The Power of a Cookie: Huntington Beach mother sees her wish granted

Logan Mundt loves to eat chocolate chip cookies from McDonald’s.

One thing he and his mother, Francine, couldn’t have predicted at the start of the novel coronavirus pandemic was that owners of the fast-food restaurant would send him not only cookies but an oven to bake them in.

Logan’s cookie habit, in and of itself, is not an unusual trait of the 18-year-old Huntington Beach resident. The reason it makes sense to Logan, who is severely autistic, is because his entire diet also consists of beige foods.

“Everything he eats is beige — chicken nuggets, French fries, Eggo [waffles], Cheerios,” Francine Mundt said. “One thing for sure though, ever since he could eat McDonald’s food, it’s been his staple. It seems to be a staple with so many kids on the spectrum, and it works for behaviors. It’s one of the things I use as a motivator to behave. It’s something that he’s so used to; it’s something that we do literally every day.”

Logan will typically start his day with pancakes and hash browns from McDonald’s, two more beige foods. But when the coronavirus hit, the company stopped selling its chocolate chip cookies in stores.

“They weren’t available on the app, and I thought it must just be a glitch,” Mundt said. “I called up the local McDonald’s and they told me, ‘No, due to the coronavirus, we have a limited menu.’ I said, ‘Oh my God.’ If we even went through the drive-through prior to this, I could have been 40 miles from the last McDonald’s we passed, and if there was no cookies in the bag and they had forgotten them, there was no doubt we were turning around and going back.”

Mundt said she felt ridiculous calling the company’s corporate office about cookies, but she did so anyway. Brad Horner, who owns McDonald’s restaurants in Orange, Los Angeles, Riverside and San Bernardino counties with his brothers, Todd and David, got the message and leapt into action.

News

Sign up for the Daily Pilot Newsletter

Email [email protected] to sign up for the newsletter featuring the latest news involving Newport Beach, Huntington Beach, Costa Mesa, Laguna Beach, Fountain Valley and other parts of Orange County.

A disruption to Logan’s routine would make things more difficult for Mundt at home. She said her younger son, who is 6-foot-4 and weighs 220 pounds, has obsessive-compulsive disorder and is prone to outbursts.

“I was kind of laughing as I called, because I felt a bit ridiculous calling about cookies, but I explained the issue,” she said. “I said, ‘You know, no big deal, I’m just curious as to when you’ll have them back in the restaurants again. It’ll just make my life easier because for him everything needs to be scheduled.’”

Mundt has a nursing degree but works as a stay-at-home single mom for Logan and his older brother Hunter, 19, who is a high-functioning autistic person. She has a blog and has started an autism consulting service for businesses, Finding Real Autism Accessibility Training.

Francine Mundt, right, and her son, Logan, eat McDonald’s cookies in their home on Wednesday, May 13. Logan only eats beige foods.

(Scott Smeltzer / Staff Photographer)

When he got the request, Brad Horner leapt into action. He said he and his brother, Dave, checked with Arytza, the bakery that provides McDonald’s with the cookies.

“The bakery said, ‘Yeah, we have some in stock,’ and they were really happy when they heard the story to be a part of it,” Brad Horner said. “I know to Francine, it seems like she made a crazy request, but we get lots of crazy requests. When we can help, we do. Normally, it’s a pretty simple thing and people say thank you and go on their way, but in this case it’s really blossoming into something else. When [the bakery] responded, that’s when I was like, ‘OK, this could turn into something really cool.’”

The Horner brothers delivered 72 chocolate chip cookies to the Mundt residence, as well as the bags the cookies would typically be served in at the restaurant.

“That made a huge difference,” Mundt said. “For Logan, that’s how it comes. That’s how it’s supposed to be.”

Horner said there are more cookies available when the family needs them. A week later, McDonald’s also had a new oven delivered to bake them in, as Mundt said her oven had recently broken.

The oven was installed on Wednesday.

“One of the things that Francine said that stuck with me was that this doesn’t make her day better, it makes her life better,” Brad Horner said. “I thought that was a pretty powerful comment to make about cookies.”

Horner said he has learned much about autism and ways of offering better communication for employees and customers.

Mundt, meanwhile, said she is amazed what a phone call can do.

“It’s crazy,” she said. “Something as simple as a cookie can alleviate so much stress. It’s small in [Horner’s] eyes, but huge for us.”

Support our coverage by becoming a digital subscriber.