McDonald’s Food Myth Debunked–Again

Please God, not again

We shouldn’t be here–again.

Making an encore appearance across countless Facebook feeds is YET another claim that McDonald’s food, left untouched for years, has gone unspoiled, ostensibly because of disgusting, harmful chemicals.

News stories trending on social media^1,2 claim that a six-year-old Happy Meal looks as good (bad?) as the day it came out of the hoppers at Mickey D’s.  Says Jennifer Lovdahl, the owner of the meal:

“We did this experiment to show our patients how unhealthy this ‘food’ is.  Especially our growing children! There are so many chemicals in this food!  Choose real food!  Apples, bananas, carrots, celery…”  ¹

Well of course there are chemicals in the food.  Everything is made up of chemicals, including the apples, bananas, and carrots that Ms. Lovdahl adores.  But the Happy Meal not spoiling?  We already know the secret behind that.  It’s called desiccation.  In plain English, the food has dried out, leaving behind a poor environment for mold to grow.

If you’ve done even a little bit of cooking, you know that the process drives a lot of water out of the food.  All you need to do to reverse this and spoil a meal is place it in a moist environment, such as a plastic bag.

Don’t take my word for it.  Try an easy experiment at home with some McDonald’s food.  My Fear Babe co-authors and I did this recently for our book.  The results are visible in the photo below.  On the left is a McDonald’s burger left in a plastic bag for approximately two weeks.  On the right, a burger left to dry in the open air.

McDonald’s hamburgers DO spoil. They just need moisture. (click/enlarge)

The plastic bag retained enough moisture to allow mold to grow on the burger inside.  The sandwich left outside didn’t spoil.  Our results have nothing to do with chemicals.  In fact, you can repeat this exercise with “healthy” chemical-free bread from your local organic store, and you’ll get the same results.

Why oh why are we still debunking this nonsense in 2016?

“A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.”–Mark Twain

 

Image Credits
McDonald’s spoiled/unspoiled hamburgers by Marc Draco, from The Fear Babe.  Copyright 2015 Senapath Press.  All rights reserved.

McDonald’s happy meal news image from Lovdahl/The Independent, used under Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107 of United States copyright law (commonly known as “fair use law”). This material is distributed without profit with the intent to provide commentary, review, education, parody, and increase public health knowledge.

References
(1) There’s Something Freakishly Disgusting About This McDonald’s Happy Meal (The Independent)
http://i100.independent.co.uk/article/theres-something-freakishly-disgusting-about-this-mcdonalds-happy-meal–bk0AyF82pe

(2) Mom shares photo of 6-year-old Happy Meal that still hasn’t spoiled (Miami Herald)
http://www.miamiherald.com/latest-news/article59297773.html

Advertisement

Modern Alternative Mama: How Did This Get “Past Your Eyes”?

Regular readers of crunchy mommy blogger Modern Alternative Mama (Kate Tietje) know that she’s an ardent opponent of pasteurization.^1,2,3,4  According to Kate’s twisted view of science, pasteurization kills all the “good” bacteria in food products (milk, honey, etc.), leaving room for the “bad” bacteria to grow. She also falsely believes pasteurization destroys all the beneficial enzymes in food, leaving what we eat devoid of nutrition.

For reasons I’m about to reveal, I was a little shocked then to find this fantabulous recipe idea–a “monkey smoothie”–on Tietje’s Facebook page:⁵

Modern Alternative Mama likes this milk. Only one problem…

“Monkey Smoothies” made from Silk brand cashew and almond milk are pushed as a healthy kids’ breakfast by Kate.  There’s only one problem here…

These products are pasteurized!  Here’s the quote from Silk’s product information page (click image to enlarge):⁶

From the Silk FAQ.  Silk almond & cashew milks are pasteurized. MAM says this is dangerous. (click/enlarge)

Oops!

Now, to be sure, these products are safe, and pasteurization helps make them so.  Kate Tietje makes a plethora of scientifically ignorant statements on pasteurization in her blog posts (such as unpasteurized products having never killed anyone–they certainly have).

But I’m not here to argue the merits of pasteurization (I’ve done that already).  The purpose of today’s blog post is to point out Kate’s hypocrisy.  She says pasteurization makes food products more dangerous by killing off “good” bacteria, leaving room for dangerous pathogens and destroying essential nutrients–so why then is she feeding this “dangerous” brew to her children every morning?

Kate?

References
(1) Kate Tietje: Monday Health, Raw Milk
http://www.modernalternativemama.com/2011/08/01/monday-health-raw-milk/

(2) Where Does Your Dairy Come From?
http://www.modernalternativemama.com/2015/01/20/dairy-come/

(3) Raw Milk: Finding It, Using It, And More
http://www.modernalternativemama.com/2011/02/25/raw-milk-finding-it-using-it-and-more/

(4) Ten Benefits And Uses For Raw Honey
http://www.modernalternativemama.com/2012/07/03/10-benefits-uses-for-raw-honey/(1)

(5) Modern Alternative Mama Monkey Smoothie (Facebook)
https://www.facebook.com/ModernAlternativeMama/posts/10153103399762913

(6) Silk FAQs
https://silk.com/faqs

 

Image Credits
Facebook, Modern Alternative Mama, and Silk screen snapshots are used in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, commonly known as “fair use law”. This material is distributed without profit with the intent to provide commentary, review, education, parody, and increase public health knowledge.