Do you know what is in your meat? Ammonia. Yes a wonderful cleaning product used to treat windows, is also used to treat our meat.
Beginning in the 90’s Beef Product’s(a company) began trying to make a way to make the fatty by- products into usable meat. To reach this goal, the fat is liquefied and then the protein is extracted, and then reconstituted which than creates a lean meat used mostly for hamburgers. This became known in the industry as “pink slime”. (So, they are saying that McDonald’s hamburgers are reconstituted beef product that was once the leftovers of other meats. Yup!) Than there is the issue that this new leaner meat is more prone to being infected with E.coli and salmonella, which came the need to clean the meat. A method of using ammonia as a processing agent was introduced to kill these bacteria and because it is used to process the food, it does not need to be included on the labels of these products. There is a pH of 9.05% of ammonia in this new meat.
Many school systems use this reconstituted meat because it saves them 0.03 a pound. Yet, they are unaware of the ammonia aspect until it is too late. The meat has been shown to have enough leftover ammonia that it actually sickens the children. In 2008, these companies began to find ways to lower the pH balance to 7.75-8.5% in an effort to combat the smell.
The companies are only using a smaller pH balance to get rid of the smell? Not to protect the children or those who also eat this meat? The meat company’s bottom line is the almighty dollar, which annually is about 440 million. Ammonia is being introduced to our bodies at a young age, how are we going to know the lasting effects of ammonia in the way we grow or absorb nutrients. When we send our children to school, we should not be worried about what the school s are serving. With the outbreaks of salmonella and E.coli, there is has to be a happy medium that won’t make people sick and what is used to “clean” the meat. However, I don’t there will ever be a better alternative as long as these companies make such a huge profit. Sad but true.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/31/us/31meat.html?_r=2&partner=rss&emc=rss&pagewanted=all
Ammonia?? Pink Slime??Leftovers?? Clean meat?? I don't think I will be able to eat meat anymore. I had NO idea companies used ammonia to treat meat. I feel ill!!!!
ReplyDeleteThis is just plain sick of these companies to do this. Also, for our school systems to save a whopping $.03 a pound for this contaminated meat? Let me tell you the few extra dollars makes me feel so much better about the children eating this meat. (not really) There are so many money hungry people and companies in the world that it is just sick what they would do to get that little bit more money from someone. This is irritating!
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