Healthify your supermarket choices.
Guess What’s in The Picture [Foodlike Substance]
A) Strawberry ice cream
B) Chicken
C) Plastic foam
D) None of the above
Answer below
What you need to know:
Folks, this is mechanically separated chicken, an invention of the late 20th century. Someone figured out in the 1960’s that meat processors can eek out a few more percent of profit from chickens, turkeys, pigs, and cows by scraping the bones 100% clean of meat. This is done by machines, not humans, by passing bones leftover after the initial cutting through a high pressure sieve. The paste you see in the picture above is the result.
This paste goes on to become the main ingredient in many a hot dog, bologna, chicken nuggets, pepperoni, salami, jerky etc…
The industry calls this method AMR – Advanced Meat Recovery.
In 2004, as a result of mad cow disease (Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy), the USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) ruled that beef could no longer be processed this way, because testing showed that parts of the bovine central nervous system ended up in the meat.
As for products using mechanically separated chicken and pork, FSIS ruled that they are safe to eat, but required them to be labeled as such.
Despite them being safe, FSIS states that no more than 20% of the meat in a hot dog come from mechanically separated pork.
What to do at the supermarket:
It’s always a better to choice to see a real cut of meat at the butcher counter in the supermarket and then decide what you want done with it. Buying something prepared in a factory, such as chicken nuggets, or hot dogs, you’ll always get the worst meat, and it will always be combined with additives and other sources of fat.
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They have been doing this stuff for years. They save the fetal pigs when they slaughter hogs, and the ENTIRE little pigs go right into the grinder for hotdogs, eyeballs, buttholes, genitals, guts, teeth and all. Pureed up and right into hotdogs, seen it myself many times.
Not sure why everyone is so scared of this stuff. Meat close to the bone is good. I eat tons of crazy gross shit at sushi restaurants and it’s called ‘exotic’ and pay top dollar for it. Here its called gross. Not harmful, not gross tasting. FDA approves it because it is safe to eat. Nab a fish eyeball or some caviar and eat up.
That’s kind of gross…..
I personally don’t eat meat anymore – due to things like this – I just don’t want that kind of yuck in my body….
I think if you eat meat, go for the best you can – real pieces of meat, from an animal you can recognise. Yes, it’s more expensive, but if you reduce your overall meat consumption, you can afford it, and yes- enjoy it more!
Hate to disappoint but you are(we all are) that kind of yuck.
I could have lived without knowing this, but now that I do, it is life changeing. We don’t eat any ground meat anyway, but when I crave a hotdog or something like it I will “Just Say No”. Enlightening?
They have been doing this stuff for years
@Scott
There are many fetal pigs that go to schools for their biology programs. How many fetal pigs can honestly end up in the food when I personally know how high the demand is for them?
@zero
Sushi is amazing. But fish and their products just *seem* so much more pure and clean than what the majority of Americans are consuming these days.
We should all grow our own food or purchase from local friends & farmers!
WOW. Just… wow. I knew this had been going on, but seeing the image is still really shocking. Neat blog BTW!
@Emma – yes, I see fetal pigs at the biology department all the time, them, their brothers and sisters all diligently studying for the next exam – you’d think it would be difficult what without opposable thumbs and you know, being dead and all, but they seem to manage. Hey, I think it’s great that you support the biology program at your colleges and state universities and I’m also super glad that science seems to be your primary interest.
I think it is good advice to know what we eat. So, I would avoid wieners. In fact, I ground my own ground pork and ground beef, not knowing what eye balls or intestines or genitals may get ground into the ground meat. Remember, 100% beef only means that 100% of the component comes from a cow, not just meat as we know it.
Another option you could have given your readers who want to avoid this nastiness is to tell them to go vegetarian or vegan.
A plant-based diet is healthier and way more compassionate than eating dead animals.
Man I love that pink color!
I don’t care if it’s chicken, it LOOKS like delicious strawberry icecream or bubblegum! And dammit, that’s what I’m going to pretend it is.
Okay, in all seriousness, saying that a plant-based diet is healthier is often an opinion based on guilt about how the meat industry treats animals. A lot of it is wretched. Most of it is. But eating organic, free-range lean meat in moderation, along with lots of greens and grains, is a very healthy dietary choice. Period. A diet balanced in both meat and veggie proteins is what comes most naturally to humans.
Also, meat is so tasty. If I didn’t have access to sustainably-obtained meat, from free-range animals, I wouldn’t eat meat either. But I do. So I do!
are you sure it’s chicken? I don’t think that it is good manufacturing practices to put a raw chicken product into a plain, unlined cardboard box… plascit foam on the other hand…