McDonald’s Never Used “Pink Slime” in Chicken McNuggets
For years, McDonald’s has fervently denied claims that its chicken-based menu items are made with a soft-serve-looking concoction known colloquially as pink slime. The megacorporation has denied the accusation for more than a decade, making a firm statement on its website as recently as 2021 insisting that its chicken nuggets are made exclusively with “USDA-inspected boneless white-meat chicken – cut from the chicken breast, tenderloins, and rib meat.”
You may have seen the accusations yourself in a chain email or viral Facebook post – likely attached to an infamous and untraceable image of so-called pink slime being deposited into a cardboard box which has floated around the internet since 2010 or so. Most descriptions of the picture claimed this was how McDonald’s restaurants produced Chicken McNuggets, in a process that involved crushing the entire bird to create a pink substance – comprised of “bones, eyes, guts, and all,” according to one email obtained by Snopes – which is then washed in ammonia and artificially flavored.
Despite the sensationalist rumors, pink slime is a real thing. But it’s not in McDonald’s Chicken McNuggets, nor is it even poultry. In food production, it’s known as lean, finely-textured beef or boneless lean beef trimmings, and the company hasn’t used it in its hamburger products since 2012. In a YouTube video released by McDonald’s Canada in 2014, the company filmed a tour of the production facility where it makes Chicken McNuggets, and while it won’t have you singing “I’m Lovin’ It,” there was no pink goop to be found. Independent food experts confirmed to CNN that what McDonald’s showed was the real deal.
KFC Hasn’t Changed Its Name Because of Mutant Chickens
Ever since then, rumors have circulated and people have even taken online to claim that in order to cut down on production cost, the brand made the call to switch to genetically engineered chicken. Those creepy mutant chickens are supposedly devoid of feathers, feet, and beaks altogether. There’s the Great KFC Mutant Chicken Myth, that suggested KFC was breeding chickens with extra legs, and the KFC Spider Chicken Myth, which suggested customers were eating chickens with eight legs and six wings. There’s even the one that claimed they changed their name to KFC because they couldn’t legally call their product “chicken” after all the tinkering – but don’t worry, none of it’s true.
KFC has gone out of their way to reassure customers they only source healthy, perfectly normal, non-GMO-engineered chickens. US restaurants even boast they serve US-raised chickens, and Canadian KFCs source local Canadian chickens, too. When Kentucky Fried Chicken changed its name to KFC in 1991, rumors swirled that it had to do with what it served. One popular theory was that the fast-food chain couldn’t use the word “chicken” in its name anymore because its products didn’t contain chicken.
MSG is Actually Safe to Eat Despite Decades of Fear
Many chains, such as Chick-fil-A, use it the salt-like substance as a flavor enhancer to give their food an addictive umami kick. However, it developed an unsavory reputation after consumers began claiming that they experienced unpleasant side effects like headaches, fluttering heartbeats, chest pain, nausea, and weakness after eating food that contained MSG. Consumers are certainly free to avoid MSG if they wish. But the truth about this controversial ingredient is that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) generally recognizes it as safe in food. Furthermore, researchers have never been able to find definitive proof MSG causes those symptoms, according to the Mayo Clinic.
The longstanding myth about Chinese food, in particular, began in the 1960s when The New England Journal of Medicine published a letter reportedly written by Chinese American researcher Dr. Robert Ho Man Kwok who wondered if MSG caused his headaches and other ailments. The question quickly turned into national hysteria. Though only deeply flawed studies were performed to back up any claims, that didn’t stop the public fear of MSG. It wasn’t until decades later in the 80s that actual science debunked the myth. A lot of restaurants stopped using MSG in response to widespread health concerns, but since then many myths about MSG have been busted, such as it being artificial and bad for you. In fact, the stigma around MSG is finally ending, and the FDA considers this flavor enhancer to be safe to add to foods.
Taco Bell’s Ground Beef Has Never Been “Grade D” Quality
The old rumor that Taco Bell served “Grade D” beef made from lower-quality parts of the cow was unsettling, to say the least. But, in actuality, there’s nothing to it. Haters gonna hate, and if you listen to Taco Bell haters, you might believe the ground meat in their beef tacos and nachos is something other than actual meat. They’ve been accused of using everything from an insane amount of fillers to “grade D” beef. None of it is true, and Taco Bell even posted a statement saying so on their website (it’s no longer there).
Taco Bell did discover traces of horse meat in the ground beef from one of its European suppliers back in 2013, according to CNN. However, contrary to rumors you might find online, that doesn’t mean the chain as a whole serves horse meat to its customers. Taco Bell acted immediately after discovering the horse meat traces and took beef off of the menu at its outlets in the United Kingdom until the issue was remedied. It also assured its American customers that none of its restaurants in the United States were impacted because they didn’t serve meat from Europe. So, even though the horse meat discovery was certainly an unsettling development, it’s not a continuing issue at Taco Bell.
Secret Menus Are Mostly Made-Up Internet Fiction
When you put it like that, it seems doubtful any place has a true “Secret Menu”, and that’s what Thrillist says, too. Food writer Lee Breslouer even researched items supposedly on secret menus, then headed out to see if he could order them. He came away from the experiment with the conclusion that secret menus just don’t exist. All of those complicated recipes and names online are completely made-up, and if you want into a Starbucks and ask for, say, a Butterbeer Latte, they will probably have no clue how to make it. They are required to customize your drink how you want it, so if you want to order something from the “secret menu,” know exactly what’s in it and ask for it that way!
Breslouer says the idea of a secret menu started with In-and-Out Burger, and we know what you’re thinking. But given their “secret” menu has an entire section on their website, it’s not so secret after all, is it? The reality is that most menu modifications are simply customizations that employees can make with existing ingredients. What people call “secret items” are usually just creative combinations that customers figured out themselves, not hidden company recipes.
McDonald’s Ice Cream Contains Real Dairy, Not Pig Fat
For years, the internet has been rife with rumors and confusion about whether McDonald’s soft serve contains pig fat. But fear not, dairy lovers! The company lists the ingredients for its vanilla soft serve, as well as for every other menu item, on its website. Spoiler alert: pork fat is not one of them. The persistent myth likely stems from people’s general suspicion about how fast food companies can create products so quickly and cheaply.
McDonald’s has made their ingredient lists publicly available online, showing that their vanilla soft serve contains milk, sugar, cream, corn syrup, and natural flavor. The creamy texture that some people find suspicious is actually achieved through standard dairy processing methods. Their shake mix contains the same dairy ingredients you’d find in premium ice cream brands, just with some additional stabilizers to maintain consistency in commercial serving machines.
White Castle Uses Real Onions, Not Cabbage Soaked in Onion Juice
Somehow, a rumor was started that White Castle doesn’t use real onions – they use cabbage cut up to look like onions and soaked in onion juice (which doesn’t really make sense, when you think about it). Cabbage cooked on the grill would not have the taste of an onion, even if it was soaked in onion juice. It wouldn’t save money, because onion juice would still be costly!
Popular as these items may be, there is a rumor that the onions in White Castle’s sliders are nothing but shredded cabbage, or even turnips, marinated in some onion juice. Could this really be the case? There is no logic to that claim, if only because onions have a different texture, crunch, and taste to begin with. Anyone who has cooked both vegetables can attest that cabbage and onions behave completely differently when heated. Cabbage wilts and becomes soft, while onions caramelize and develop their signature sweet-savory flavor that makes White Castle sliders so distinctive.
Tim Hortons Coffee Contains No Nicotine or MSG
According to one rumor, Tim Hortons added nicotine to its coffee to make it addictive. To address the rumor in 2004, CBC News’ Disclosure decided to test various coffees, including Tim Hortons and Starbucks. Caffeine levels varied and no nicotine was found. There is absolutely NO nicotine or MSG in our coffee. While Tim Horton’s coffee does not contain additives, it is full of premium-quality Arabica beans, which are clearly good enough to keep consumers coming back for more.
The Canadian Food Inspection Agency is known for its extremely rigorous rules, and it aims to protect Canadians from “preventable food safety hazards” and “food fraud.” It would therefore never allow the inclusion of nicotine – whose harmful effects may include cancer, chronic kidney disease, and respiratory problems – to unsuspecting consumers. The addictive quality that some people attribute to Tim Hortons coffee is simply the result of caffeine content and quality brewing methods, not mysterious chemical additions.
McDonald’s Hamburgers Don’t Contain Cow Eyeballs
The myth says that while McDonald’s labels their meat “100 percent beef,” you may not be eating all the usual parts of the cow. If they included things like cow eyeballs it would technically still be beef, after all, and ThoughtCo. took a crack at debunking this one. Since the urban legend that McDonald’s is the world’s largest purchaser of cow eyeballs goes hand-in-hand with this one, they looked at how economically advantageous it would be to replace meat with eyeballs. Since they found it would actually be more expensive to use eyeballs in particular (they’re often sold to colleges and research facilities), there’s no point! The USDA also specifies any “beef byproducts” need to be disclosed, and McDonald’s wouldn’t be able to label their eyeball-filled meat as “100 percent beef” anyway.
The economic reality makes this myth particularly absurd. Cow eyeballs are actually valuable to medical research institutions and universities for scientific studies, making them cost more per pound than regular ground beef. McDonald’s would literally lose money by using eyeballs instead of standard meat cuts. Federal regulations require clear labeling of any organ meat or byproducts in ground beef, making this deception impossible to maintain legally.
Taco Bell’s Cinnamon Twists Are Not Deep-Fried Pasta
Taco Bell isn’t really known for its dessert menu, which largely consists of little balls of Cinnabon dough and Cinnamon Twists, which are sweet crunchy treats that look and taste like churros designed for an American Girl doll. But these Cinnamon Twists are also the source of one the chain’s longest running myths. Specifically, that they’re just rotini pasta that have been deep fried and rolled in cinnamon and sugar. It’s a rumor that’s been around so long that we’ve written about the Cinnamon Twist pasta myth before, and you can even find videos online of people claiming you can recreate the dish by frying up some store-bought pasta in your own kitchen.
But before you try to save a whole buck-fifty by frying up some homemade twists, you should know that it’s not true. Sure, the uncooked twists look like spiral pasta, but they’re actually a type of wheat puff based on a Mexican dish called “Duros de harina,” which literally translates to “hard flour.” Also called “Mexican wheel chips,” “chicharrones de harina” or “duritos,” these little wheat pellets puff up when they fry, creating a light, golden treat. And while they do share many of the same ingredients as rotini, pasta is made to be boiled for a long time, so they won’t puff up in the same way.
