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McDonald’s Gets Lawyer-y With Little Mac

Photo: Local Lemons

Grub Street broke the story about Oakland’s upcoming mac-and-cheese restaurant Little Mac, and today co-owner Allison Arevalo writes to let us know that she and partner Erin Wade received a cease and desist letter word from McDonald’s threatening legal action if they try to incorporate the word “mac” in their name at all. The riff on Big Mac likely came to Arevalo following the Fast Food Slow series she did on her blog Local Lemons, in which she once made a slow-food Big Mac.

So, now they’re holding a contest to rename the place, which come fall will join American Grilled Cheese Kitchen and Fondue Cowboy in this especially cheesy year of openings.

Update: It turns out McDonald’s never contacted them, but the Little Mac teamed reached out to make sure their name would pass muster. The McDonald’s legal team, by phone, assured them it would not.

The Restaurant Formerly Known as Little Mac [Local Lemons]
Earlier: Little Mac Finds a Location [Grub Street]
Berkeley-Based Blogger to Open Oakland Mac-and-Cheese Restaurant [Grub Street]

McDonald’s Gets Lawyer-y With Little Mac