These are just two of the ingredients in a McDonald's Chicken McNugget. Only 50 percent of a McNugget is actually chicken. The other half includes corn derivatives, sugars, leavening agents and completely synthetic ingredients.
There's no doubt processed food like that from McDonald's is not part of a healthful diet, and I'm grateful I've never had a chicken McNugget. But many Americans cannot say the same.
This sentiment was echoed by Federal Judge Robert Sweet in a lawsuit against the restaurant chain in 2003:
"Chicken McNuggets, rather than being merely chicken fried in a pan, are a McFrankenstein creation of various elements not utilized by the home cook."Time Magazine reported that Judge Sweet "questioned whether customers understood the risks of eating McDonald's chicken over regular chicken."
Seven years later, I still wonder whether McDonald's customers truly understand the risks of consuming fast food on a regular basis.
If you missed Morgan Spurlock's documentary Super-Size Me, I highly recommend you watch this real-life illustration of just how dangerous an excessive fast food diet can be. And excessive is likely far less than you imagine: Eating fast food just twice a week doubles your risk of developing insulin resistance, compared to eating it only once a week. (Insulin resistance one of the primary driving factors behind most Western diseases, from diabetes to cancer to heart disease.)
The truth is, McDonald's fare contains non-food ingredients that can seriously harm your health. This shouldn't come as any great surprise. After all, how healthful can something be that shows no signs of decomposing after being left on a counter for more than a decade?
According to McDonald's, their chicken nuggets are "made with white meat, wrapped up in a crisp tempura batter." But as Organic Authority pointed out in a recent article, these nuggets are a far cry from what you might expect.
So what are dimethyl polysiloxane and tertiary butylhydroquinone?
- Dimethyl polysiloxane is a type of silicone with anti-foaming properties used in cosmetics and a variety of other goods like Silly Putty.
- Tertiary butylhydroquinone (TBHQ) is a petroleum-based product with antioxidant properties.
TBHQ, typically listed as an "antioxidant," is a synthetic chemical with antioxidant properties - not a natural antioxidant.
TBHQ prevents oxidation of fats and oils, extending shelf life of processed foods. Commonly used in processed foods of all kinds, it's also found in varnishes, lacquers, pesticide products, cosmetics, and perfumes to reduce the evaporation rate and improve stability.
According to A Consumer's Dictionary of Food Additives, one gram of TBHQ can cause:
- Nausea
- Vomiting
- Ringing in the ears (tinnitus)
- Delirium
- Sense of suffocation
- Collapse
- liver effects at very low doses
- positive mutation results from in vitro tests on mammalian cells
- biochemical changes at very low doses
- reproductive effects at high doses
I recently commented on how McDonald's food seems to remain impervious to degradation, as if it's been embalmed to stay fresh forever! After sitting on a shelf for 14 years, the hamburger bun has yet to develop a single trace of mold or even shrivel.
If you read the list of ingredients in these buns, this mysterious mummification becomes less of a mystery:
- calcium sulfate (Plaster of Paris)
- calcium carbonate (Antacid)
- ammonium sulfate (Harmful if swallowed)
- ammonium chloride (Causes irritation to the gastrointestinal tract. Symptoms include nausea, vomiting and diarrhea)
- calcium propionate (Preservative)
- sodium propionate (Mold inhibitor)
The bottom line is, if you want to stay healthy, and keep your children healthy, it is best to avoid both fast food and other processed foods, and invest time in cooking from scratch.
Ideally, you'll want to consume as much whole, raw, organic and/or locally grown foods as possible. That's why so many people like vegetable juicing. You're consuming living raw food!
Most vegetables also have very low carbohydrate levels that minimally disturb insulin metabolism - another important trait of a healthful diet.
I also believe optimal health is largely dependent on eating the right foods for your nutritional type. To find out your type, visit my Nutritional Typing test.
If you're hooked on fast food and other processed foods, please review my recent article "How to Wean Yourself Off Processed Foods in 7 Steps."
And if you have children, remember that home-cooked meals can have far reaching benefits, even to your future grandchildren. It's now well known that dietary changes can prompt epigenetic DNA changes that can be passed on to future generations.
So, making wise food decisions can literally "override" genetic predispositions for disease.
Comment: For more information about how 'home cooked meals can have far reaching benefits read the following article:
How Eating at Home Can Save Your Life
From the article:
The slow insidious displacement of home cooked and communally shared family meals by the industrial food system has fattened our nation and weakened our family ties. In 1900, 2 percent of meals were eaten outside the home. In 2010, 50 percent were eaten away from home and one in five breakfasts is from MacDonald's.
And the other additives you mention, are mostly not what actually worries me, although, I'd prefer to know it, before I ingested any amount of those drugs, preservatives or simple minerals, - and for what reason... They are, regarding toxicity, in allowed doses, not the most problematic thing with these "food replacements", -which I think is the extreme conditions the original ingredients have been "denatured" under, and the weird structures created by mutilating food ingredients in this way, creating sundry mutagenic substanses, and strange reaction products, amongst the resulting ingredients. The fact that it is probably done to hide the dubious quality of the original meat etc, is not making me long for a serving of this recycled "garbage". The way most nutrients are destroyed by the extreme conditions, is rendering nothing but a higly unnatural mix of chemicals. The extra additives, are probably, better for us, and common, in everything from medicines for Childhood colic, to biscuits, and bread. (To know the way chickens, are treated at factory farms and slaughterhouses, is just making me sad and angry...). - If you can make food as improper as this in your kitchen, you are probably not starting from raw materials...