Whats Really In Chicken McNuggets
December 11, 2008 by Rob
McDonalds chicken nuggets are a favorite with children in many families. Parents buy the ‘chicken nuggets’ believing they are indeed made from just chicken. McDonalds even provides flyers titled “A Full Serving of Nutrition Facts: Choose the Best Meal for You.” However as you can see from the ingredient list below, there is a lot more than just chicken.
Chicken, water, salt, modified cornstarch, sodium phosphates, chicken broth powder (chicken broth, salt, and natural flavoring (chicken source)), seasoning (vegetable oil, extracts of rosemary, mono, di- and triglycerides, lecithin). Battered and breaded with water, enriched bleached wheat flour (niacin, iron, thiamine mononitrate, riboflavin, folic acid), yellow corn flour, bleached wheat flour, modified corn starch, salt, leavening (baking soda, sodium acid pyrophosphate, sodium aluminum phosphate, monocalcium phosphate, calcium lactate), spices, wheat starch, dried whey, corn starch. Batter set in vegetable shortening. Cooked in partially hydrogenated vegetable oils, (may contain partially hydrogenated soybean oil and/or partially hydrogenated corn oil and/or partially hydrogenated canola oil and/or cottonseed oil and/or sunflower oil and/or corn oil). TBHQ and citric acid added to help preserve freshness. Dimethylpolysiloxane added as an anti-foaming agent.
There are 38 ingredients in a McNugget; many of them made from corn. Further down the list there are the mono, diandtriglycerides, and the emulsifiers that keep the fats and the water from separating. More corn flour is used to make the batter, and the hydrogenated oil in which the nuggets are fried can come from soybeans, canola or cottonseed, depending on the market price.
It gets worse: a number of the ingredients come from petroleum products, to keep the items from spoiling or ‘looking strange’ after months in the freezer or on the road. If you are truly worried, look up these ingredients: sodium aluminum phosphate; mono-calcium phosphate, sodium acid pyrophosphate, and calcium lactate. These are used to keep the animal and vegetable fats from turning rancid. Then there are “anti foaming” agents like dimethylpolysiloxene. According to the Handbook of Food Additives, this material is a suspected carcinogen and an established mutagen, tumorigenic, and reproductive effector. It is also flammable.
The most alarming ingredient in Chicken McNuggets is “tertiary butyl hydroquinone,” or TBHQ, derived from petroleum. This is sprayed directly on the nugget or the inside of the box it comes in to “help preserve freshness.” Again, according to A Consumer’s Dictionary of Food Additives, TBHQ is a form of butane (lighter fluid) the FDA allows processors to use sparingly in our food. It can comprise no more than 0.02 percent of the oil in a nugget. Which is probably just as well, considering that ingesting a single gram of TBHQ can cause “nausea, vomiting, ringing in the ears, delirium, a sense of suffocation, and collapse.” Ingesting five grams can be fatal.
Do you really want to give your kids Chicken McNuggets?
Source: the Gerson Healing Newsletter – www.gerson.org
Popularity: 38%
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Rob Cooper, also known as the Former Fat Guy once weighed 475 pounds. Through a system of natural health, whole foods and a basic walking program of 20 minutes a day, lost nearly 300 pounds of fat over 2 and a half years. Weekly weight training added over 50 pounds of muscle and has lowered his body fat even further. He’s the author of How To Lose 10 Pounds a Month, Every Month, a free report given to subscribers of his natural health and weight loss newsletter as well as the transformational... 
November 11th, 2009 at 1:08 am
I once left a bigmac in a ziplock… two weeks later, it smelled and looked like new… thats kinda scary.. what type of chemicals are these mofos using?
November 21st, 2009 at 7:16 pm
This is disgusting!
I read somewhere that everything with corn starch is addicting.
November 29th, 2009 at 4:48 pm
Man this is really scary stuff. I will never let my little one eat this crap again..
December 26th, 2009 at 2:02 am
If it goes in the fryer at McDonalds, it not good for you.
January 25th, 2010 at 7:10 pm
Every time I eat at McDonalds I get sick now.. I try to avoid it, however my kids love the playplace and it is free. so I bring them there once a month maybe twice. I just wish they had a healthier menu. I once saw a video on Youtube that talked about a five year old happy meal. And when they showed it on the video it only looked a day old. Scary That if it still looks that good over that time what are those preservatives doing to our bodies?
March 18th, 2010 at 1:15 pm
Ugggh..there are very rarely those crazy days when McRaunchy’s is just a quick option, I thought the chicken nuggets were a safer bet..I should have known better after seeing the ingredient list for the ‘chicken’ in their chicken wraps. Gross…I’d rather just be hungry..why can’t chicken just be chicken??
March 29th, 2010 at 8:07 am
I can not believe that I used to eat there so often. How awful.
March 30th, 2010 at 7:31 am
I was watching Dr.OZ and he told about all the bad things and ground up the chicken & the bones, grizzle and especially skin. NO MEAT is in them only the few scraps left on the bone after cutting them up for eating. That’s what the chicken patties and nugget’s are made from. After I saw this show I have serious doubt’s about ever buying any of this stuff again. I had already stopped FASTFOOD, but this is a good thing to see so I don’t ever go back to it!
May 6th, 2010 at 2:38 pm
McDonald’s does have salads people
May 11th, 2010 at 1:39 pm
Im 21 and i have a 3 year old soon to be 4 daughter. She has never been to Mcds and she will never eat this poison. people always tell me its ok just once in a while. n i tell them my child means the world to me and i will never feed her lighter fluid or n e other substance that can harm her!!
May 17th, 2010 at 7:28 am
Going to McDonalds for a salad is like going to a brothel for a hug.
There is nothing healthy about McDonalds, and the “healthy menu” is just their way of turning around years of bad publicity. Nothing manufactured in high volume everday is going to be good for you, simple.
May 26th, 2010 at 1:33 pm
Now I know why my girlfriend is a vegetarian. I guess if you just smother the nuggets in ranch then they will be ok to eat. Just kidding. I used to eat so much fast food in my early 20’s and now we might eat it once a month. Best change I ever made to my eating habits.
June 6th, 2010 at 2:18 pm
Who would go to McChemicald’s for a salad?
Hit the local Super Salad or grocery store!
June 10th, 2010 at 11:07 am
@McDeath – well said.
June 15th, 2010 at 1:16 am
Looking at the structure of the TBHQ, it is nowhere near being a type of butane. At best it is related to phenol but even then its a very tenuous link.
Interesting article though!
June 15th, 2010 at 1:26 am
@ Paco – What should scare you even more is if preservatives keep things that good, how long had that bigmac been sitting around before they sold it to you!
June 15th, 2010 at 3:13 pm
I saw whey is in there. Therefore, they’re good for you.
June 15th, 2010 at 3:45 pm
Ha. Ya… that’s it @Josh. hey, you need a http://www.Gravatar.com buddy!
July 25th, 2010 at 7:22 am
My brother worked the Ship yards in Virgina and the ALL BEEF used in the Big Mac is Kangaroo beef NOT cow beef
September 14th, 2010 at 7:47 pm
Well if there a using kangaroo then is good that meat is better than cow meet is more lean only 2% of fat
October 13th, 2010 at 10:13 am
Check this out, You’ll never eat another nugget after you read this:
http://countmyribs.tumblr.com/post/1207200876
December 13th, 2010 at 4:23 pm
The petroleum spraying is quite scary, but companies already put that in black people’s hair care products, so it’s nothing new. I’m not even surprised by the list. If it was only chicken and batter then I WOULD be surprised. No wonder people go organic.
January 6th, 2011 at 3:07 pm
this stuff is wierd and all the comments people leave
haha
January 10th, 2011 at 3:36 am
Good to know..The Mcnuggets are usually what I always chose..I have not had a McNugget since I started eating healthy 18 weeks ago and I do not miss them. They are like a drug. Once you stop eating them and get them out of your system you stop craving them.
January 20th, 2011 at 2:55 pm
Of course all of these items are added to the “chicken meat” which is nothing of the sort either. A peek under the hood of our factory farming systems will make that clear in a hurry.
The horror stories will never stop unless we stop making people rich by buying this crap. No one is going to stand up for us, we have to do it for ourselves.
Get educated people!
January 30th, 2011 at 7:05 am
I had a best friend that worked their and “he” wouldn’t even eat the food their. That in itself tells you alot about that place!