McDonald’s doing damage control
Nicki Gostin at Kitchen Daily:
McDonald’s officials in Shanghai attempted to reassure customers that their food is fine to eat after a Denver nutritionist published claims that it is packed with preservatives.
Joann Bruso, whose website is called BabyBites.info, left a Happy Meal (a product primarily eaten by children) out for one year…that’s right a whole year. The horrifying results? She alleges that the food did not change at all.
“It sat on my shelf for a year as a silent witness to our fast-food industry. It never smelled bad. The food did not decompose,” she wrote.
McDonald’s issued the following statement: “No preservatives are added to the beef patties in McDonald’s hamburgers.” It went on to trumpet McDonald’s commitment to sanitation and freshness.
It may be true that there are no preservatives in the meat, but what they shrewdly omitted is what goes into the buns, lettuce, cheese and sauces.
On the McDonald’s website over a dozen ingredients are listed for a Big Mac bun including azodicarbonamide. (Maybe they should include that in the little ditty listing the ingredients: Two all beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on an azodicarbonamide sesame-seed bun!)
The cheese has something called calcium disodium EDTA, to protect its flavor, and the fries have sodium acid pyrophosphate. Even the pickle slices contain preservatives. After reading the Dr. Seuss-like list of ingredients one could hardly describe it as a paragon to freshness (it barely even resembles food).
I knew a guy that used an older than dirt happy meal as an aid to sell Shacklee products.
Sean
23 March 2010 at 12:20 pm
“Edible food-like substances” – Michael Pollan
Steve
23 March 2010 at 6:50 pm
This information is suspect. I hit the link to BabyBites.com and there is no reference to either Joann Bruso or the McDonald’s story. When you hit the McDonald’s link it loops right back to the KitchenDaily web site. A subsequent link to a quote by Ms. Bruso is in an unreferenced article in MailOnline. It identifies Ms. Bruso as an American nutritionist, but gives no sources for the origins of the McDonald’s story. Sounds like how urban legends are born.
Steve
23 March 2010 at 7:02 pm
P.S. I’m surprised Marion Nestle wouldn’t have picked this up right away.
Steve
23 March 2010 at 7:04 pm
In the (entertaining) documentary Super Size Me, he showed the absolute lack of aging of some McDonald’s french fries (and perhaps a hamburger—I can’t recall).
LeisureGuy
23 March 2010 at 7:23 pm
You have incorrectly listed my website. If your readers want to see my blog, Happy Birthday to My Happy Meal, they will need the correct email address. Please change it in you blog to:
http://www.BabyBites.INFO
Thanks!
Joann Bruso
25 March 2010 at 5:53 am
Correction made, and many thanks.
LeisureGuy
25 March 2010 at 7:15 am