Posted on 01/06/2010 11:59:01 AM PST by Nodems2000
Window cleaning chemical injected into fast food hamburger meat
Mike Adams Natural News Wednesday, January 6th, 2010
If you’re in the beef business, what do you do with all the extra cow parts and trimmings that have traditionally been sold off for use in pet food? You scrape them together into a pink mass, inject them with a chemical to kill the e.coli, and sell them to fast food restaurants to make into hamburgers.
That’s what’s been happening all across the USA with beef sold to McDonald’s, Burger King, school lunches and other fast food restaurants, according to a New York Times article. The beef is injected with ammonia, a chemical commonly used in glass cleaning and window cleaning products.
This is all fine with the USDA, which endorses the procedure as a way to make the hamburger beef “safe” enough to eat. Ammonia kills e.coli, you see, and the USDA doesn’t seem to be concerned with the fact that people are eating ammonia in their hamburgers.
This ammonia-injected beef comes from a company called Beef Products, Inc. As NYT reports, the federal school lunch program used a whopping 5.5 million pounds of ammonia-injected beef trimmings from this company in 2008. This company reportedly developed the idea of using ammonia to sterilize beef before selling it for human consumption.
Window cleaning chemical injected into fast food hamburger meat 251109banner
Aside from the fact that there’s ammonia in the hamburger meat, there’s another problem with this company’s products: The ammonia doesn’t always kill the pathogens. Both e.coli and salmonella have been found contaminating the cow-derived products sold by this company.
This came as a shock to the USDA, which had actually exempted the company’s products from pathogen testing and product recalls. Why was it exempted? Because the ammonia injection process was deemed so effective that the meat products were thought to be safe beyond any question.
What else is in there? As the NYT reports, “The company says its processed beef, a mashlike substance frozen into blocks or chips, is used in a majority of the hamburger sold nationwide. But it has remained little known outside industry and government circles. Federal officials agreed to the company’s request that the ammonia be classified as a ‘processing agent’ and not an ingredient that would be listed on labels.”
Fascinating. So you can inject a beef product with a chemical found in glass cleaning products and simply call it a “processing agent” — with the full permission and approval of the USDA, no less! Does anyone doubt any longer how deeply embedded the USDA is with the beef industry?
Apparently, this practice of injecting fast food beef with ammonia has been a well-kept secret for years. I never knew this was going on, and this news appears to be new information to virtually everyone. The real shocker is that “a majority” of fast food restaurants use this ammonia-injected cow-derived product in their hamburger meat. It sort of makes you wonder: What else is in there that we don’t know about?
“School lunch officials and other customers complained about the taste and smell of the beef,” says the NYT. No wonder. It’s been pumped full of chemicals.
There are already a thousand reasons not to eat fast food. Make this reason number 1,001. Ammonia. It’s not supposed to be there.
You can get the same effect by opening a can of dog food made with beef byproducts, spraying it with ammonia, and swallowing it. That is essentially what you’re eating when you order a fast food burger.
It’s almost enough to make you want to puke. If you do so, please aim it at your windows, because ammonia cuts through grease like nothing else, leaving your windows squeaky clean
This is pretty bad PR for McDonalds.
I for one almost got myself a Big Mac today, I’m glad i didn’t.
I wonder what McDonalds current stance on the matter is, You know, Using “extra cow parts and trimmings that have traditionally been sold off for use in pet food” in their burger patties.
I won’t be going back soon, And just when i got a McD’s gift card in my stocking.
What about the smell?
35 years ago, or so, a local physician who is also a rancher had 4 orphan calves after a blizzard. He lives in an old, rambling Victorian with a full basement and so, he brought the babies home for the winter. The neighbors for a block around, not to mention his family, complained. I think he still kept them there until thaw. It is one of those local stories that will never be forgotten.
I don’t suppose it matters that red meat naturally has ammonia in it.
I'd rather they use gamma radiation ...
There's a huge difference between claiming that the product is "unsafe" and observing that it's made with the lowest possible quality of meat. There's a huge difference in texture and taste between a homemade hamburger (grocery store ground beef) and a fast food hamburger.
So, after reading the 4 page article on the NYT website, what do you think was the main point?
To let people know they are injecting ammonia into beef so they can make their own decision on wether or not to eat said beef. It’s simply investigative reporting. Do I think it is secretly PETA trying to destroy fast food chains to save poor innocent cows? No, but even if it were, injecting ammonia into meat destined for school children is something parents have a right to know. You should have heard the devestating few days on our local conservative talk show about the chicken being fed to the children at schools (they had guest that new the inside story). To be honest, I haven’t eating ground beef in over a decade, it’s garbage meat, period. My children never eat the school lunches or eat at fast rood joints.
I know all about the chicken, like I said on the other thread, my sister worked at a huge farm and operates 24 x 7 and she picked flats of eggs all night long. The chickens were bloody, featherless (from the small chicken wire cages) and hopped up on high levels of antibiotics to keep them from getting sick because of the filthy conditions they were raised in. The campbells would come and buy the played out hens (though campbells no longer uses them). They were disgusting, this is the mechanically seperate and (rejoined) chicken nuggets your kids are eating at school.
Exactly, Ammonia is simply 1 Hydrogen molecule and three hyrdoget molecules... while it certainly can cause issues if you breath high levels in or ingest high levels.. it has a boiling point of -28F.
They are injecting the beef with it to kill pathogens, the reality is, I doubt 100% you can find any trace levels of ammonia in a piece of cooked beef that’s been injected with ammonia.
Its evaporated away before the beef has fully thawed, let alone been fully cooked.
This is definitely a fear mongering article to me, nothing more.
My husband and I have been using ground venison for a number of years, from the deer he has killed each year. We ran out before deer season this year, and he decided that he wanted enchiladas one day, so we bought ground beef.
The difference in taste and quality of the meats was very evident, even though we bought the leaner product than regular ground beef.
Each of us said that we don’t even like ground beef anymore.
My thought exactly - it gives a whole new meaning to “special sauce”!
Well you haven’t had real ground beef if you have bought it from a supermarket or a butcher shop. You want to taste what it is meant to taste like, find a local farmer who raises cattle (not an industrial farmer) and buy a 1/2 or whole cow from him.
Calling what they sell in supermarkets and butcher shops ground meat is like calling chipped ham, ham. There is literally no comparison. I fry up a lb of ground meat from the cows we have slaughtered and there isn’t even enough fat to drain from the bottom of the pan.. Even the so called “ultra-lean” 93-7 or “ground chuck” at the supermarket is a joke compared to this.
You really cannot compare industrial farmed meat with those done by a small local farm in any way shape or form.. most however know no different because they have never had an alternative.
Dihydrogen monoxide can be some nasty stuff
The company my husband retired from used to own Alpo. At one point he learned that Alpo lost the bid to buy *lips and gums* to McDonalds.
I swear to this day it’s hard for me to even pass by a McDonalds without gagging. Sometimes ignorance is bliss.
I agree with you. Same with pork, especially sausage products which would be more similar to the ground meat.
The ammonia is only apart of the larger point in the NYT article. The real point is that the claim that ammonia gets rid of e coli may not be true.
Natural times turned that point around and made their article about the dangers of the ammonia.
I haven’t eating ground beef in over a decade, it’s garbage meat, period.
And now, your real point. I get it, you don't like ground beef.
Exactly.
I’m so glad I stopped eating beef years ago!!
Ecoli can’t survive proper cooking, the key is that no matter where ground meat comes from, don’t it it raw or undercooked.
If you eat a burger that is pink in the middle, I don’t care if its the best quality meat you can find, you are taking a chance at an ECOLI infection.
I personally think irradiation should be used on all industrial produce and ground meat products prior to processing. This would virtually eliminate the risk of E-Coli outbreaks.. but can’t have that word “radiation” out there, that spooks folks.
It can KILL, And it’s EVERYWHERE!
It seems that the word "ammonia" has it's own ability to scare.
I understand Chemistry. Our resident liberal doesn’t. She thinks using it means it is left in the food as a common cleaning agent.
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