. Online petitions demanding McDonald’s to bring back the sauce garnered thousands of signatures.

And lest we forget the infamous sauce riots of 2017, when McDonald’s made the terrible mistake — or greatest marketing campaign ever — of circulating criminally small amounts of the sauce. Roughly 20 packets were distributed to selected restaurants, which could not satisfy the many hundred-plus person lines of Rick and Morty fans at McDonald’s locations across the country.

Rumor has it that at least one person was stabbed while waiting in line, but, to be fair, it could have been just your everyday McDonald’s stabbing. But people died for this! (If you count special agent Cornvelious Daniel and the scores of other fictional aliens Rick destroyed to get the sauce.)

Packets of the original October 2017 distribution are still going for hundreds of dollars online, even now that it has returned with a bigger circulation. Szechuan Sauce Madness may have peaked when one person even traded their fully functional car for one packet. As if to sate the ravenous masses, DJ Deadmau5 shared a 64 Oz. bottle of the sauce with fans at a concert after reportedly purchasing it for roughly $15,000 on eBay. It was just too much sauce for one DJ to handle.

So when I heard that the sauce would make a more widespread return, I took a trip to the small-town McDonald’s in Brookings, Oregon. After making my way past several dozen senior citizens who treat this particular fast food joint as a daily hangout spot, I stood awkwardly at the counter for about 10 minutes before someone found the time and willpower to help me. I went ahead and ordered a six-piece chicken strip meal, asked for a handful of the sauce and some honey mustard — just in case.

After about 15 minutes of sipping on flat soda, the manager brought out my order before tackling the now 10-plus person lunch rush line. I was the only customer there for the sauce. Perhaps the Szechuan craze has yet to reach the rural outstretches of Oregon.

With the moment of truth finally upon me, I slowly peeled back the lid and stare into the dark pool of sticky orange liquid as if staring into the void itself. The faint scent vaguely reminded me of cheap Chinese food. In one swift motion, I dipped the crispy buttermilk tender into the abyss before taking a single crunchy bite…

It wasn’t what I was expecting. I hoped it’d taste a little like Panda Express’s infamous orange chicken or a more traditional garlic sauce. Instead, it reminded me of some late-afternoon General Tso’s chicken from a Fred Meyer’s. It was sweet and sticky almost intolerable. I could hardly eat it. Like, I was expecting some spiciness or a bit of tanginess, but no. If so, I would have ordered 20 McNuggets and requested as much of the precious sauce as they could legally fork over.

The familiar stomachache I got from eating the old, overcooked and dried-out chicken tenders and chemical-infused fries didn’t do much to sway my opinion either.

I can’t help but wonder if there was some sort of mistake. Maybe the batch sent to my podunk town’s McDonald’s was defective. Maybe it was just the gross food I had to go with it that spoiled it. Or maybe the sauce just isn’t that good. It’s alright, but let’s just say I’m glad I snagged that extra packet of honey mustard.

I’m tempted to give it another go, but that would require going into McDonald’s again. I don’t know if I have the willpower.

So where do we go from here? Is it too much to expect a response from everyone’s lovable, consistently drunk and mildly-psychotic grandpa Rick in Season 4 of Rick and Morty, or do we finally let the meme die?

I imagine the whole experience will end up as a net win for ol’ Micky D’s, despite a bit of negative press. As a joke, McDonald’s delivered the aforementioned 64 Oz. jug of sauce to Rick And Morty creator Justin Roiland in a specially made case that read “Dimension C-1998M,” where it just never stops being 1998.

Holy shit. pic.twitter.com/vNEIfHTmNU

— Justin Roiland (@JustinRoiland) July 30, 2017

The only other thing from McDonald’s to grab this much attention were the line of Hello Kitty toys they debuted in 2000. After an angry mob in Singapore shattered the glass of an opening McDonald’s, at least three customers were taken to the hospital. Not to mention the fistfight between a doctor and a truck driver a few days beforehand.

I certainly wouldn’t have stepped inside one of their restaurants if they hadn’t played along so elegantly up until this point. Though I can’t help but think they would have gained more if they let the legend live on in our minds, teasing us with an imaginary product we only assumed was life-changing because a fictional mad scientist — who is established as the most unreliable of narrators in the Szechuan Sauce episode — told us we needed it.

Rick Sanchez once again proves he isn’t your everyday cartoon character. Dan Harmon once waxed philosophically about Rick being the awkward in-between of god and man, as he navigates infinite universes with the power to do or take whatever he wants but can still confuse the words “granite” and “granted.” How fitting that a character like Rick has managed to manipulate the real world as easily as his own fictional universe.

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