How Chicken Nuggets Are Made: McDonald's Canada Exposes The Mystery Behind McNuggets [VIDEO]
Over the past few years, food bloggers and health advocates have tirelessly spoken out against many fast food chains, including McDonald’s. Their claim? That the infamous McNuggets are made out of “pink goop.” However, McDonald’s Canada recently released a video debunking that assumption.
One consumer from Alberta, Canada, asked, “What are legitimately in chicken McNuggets? Is there pink goop?” So Nicoletta Stefou, supply chain manager at McDonald’s Canada responded with a video tour throughout a factory in Cargill, Ontario, which makes and packages the nuggets.
The video does in fact show workers deboning actual whole chickens, which are then cut, ground, and made into the famous four shapes (ball, bow tie, boot and bell). However, the video does state that the leftover chicken skin is used in the nugget mixture and it’s unclear as to what types of chickens — whether it be cage-free or organic chickens — are used in making the nuggets.
Despite this information, there have been previous studies that don’t actually follow along with what the famous fast food company is trying to promote. In 2011, a study published in The American Journal of Medicine found that the nuggets were mostly made up of things other than chicken meat. "Our sampling shows that some commercially available chicken nuggets are actually fat nuggets," said head researcher Dr. Richard deShazo, a professor of pediatrics and medicine at the University of Mississippi Medical Center, NPR reported.
Other research has shown that McNuggets are also made with ingredients such as autolyzed yeast extract (which contain free glutamate, similar to MSG), sodium phosphates, and sodium aluminum phosphate, which the American McDonald's lists on its website. In other words, the nuggets are made up of more than just chicken breast.
The video was filmed in McDonald’s Canada, therefore, food preparation and ingredients might differ from the United States or any other part of the world where McDonald’s is sold.
Check out the video below: