Pink Slime

[Draca]

The big deal is it was unlabeled, undisclosed, snuck into the American diet. The USDA allowed it not to be labeled separately because it is made out of cattle, this is despite the expectation by the consumer that ground beef contains ground meat.

And all this time I thought you were saying

Being fed what is meant to be dog food is being nutritionally poisoned in my opinion. Not to mention the ammonia added to kill off all of the ecoli. Beyond gross.

That it isn't labeled "nutritionally poisonous"? or " beyond gross"?

Here is what I wrote in the starting op:

I've been following the Pink Slime story with disgust. Obviously we can not count on the government to provide protection or honesty on what is being sold as food. Absolutely outraged that major stores have gotten away with selling this. Our food supply is poisoned.

What I'm most outraged at is that it isn't even labeled to give people a choice, and there are no plans to require it to be labeled in the future. The USDA has utterly betrayed the American people in favor of big business.

Quote from ABC News "A USDA source told ABC news it’s up to the grocery stores to disclose what’s in their ground beef and the Agriculture Department has no jurisdiction."

Lack of labeling and disclosure has been my main issue with this from the start. Especially that the USDA pushed it through and they are suppose to be working for us. The hidden nature of the product being put in the food supply without it being known I find extremely disturbing.

Give people a choice. Hotdogs are a great example. It would be as if the public thinks that hotdogs are made out of pure ground pork meat when in reality it isn't. That isn't the case, the package lists what could be in a hotdog. LTFB has been passed off as pure ground beef meat.

When I used the word poisonous I meant in the way it would be to eat nutritionally empty junk food laden with chemicals everyday instead of high quality food. It's like a real potato vs. potato chips. When 15-20% of a food that is bought for nutrition is not what is expected - that is a problem. And yes, I do think LFTB is gross.


"That it isn't labeled "nutritionally poisonous"? or " beyond gross"?"
- labeling it LFTB would be enough to cover that.

 

[Dipayan]

Sure. I'm more than willing to take a blinded test. It would be interesting if anyone in the Seattle/Bellevue area was game.

I wonder if anybody has actually tried this. Will check it out.

The main reason I'm interested in this is that quite a few people such as yourself, Draca etc are suggesting that the texture of the beef is made worse (rubbery, gristly) by the LFTB because of its higher percentage content of connective tissues, cartilage etc. I'm trying to reconcile the stated texture of the LFTB (slimy, gooey) with this observation.

 

[casebro]

There is nor reason to suspect that (slimy,gooey) when raw equals (slimy,gooey) after cooking. Nearly all foods change texture when cooked. Even good hamburger toughens up some when cooked.

This afternoon, I will be cooking a plastic tube of Ground Chicken. It says "100% pure" right on it, and no 'ingredients' frame anywhere. No where does it list "mechanically separated chicken".

I make 'dirty rice' out of it, to feed to the dogs. I think my dog food is better than some people's hamburgers.

 

[Dipayan]

There is nor reason to suspect that (slimy,gooey) when raw equals (slimy,gooey) after cooking. Nearly all foods change texture when cooked. Even good hamburger toughens up some when cooked.

I understand what you are saying, but I don't necessarily agree if this 'toughening' of meat is what 'gristly' refers to - of course would prefer if one of the original posters could clarify. To my mind, the picture is somewhat different when I hear 'gristly'.

 

[23_Tauri]

Wanna know the funniest thing about this?

The term 'pink slime' was used in an internal e-mail that some scientist or USDA employee or both, I'm not going to bother looking it up, thought was all private and jokey and whatnot.

Yes, it was first coined by Gerald Zirnstein, a USDA microbiologist, in a private email. Then popularised by that idiot Jamie Oliver.

I'm late to this discussion, but my tuppence'worth is that it seems to me that inventing a way to make use of valuable animal protein rather than having to throw it away as pet food is a winning situation for everyone.

Labelling another's matter. I'm all for labelling, and the individual consumer doing their own research so they can decipher the labels. But again, it would seem that labelling of LFTB is only an issue because so many health faddists get a bee in their bonnet about made-up health scares that they don't understand. Honestly, as long as it's safe (and LFTB has been demonstrated to be as safe as any other ground beef) people should be glad they have any meat to eat at all.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

I understand what you are saying, but I don't necessarily agree if this 'toughening' of meat is what 'gristly' refers to - of course would prefer if one of the original posters could clarify. To my mind, the picture is somewhat different when I hear 'gristly'.

The texture of most burger in my area changed a number of years ago. At first I thought that somehow more gristle was beng used. As it became more common, I suspected maybe it was some new way of processing meat, a new method of taking the meat off the bone. And while I won't know for sure if this is the cause until more people take it out of their products, 'lean beef trimmings' fits the bill for the change I've observed.

But if I had to describe the texture without guessing more gristle was the cause, I would describe it as rubbery.

 

[Draca]

The Democrats respond:

Congresswoman Chellie Pingree’s bill, which she called “Requiring Easy and Accurate Labeling of Beef Act (REAL Beef Act)” would require any beef containing ‘finely textured beef’ to have a label at the final point of sale.

“Consumers have made it pretty clear they don’t want this stuff in their food,” Pingree said. “If a product contains connective tissue and beef scraps and has been treated with ammonia, you ought to be able to know that when you pick it up in the grocery store.”

Pingree said her bill has ten democratic co-sponsors

http://blogs.desmoinesregister.com/dmr/index.php/2012/03/30/bill-introduced-to-id-beef-additives/

 

[Checkmite]

I, too, once a couple of years ago had to throw out frozen burgers that I suspect had more than a token amount of "pink slime" in them. But I have to say that my experience differs from those here markedly. When I tried cooking a couple, what I found was that they had no "bite" whatsoever - rubbery or otherwise. On the contrary, they seemed mealy, mushy, and insubstantial. I was not aware at the time of any sort of "pink slime" component, I simply thought it was extremely low-quality meat and I didn't buy that brand any more. But now as I think on it, I'd suspect the loosely-bound "finely-textured trimmings" made up largely of grated connective tissue to end up tasting that way when cooked, rather than rubbery, firm, or tough.

 

[Dipayan]

The texture of most burger in my area changed a number of years ago.

I might be wrong, but I got the impression that LFTB has been around since 1975...?

And while I won't know for sure if this is the cause until more people take it out of their products, 'lean beef trimmings' fits the bill for the change I've observed.

This is the part that I'm trying to understand. How can we know what fits the bill if we have no way of know whether it was the tasty meat that had LFTB, or the crappy meat, or both? We are starting off by assuming that LFTB must taste a certain unpleasant way, and then assigning blame to LFTB for all the times we have had that certain unpleasant taste in any meat.

 

[Oliver]

Just put a ****** LABEL on it so the consumer has a choice on if they want to consume it or not.

That's how it should be. Unfortunately, you don't count and political capitalism rocks.

 

[Dipayan]

I, too, once a couple of years ago had to throw out frozen burgers that I suspect had more than a token amount of "pink slime" in them. But I have to say that my experience differs from those here markedly. When I tried cooking a couple, what I found was that they had no "bite" whatsoever - rubbery or otherwise. On the contrary, they seemed mealy, mushy, and insubstantial. I was not aware at the time of any sort of "pink slime" component, I simply thought it was extremely low-quality meat and I didn't buy that brand any more. But now as I think on it, I'd suspect the loosely-bound "finely-textured trimmings" made up largely of grated connective tissue to end up tasting that way when cooked, rather than rubbery, firm, or tough.

This is what I mean. While another poster has had bad experiences with 'rubbery' meat, this poster has had a bad experience with 'mushy' meat. Two separate issues, but both posters somehow seem pretty sure that LFTB had something to do with it.

The reasoning seems somewhat circular.

 

[RenaissanceBiker]

I cooked venison burgers for dinner last night. I am always pleased to see how red it is when I open the package. There's almost no fat and absolutely no pink slime.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

I might be wrong, but I got the impression that LFTB has been around since 1975...?



This is the part that I'm trying to understand. How can we know what fits the bill if we have no way of know whether it was the tasty meat that had LFTB, or the crappy meat, or both? We are starting off by assuming that LFTB must taste a certain unpleasant way, and then assigning blame to LFTB for all the times we have had that certain unpleasant taste in any meat.

History of Beef Products, Inc

1991 - BPI begins production of "lean" beef and becomes a key ingredient in low fat or lean ground beef.

First, I don't know other than it has been years I've been getting hamburger that had this unpleasant texture. I estimated a decade, give or take.

The company making the stuff started making this particular product in the early 90s not the 70s. So if the stuff was invented in the 70s doesn't mean it was used then and even in the 90s the market may have started out small. I believe the company's history page is consistent with when I started having complaints.

 

[MattusMaximus]

My only observation in this whole discussion to add at this point is this: how many of the people here complaining about so-called "pink slime" would be willing to pay the inevitable higher prices for "more pure" beef? And we aren't talking chump change here, either. This is a big potentially unintended consequence of banning beef with "pink slime" in it that I don't think most people are thinking about.

For example, much noise has been made on this issue concerning beef which goes to public schools, mostly with freaked out parents complaining that they don't want their children eating "pink slime". Okay, fine, but are those same people willing to pay higher taxes to support the increased costs that public schools would have to pay for the "better" beef?

It's one thing to complain and make noise about "pink slime", but entirely another thing to step up and pay more out of your own pocketbook when confronted with the economic fallout. If people expect to get something for nothing (an all-too-common sentiment among people), then they're being idiots.

ETA: The best analogy I can think of is to think about gas prices. People want cleaner burning gas so that air quality is getter and fewer greenhouse gases are emitted (all good things), so there must be a more complicated refining process on the gasoline, and there are likely a number of additives to be mixed in, etc. All of this costs money, which translates into higher prices at the pump (which was true even before the most recent run-up in gas prices). And then people complain about having to pay higher gas prices as a result

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

My only observation in this whole discussion to add at this point is this: how many of the people here complaining about so-called "pink slime" would be willing to pay the inevitable higher prices for "more pure" beef? ...

Me, and I've been doing it now for at least a year. The organic burger at Whole Foods is $9-10/pound.

 

[Joey McGee]

But they were lying and defrauding and stealing from us with this poisonous product weren't they? So poor people paying more money for burgers is just the money that the companies used to be stealing. Wait, no, I've confused myself.

 

[MattusMaximus]

Me, and I've been doing it now for at least a year. The organic burger at Whole Foods is $9-10/pound.

Good on ya, SG. Now if everyone who is complaining about "pink slime" would be willing to step up and pay more for beef, as well as paying increased taxes to support the "pure" beef in their public schools, that would be just hunky-dory by me.

This also goes for all the idiots who signed the Internet petition without thinking it through first. How much you want to bet the majority of them would turn around and complain about increased costs/taxes for "pure" beef?

 

[Joey McGee]

I feel like I'm missing out, it's time to bring pink slime to Canada.

‘Pink slime’: Is Canada really better off without it?

Richard Holley, a food science professor at the University of Manitoba, not only thinks "pink slime" is fine, he thinks it's a better alternative to what is typically done in Canada.

"I see this as not an unreasonable process from a scientific perspective," he says. "It enables the recovery of high-quality protein from meat that otherwise would more than likely end up as mechanically separated."

Evidence-enough that he is employed by the nefarious "beef industry".

According to McGill chemistry professor Joe Schwarcz, the process is nothing to worry about.

"Neither the dissolved ammonia, nor the ammonium hydroxide it forms, presents a health concern," Schwarcz wrote in a recent Montreal Gazette article."Ammonia is a product of protein metabolism and therefore routinely forms in the human body. It ends up being converted into urea which is then excreted in the urine."

But, how can Joe be so sure about that?

 

[Joey McGee]

"This isn't a situation where somebody was doing something wrong and they got caught and now there's this need to pay the consequences," Mills said. "This is a company with a long reputation of doing things right, working with regulatory agencies and food safety people. From a technical or logical standpoint, these are the folks you'd hold up and say this is the way you do it."

Edward Mills, associate professor of dairy and animal science at Penn State University

source

They lied to us! They stole from us! They don't even care about our children!!!

No evidence that this product is not safe and nutritious yet. That it doesn't have virtually the same nutritional profile as ground beef. Oh wait we don't trust the company and the usda anymore, got it.

 

[casebro]

It ain't a healthy component if it is 70% undigestible.

It's not doing the poor any favors is it? "Have some! It's CHEAP! But has only a fraction of the absorb-able protein and essential amino acids you expect! You can starve to death by eating your fill! But it is CHEAP!"

I don't eat much hamburger. I buy Rib Eye roast for $3.79/lb at the Vietnamese grocer. Slice my own steaks, or slice and dice for Fajitas tacos. Costco sells good ground beef, but it cost about $3/lb. I'd rather have steak.