O! I thought I'd done S5! Shame on me!

Will update soon!

Many times I was wandering what MacGyver liked to eat and drink. We can see him eating or drinking from time to time, but I think that there are some inconsistency.

Ok, one thing is certain - he likes icecream

He also don't drink alcohol - if I'm right.

In "The Prodigal" MacGyver is saying: "Now technically I'm driving a stolen car, following a kidnapper, and I haven't even had my first cup of coffee" but, in few episodes He is against drinking coffee.

I don't drink coffee anymore ... but often use it in expressions and talk about like I do. Same sort of syndrome - One head, two minds.

As for alcohol, I think that he wasn't exactly a teetotaler but only had a drink on special occasions - like in Log Jam where he has a glass of brandy with Amy.

Mac's a health freak. He prefers juices over alcohol and tofu over junkfood. He doesn't even drink Cola for all I know.

Mac is not against drinking coffee. Maybe he just drinks it black with no sugar. He told Deborah once that he doesn't drink coffee either just to be charming.

Mac likes icecream (Thief of Budapest/Secret of Parker House), drinks coffee, orange juice (Serenity and several other episodes), carrot juice (Hell Week), tomato juice (High Control), ginger ale and alfa alfa sprouts (The Eraser) he also eat fruit like apples (The Heist and Runners) and oranges (The Widowmaker), he likes to eat Chinese (Out in the Cold and MacGyver's Women), eggroles (Second Chance) and is always up for pizza (Easy Target) and cheeseburgers (Family Matter) but he think hotdogs are weak (Jerico Games) and he loves chocolat (Pilot) and he always has bread somewhere in (The Stringer).

Further more he enjoys everything nature has to offer, nuts and fish.

Huh?? He took a sip of wine in The Heist, but I don't recall Mac having a brandy in Log Jam?

Nicely put, MacGyverGod!

There is also the traditional English Breakfast in Legend of the Holy Rose, the lunch scene with Frank Colton in Black Corsage, I assume it were beans in Serenity. Just some wild guesses.

You can see the list of all food eaten by MacGyver here.

There's an in depth discussion about whether he's a vegetarian or not here.

MacGyver was against drinking alcohol and states as much in a number of episodes; not the least of which was 20 Questions in which he explains why he doesn't drink.

We do see him take a mouth full of wine in The Heist but it was part of a MacGyverism AND he screws up his face in disgust at the taste. We also see him avoid it in a couple (maybe more) episodes. One being Enemy Within where he takes a glass of wine offered to him and then hands it off to someone else. The second is the beginning of GX-1 when he toasts Heidi in the hot-air balloon. She has a glass of champagne and he has a strawberry.

Well, he's clearly accepted & nursing a glass of brandy/cognac by the fireside in Log Jam. Traditional for this part of the world. Sometimes the ambience (and or the script/setting) just induces one to imbibe. In other words, to hell with the squeaky-clean geekiness for a moment, boost the ratings, and appease the audience majority and do what they might do in a similar situation.

thanks a lot for nice discussion :-)

...I'm sure, that once I've seen scene where someone said, that Mac always say that coffee is no good for stomach... I have to find it.

Assignment for tonight, checking out Log Jam and find out for myself. You might be right though. If so, Mac is only human and probably figured: what the hey, one doesn't hurt. You live in a cabin in the woods, fire is cracking in the fireplace, you had a good meal after a hard day of work and have a brandy by the fire.

You're thinking of Secret of Parker House. Penny offers the officer some coffee. The officer declines saying it was too hard on his stomach. Penny motions to MacGyver and says "That's what he always says".


On the subject of Mac drinking in Log Jam. I actually checked it out. It's kinda hard to tell what he's drinking. Nothing about that scene proves or disproves that he was drinking alcohol. I would say that this is something that's up to the viewer.

I'm an experienced drinker, and anytime I watched the scene, I just assumed he was drinking ginger ale or water while they finished up a meal. Given Mac's character and his dislike of alcohol... I really, highly doubt that's what it was.

But hey, who knows... I can be wrong.

It's implicit, isn't it, with the fireside dinner, crystal double highball glasses used primarily for the serving of alcohol, the intense discussion, and Mac even swirls his glass a bit like you would with a fine liquor as he sets it on the table.

Or sure it could be ginger ale ... but the setting suggests otherwise and the whole scenario of two old friends discussing serious environmental issues over fine dinning and a soda pop is probably not the message the director would ever want to send.

There's also the slight illusion of romance created and which is used to set up the next scene where we are left in doubt whether or not there are any sparks happening between Amy & Mac. And with that in mind, a brandy by the fire somehow conjures up more romantic ambience then a bottle of A&W root beer could ever hope to.

It could be alcohol... but I highly doubt it.

It appears to be amber, dense and Mac appears to 'sip' it as he contemplates the facts that Amy is presenting. Too flat for ginger ale and too colored for water.

LOL! You're really trying to sell it aren't ya?

Dude, Mac doesn't like to drink. He doesn't like alcohol. My mother was the same way. She did a lot of things very similar to what you're claiming without alcohol. Could have been juice for all we know.

They were just finishing up a meal, and Mac doesn't like to drink. So I doubt it was alcohol.

RDA on the other hand... he was probably drinking something alcoholic.

Mac? Nah... I don't buy it.

I'm not trying to sell anything - the director was trying to sell it given the ambience of the set chosen. I'm just interpreting what I saw. I bet 99/100 people would say that's some kind of liquor if shown the same scene and not knowing the background of Mac's preferred tastes.

I wish Mac had of said, "Amy, that's the best dang fireside prune juice I've ever had and would you mind topping me up while I use the washroom!'


But he didn't (thankgawd) and left us to draw conclusions from the visual evidence provided.....

I just saw it myself. You have to look fast though because you can see him putting the glass down. Considering they were both having a serious conversation and were really into it about the loggers and all, I doubt they would've been discussing it with alcohol. So nope, it wasn't. It looks like fun though having a meal next to fireplace.

Besides it was working day after, imagine Mac having a wooden head when he goes for a job.

Joe SAKic - I don't mind being the 1/100 that thinks otherwise. lol The reason I don't believe that it's alcohol is based on my own personal experiences and what I know of Mac's character. Not based off some "ambiance" that you claim is there that I just don't see.

Sorry.

And that's ORGANIC fireside prune juice to you.

Lol, Mac could be chugging clear liquid out of a 40ozer and there would be doubting thomas' among the hardcore fandom.

It was amidst rugged logging country for gawdsakes - they're not known for their teatotalling & kool-aid sipping after a day slogging timber and slapping skeeters - that's for sure.

And the Monday night audience full of tailgating football fans would like to believe that Mac might have a wee sip with them every now & then . And so they left it open to interpretation with lowball glasses, alcoholic proportions and prototypical setting .... and slid it right though. And relax folks, it was just a sociable sip for crying out loud - no need to call AA just yet.

I just watched that scene and there's no swirling of the glass. Just a slight movement as he puts it down after taking a sip. He's also entirely focused on the newspaper clipping being handed to him as he does this. You normally swirl before you drink to release the scent and flavor not as you put the glass down.

The liquid is clear and flat... kinda like water.

And knowing that it's VERY well established that MacGyver doesn't drink at all. (He even states in one episode that carrot juice is a strong as he gets.) I think it's a 100% certainty that it was water in those glass tumblers.

I just showed it to three people at the office who don't know MacGyver. One said whiskey and the other two said cognac. Amy has very rusty pipes if it's 100% water. Regardless of what it is (often a little maple syrup diluted with water) - they appease both sides of their audience by making it look as close as possible to an alcoholic beverage that goes better with the particular setting and then by staying mum on the beverage and there by not incriminating Mac in the eye's of his watchdog fans. Btw, if there was a bottle of root beer sitting on the table - the next scene with the peeping jealous husband would not have been nearly as effective.

Or very dirty glassware.

Seems like a plausible explanation. But it does leave the question of what it could be within the non-drinking MacGyver universe. It does have a bit of a tinge to it.

I just think the 'MacGyver Management' wanted the best of both worlds in that scene. Usually - if it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it's a duck ... but there's nothing in the accompanying props/script that proved it a duck.

Amy probably just had the most stressful day off her life - just been arrested, marriage in tatters, and beloved forest under the knife. Enter old friend (and former love interest?) MacGyver to the rescue, a relaxing dinner by the fire with very appropriate looking and matching drinks. I know what 'they' needed & wanted us to believe they were sipping and for that 80s/90s scenario. And I also know what that era's audience would expect old friends (Mormons et al excluded) to be sipping by the fire.


Certainly had they had shown us 'what kind' of a sip Mac had taken - we would have known definitively if it were alcohol or not. But they chose not to in lieu of enhancing the slightly romantic ambience and have the drinking glass pass through the fire light for further effect.

So we are left with a split decision - the Mac purists in denial and the period etiquette purists in approval.

It's weird that 2 episodes before this one we see MacGyver as a cowboy in a saloon turning down alcoholic drink and asking for a glass of milk instead and then being hassled about it, including the line "he doesn't drink, he doesn't carry a gun. Is he wearing lace underwear?" (paraphrased).

That was a dream. Anything goes in a dream and even Mac might have been susceptible to the odd vice. Personally, I would have had him let his hair down a bit, slug back a few whiskeys with Jack and the boyz in Serenity ... and then slug Murdoch or something. Good opportunity for something a little different - missed.

They weren't looking to do something a little different though because the shows fandom was built around having a hero who didn't do any of those usual things we see heroes doing in the other shows. So probably not so much opportunity missed as opportunity ignored.

So the answer to the this little conundrum about what was in those glasses I guess it that it was left to the viewers imagination to read into that scene what they like. But for the purposes of our food list I'm going to take into account the characters very well documented (and somewhat regularly referred to) dislike of alcohol which would mean it was dirty water?

I can see you're point of view though Joe. They certainly did load that scene with suggestive material.

My fandom basis is that he was into hockey, using his brains, the out of doors, and high technology. That's what I remember best, if you had asked me a year ago when I started to revisit the series if he'd ever shot a gun or took a drink in the series - I think I would have probably said yes to both. It's not something I kept track of with mental notepad and paper or found a particularly important characteristic of the show.


And the fact that he did or didn't has no basis what so ever on my appreciation for the show or character. I think the series touched fans in many different ways and struck many chords along the way.

Having said that and having come of age in that era and in the heart of logging country - it would be definitely have been the norm to have a proper tipple with an old friend in such a given situation - and they tried their very best to sell it as so.

Olives, "The little green ones with the pimento." - The Eraser

nice catch.

Updated the list.

I watched 'The Heist' the other day, in which Mac does the trick with the wine glasses making different notes to open the safe.
He drinks the wine to get the glass to 'sing' the right note and the look on his face is priceless - never have I seen someone enjoy the taste of something LESS!