Pink Slime

[jimbob]

OK, and what has that to do with anything? Do you agree? do you disagree? It is just hanging there.

In my world I think things are true because they are facts. In your world you think things are true because of how you feel. We cannot communicate.

Look at the original exchange (fixing broken quotes)

You quoted the highlighted pare with no reference to what it was or indeed where you saw it. I have no idea what you are trying to say with that - or whether it was implying it was something someone else said that you either agreed with, or disagreed with.

I also have no idea where that quote came from. Or was it not supposed to be a quote?

Not quite... I have an issue with the unlabelled addition of a differently textured meat

this bit is fair, all of the companies are on your side on this point

to the product that reduces its cost per kilo. The lack of labelling means that lower quality meat is not identified in the product.

This is a lie. It is cheaper meat, not lower quality. All of the academic and USDA opinion reiterates this. This is the problem you just can't help yourself.

Meanwhile, I can expect Melton Mowbray pork pies to be made in a small area of Leicestershire and Cornish pasties to be made in Cornwall, both to specified methods.

You can expect to get ground beef in your ground beef. You're not really with it.

 

[GlennB]

I don't have a response to this, other than to say it is extremely stupid.

There is no difference in molecular constitution from meat that is micrometers away from the place the butcher put his knife. Total lack of attention to detail in this thread.

'Molecular constitution' has nothing to do with whether devotees of Steak Tartare might find raw LFTB with a raw egg on top a suitable subsitute for their 'delicacy'.

But I guess you're plain trolling now. You win, it seems.

 

[The Greater Fool]

Round Steak is a beef steak from the "round", the rear leg of the cow. The round is divided into cuts including the eye (of) round, bottom round, and top round, with or without the "round" bone (femur), and may include the knuckle (sirloin tip), depending on how the round is separated from the loin.

Ground Round is ground Round Steak.

LFTB is a (different) processed beef, sometimes even Round Beef.

Each are 100% beef, 100% Round Steak (When LFTB uses Round Steak), and chemically indistinguishable.

Round Steak is a single piece of beef;
Ground Round is ground;
LFTB is small, finely minced pieces.

While some folks may not care or notice texture differences, the vast majority of people not only notice, but appreciate differences, and use each to achieve specific results.

If a butcher labels a package as Round Steak, you expect Round Steak in the package. It would be unacceptable for the butcher to add Ground Round or LFTB for any reason.

If a butcher labels a package as Ground Round, you expect Ground Round in the package. It would be unacceptable for the butcher to include whole Round Steak or LFTB as neither is Ground Round.

If a butcher labels a package as LFTB, you expect LFTB in the package. It would be unacceptable for the butcher to include whole Round Steak or Ground Round as neither is LFTB.

It is not Ground Beef if it is not Ground beef.

 

[Red Baron Farms]

It is cheaper, it has a different texture, and requires additional processing. Quality is more than just safety. One can see the difference if you look at the marbling in meat from (particularly) beef animals reared under different regimes. One can taste the difference in rearing systems with roast chicken.

Huge difference in nutrition as well. The whole lipid profile is radically changed, as well as some vitamins. Basically you have crap meat to start with, then process it even further. But no amount of processing, or lack there of, is going to change it from being crap. Garbage in, garbage out. But I don't think that is the topic here. It's fun to watch the industrial meat guys try and defend their crap. They are used to telling us what we are supposed to like and get highly offended when consumers reject their woo. But ultimately the product is crap with or without pink slime. It's just slimier crap. There is only so much slime in their food consumers can take.

 

[Prometheus]

Whatever you are talking about is not what the discussion is about. The same thing was said that it's all my problem and the producers have no obligation to label their additive of tendons and connective tissue: I should just go to the butcher and have them grind a cut of meat for me.

I did solve the problem. I began only buying fresh ground from Whole Foods because it was the only product that consistently didn't have the gross texture.

But that's not the issue. Why should I not be able to buy a package of burger from the grocery case and know if there was LFTB in it? Why should the producers be allowed to use filler that affects the product without saying so?

When you actually show that LTFB comprises tendons and connective tissue, your point will be slightly more valid, but it still won't go as far as you seem to think. I've seen one misrepresented study to that effect. That doesn't cut it. Regardless, why should you be able to buy a package of burger from the grocery case and know whether there was LTFB in it? From all the information that has been presented in this thread, it seems that the addition of LTFB results in the following:

1) Alters texture to a degree that some people can detect. Of those who can detect the change, some like it and some do not.

2) Reduces waste and lowers production cost.

3) increases the supply, and thus lowers the price, of whole cuts of meat that don't get ground into burger.

4) reduces proportion of fat present in the products it's added to, arguably making them healthier.

5) ???

Unless that yet-to-be-presented #5 is a major hidden smoking gun, I'm honestly at a loss as to why this amounts to anything other than an extremely minor annoyance.

Suppose I buy a bag of "fine washed construction sand" and a bag of "coarse unwashed beach sand", and mix them together. Would you consider it wrong for me to sell the mixture labeled simply "100% Sand"? Do you think I should be forced to break down the textures and processing that go into my Sand just because a few customers need fine washed construction sand and don't want to be bothered to special order it?

 

[Joey McGee]

Suppose I buy a bag of "fine washed construction sand" and a bag of "coarse unwashed beach sand", and mix them together. Would you consider it wrong for me to sell the mixture labeled simply "100% Sand"? Do you think I should be forced to break down the textures and processing that go into my Sand just because a few customers need fine washed construction sand and don't want to be bothered to special order it?

Listen up children, this is the real deal.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

When you actually show that LTFB comprises tendons and connective tissue, your point will be slightly more valid, but it still won't go as far as you seem to think.

Round and around and around, same points over and over.

Do you have the analysis that supports Joey's claim the LFTB was unfairly compared to ground chuck instead of 'trim'?

The university analysis showed there was little meat in the stuff, and the anatomy of muscles and common sense tells you there was no muscle meat being discarded. That means the additionally recovered "trim" that is being used in the LFTB is mostly tendons and connective tissue.

...why should you be able to buy a package of burger from the grocery case and know whether there was LTFB in it?

Because LFTB is filler and filler would normally be listed if consumers had as much influence as big business lobbyists who have an inordinate amount of influence in the USDA.

From all the information that has been presented in this thread, it seems that the addition of LTFB results in the following:

1) Alters texture to a degree that some people can detect. Of those who can detect the change, some like it and some do not.

2) Reduces waste and lowers production cost.

3) increases the supply, and thus lowers the price, of whole cuts of meat that don't get ground into burger.

4) reduces proportion of fat present in the products it's added to, arguably making them healthier.

5) ???

Unless that yet-to-be-presented #5 is a major hidden smoking gun, I'm honestly at a loss as to why this amounts to anything other than an extremely minor annoyance.

Suppose I buy a bag of "fine washed construction sand" and a bag of "coarse unwashed beach sand", and mix them together. Would you consider it wrong for me to sell the mixture labeled simply "100% Sand"? Do you think I should be forced to break down the textures and processing that go into my Sand just because a few customers need fine washed construction sand and don't want to be bothered to special order it?

None of this supports the position it shouldn't be labeled.

 

[jimbob]

LFTB is not banned in any country complete kookism.

LFTB is banned in the EU. There are many sources stating this.
For example
.

http://www.globalmeatnews.com/Safety-Legislation/UK-processors-reject-EU-ban-on-desinewed-meat

“This issue has nothing to do with recent reports in the media about ‘pink slime’, a beef-based food additive used in the US as a filler in minced beef. This product is not permitted in the EU and is not obtained by the same processes as MSM or DSM,” an FSA spokesperson told GlobalMeatNews.

(In this case "FSA" is the Food Standards Agency)


BTW
I have found the EU definition of MSM, which I would say that LFTB shares key features with:

'MSM' or mechanically separated meat is defined in EU law as "the product obtained by removing meat from flesh bearing bones after boning or from poultry carcases, using mechanical means resulting in the loss or modification of the muscle fibre structure." In practice, MSM has very little structure and has a paste-like consistency.

 

[jimbob]

It has a different texture.

Which is why they call it lean FINELY TEXTURED beef... and all major players are pro-labelling. Listen, there is this thing called attention to detail... LEARN IT

I thought you were arguing that labelling it as LFTB was unnecessary?

Do you think people should be allowed to put LFTB in products without labelling it as such?


That is all I am arguing for - labelling of the product.


ETA: in this post, for example

You have zero proof of this that anyone would ever take seriouslynot the correct adjective, I'm more saddened by the lost of work by the employees, disgusted with idiots, and besieging God for not existing. Hysterical. I believe it is the same product and therefore would be insane to label differently, ammonia is not required to be named as a processing agent, not is citrus juice, and you have zero proof its practically different than regular ground beef on a molecular level, you're off on a trip.I's probably better that you can actually prove your public arguments irrefutably and correctly.

 

[jimbob]

Post a picture of lftb i dare you.

I won't due to copyright

However The Independent has a photo here:

 

[Prometheus]

Round and around and around, same points over and over.

At last, a point of agreement!

Do you have the analysis that supports Joey's claim the LFTB was unfairly compared to ground chuck instead of 'trim'?

I don't need it, as it is not in the slightest relevant to my position. I don't care what you can or can't compare it to. It comes from a cow, so I don't mind there being some percentage of it in generic ground beef. When I want beef that is guaranteed only to have certain parts of the animal in it, then that's what I buy. What's the big deal?

The university analysis showed there was little meat in the stuff, and the anatomy of muscles and common sense tells you there was no muscle meat being discarded. That means the additionally recovered "trim" that is being used in the LFTB is mostly tendons and connective tissue.

No, that paper showed nothing of the kind. I'd almost believe this was just an innocent error, if it hadn't been pointed out multiple times in this very thread. The author of that paper has publicly stated that yours is a misreading of its conclusions. I read the paper myself and it is obvious to me that your interpretation is false.

Because LFTB is filler and filler would normally be listed if consumers had as much influence as big business lobbyists who have an inordinate amount of influence in the USDA.

So? Sometimes life sucks. It's not like this is a difficult problem for consumers to deal with. What one would normally expect, and what one can reasonably expect are often not the same thing. I believe that's pretty much the whole point behind promoting critical thinking in the first place.

None of this supports the position it shouldn't be labeled.[/HILITE][/QUOTE]

And none of it refutes my position, nor supports yours either. That's my point. I get that you are upset by this. I would be too in your position. I just don't see an cogent argument in your favour anywhere in this thread.

 

[jimbob]

You can say whatever the hell you want. It is not banned. It is also "not allowed" in Canada for the same reason. And that it is that it has never been applied for. There is nothing about the product that the UK has created those restrictions for. It is completely unrelated and means nothing. It is very, very sad that people are so desperate to discredit things they need to invent connections. And FFS, even if it WAS remotely true, which it isn't, even remotely, the EU bans GMO!!! Does that mean GMO is poison? What a *********** joke.

You said that it was not banned in any country.

It is not allowed in the EU. Whether it would be allowed if there was an application is another question. Given the requirements in the EU, if LFTB were to be allowed, it would almost certainly have to be labelled as some form of mechanically separated meat - just as "Desinued Meat" has to be.

 

[GlennB]

How is the highlighted part a lie?

You said :

It is used because it reduces the cost of the final beef product.

He said:

This is a lie. It is used because it recovers more of the same meat from the animal which gets them more money per cow.

Apparently, in JMcG world, reducing the net production cost is not the same as increased revenue. Or something.

 

[jimbob]

But the first is a conspiracy theory, apparently

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

[qimg]http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/imagehosting/6731953fa05bedd4c8.jpg[/qimg]

No he isn't. Joey provides cherry picked evidence, almost 100% of which is directly from BFI's propaganda material. And he dodges a number of questions, claiming he's answered them when he hasn't.

Why is it only OK to add 15% to the burger if it's no different than the rest of the trim? There's no restriction one cannot add unlimited amounts of the other trim.

Why is the stuff not considered the same in both Canada and the EU?

How is "closer to the hide" not further from the muscle, as in low-grade beef trimmings and other meat by-products such as cartilage, connective tissue and sinew?

He's yet to provide another analysis given he rejects the analysis that the stuff is 70% connective tissue when ground chuck is 30%, using the company line that comparing trim to chuck is unfair. If it's unfair, where is his alternate analysis?

No, Joey conveniently dodges certain questions.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

There’s another issue here that gets lost in the ‘but it’s beef’ debate. One reason I was getting burger so often with the bad texture is I was buying the lowest fat hamburger. So while I believed I was getting leaner cuts of meat with less trim, in reality I was getting hamburger with a protein filler added that was not meat. It was the protein from cartilage, connective tissue and sinew. Beef or not, that’s still very dishonest, deceptive labeling.

 

[Butter!]

SG, I must respectfully disagree.

 

[Darat]

This thread need a cleanout so it is being closed until such time as a member of the moderating gives it a clean up and issues the appropriate infractions and suspensions. As ever don't try to discuss this topic elsewhere on the Forum, you'll have to wait until it is reopened.

Replying to this modbox in thread will be off topic  Posted By: Darat

 

[Locknar]

Thread re-opened post clean out, though there may be another review/clean up. Please keep your Membership Agreement in mind while posting...especially rule 0, rule 11, rule 12 (ie. keep it civil & polite, on topic, and address the argument.

Replying to this modbox in thread will be off topic  Posted By: Locknar

 

[Joey McGee]

http://fns.dpi.wi.gov/files/fns/pdf/dpi_lftb_info_031912.pdf

“LFTB is not filler; it is nutritionally equivalent to 95% lean beef and doesn’t contain connective tissue.“

Please provide evidence that the USDA is involved in a decades long coverup worth billions of dollars in lawsuits.