The most popular last meals before the death penalty

Grim, isn't it? Blame my twisted mind for this, but this is what I was thinking about recently after I wiped my tears because I watched The Green Mile again. In the Netherlands, we obviously don't have the death penalty, but in America they still do (although prisoners on death row often ‘wait’ for decades for their execution), and they get to choose their last meal. I used to see celebrities being asked this question in interviews a lot: ‘What would you want as your last meal?’ Now that question is a lot lighter, since they are not actually on death row, so I can imagine their answers differ quite a bit from the actual popular requests of prisoners.

CBS News researched this and came up with a very detailed result. The average last meal contains 2756 calories (you don't have to worry about that after dinner dip) and it won't surprise you that the vast majority goes for something tasty and not necessarily something healthy. More than two-thirds of the prisoners ordered fried food (lots of fries) and also a dessert. As a drink, they often went for soda.

So mainly comfort food, and from these requests, 24 percent wanted a hamburger, 22 percent a steak, and only 4 percent a meal from a fast-food chain like McDonald's, KFC, or Burger King. Honestly, that surprised me: I thought those would be much more popular. I also expected pizza to be requested a lot, but that is also not the case.

Let's end it grimly then: these were the last meals of the most famous Americans on death row.

John Wayne Gacy (The Killer Clown): fried shrimp, a bucket of KFC wings, fries, and a pound of strawberries

Ted Bundy: a steak with eggs and hash browns, although he ate none of it

Timothy McVeigh (Oklahoma City Bomber): two large tubs of chocolate mint ice cream from Ben & Jerry's