It’s no secret that I have a past that included secret, middle of the night meals at Taco Bell. In 1996, I poked fun at them, posting a spoof review of the chain for April Fools day. Still, I haven’t been for years, and when I was on a road trip a few months ago, I stopped and got a “burrito”. I didn’t expect it to be good, but was, in a word, awful. I couldn’t eat it. The meat didn’t taste like meat anymore, and the “beans” were drenched in salt. Fast forward to today.
From Yahoo Finance:
An Alabama law firm claims in a lawsuit that Taco Bell is using false advertising when it refers to using “seasoned ground beef” or “seasoned beef” in its products.
The meat mixture sold by Taco Bell restaurants contains binders and extenders and does not meet the minimum requirements set by the U.S. Department of Agriculture to be labeled as “beef,” according to the legal complaint.
The class-action lawsuit was filed Friday in federal court in the Central District of California by the Montgomery law firm Beasley, Allen, Crow, Methvin, Portis & Miles.
Attorney Dee Miles said attorneys had Taco Bell’s “meat mixture” tested and found it contained less that 35 percent beef.
It gets worse. From one of my favorite websites, Gizmodo, (4/11 – link is broken now)
Taco Bell “beef” pseudo-Mexican delicacies are not made with USDA ground beef. They use a gross thing called “Taco Meat Filling” as shown on their big container’s labels—which customers can’t see. The list of ingredients is gruesome:
Water, isolated oat product, salt, chili pepper, onion powder, tomato powder, oats (wheat), soy lecithin, sugar, spices, maltodextrin (a polysaccharide that is absorbed as glucose), soybean oil (anti-dusting agent), garlic powder, autolyzed yeast extract, citric acid, caramel color, cocoa powder, silicon dioxide (anti-caking agent), natural flavors, yeast, modified corn starch, natural smoke flavor, salt, sodium phosphate, less than 2% of beef broth, potassium phosphate, and potassium lactate.
…what Taco Bell claims is “beef” in their commercials is just the aforementioned processed clustermass of disgust. It seems that they have a very good point.
The fact is that the containers in which the taco meatmud arrives to their establishments is labeled as “taco meat filling,” which is exactly how it should be labeled in all advertising and packaging according to the USDA. Of course, the All-New Double Decker with Two Times More Taco Meat Filling will not sound very good on TV.
Lunch anyone?
Liza says
Wow, it’s almost meatLESS.
superdog says
I wonder, if this lawsuit gets anywhere, how many other restaurants will get sue for this. Hard to believe you can get 2 cheese burger for 3 bucks at Big McD’s while the gnd beef prices swing from $2/pound – $3/pound. $5.00 footlong anyone?
qball says
I don’t get what is so “gruesome” about the ingredients. There is nothing in this stuff that’s that bad. I’m not saying it’s wholesome and nutritious, but it’s far from being a clustermass of disgust.
CO says
you know, the meat-like filling is probably the least scary thing on the menu.
Don’t look a gift isolated, Hydrolized Equine organism in the mouth.
Mary Sue says
Oh, by the way, someone applied the scientific method to the ‘non-rotting McDonalds burger’ and discovered the burger didn’t rot because of its large size and exposure to air dried it out.
pcrackenhead says
For what it’s worth, the McDonald’s hamburger thing is kind of a hoax, homemade burgers of the same size do the same thing:
http://aht.seriouseats.com/archives/2010/11/the-burger-lab-revisiting-the-myth-of-the-12-year-old-burger-testing-results.html
The Wizard Tim says
It’s al sugar, salt, and corn by-products, nothing really nourishing in their “meat”.
grapedog says
I had a Whopper Jr at a Burger King recently, the first time I’ve had BK (or pretty much any fast food) in years. Completely tasteless and cool “meat” patty. Runny “mayo”.
Why did I eat this? After a day of helping demolishing a friend’s deck, I figured it would be good eats. Nope.
truthypup says
yummmmmmmmmmmmmmmm this makes me crave a mexican pizza
truthypup says
I was just happy to see no horse or walrus meat honestly
shawn says
Wheeeeeere’s the beef?!?
personal trainer marketing says
Not the point… if a bag of the slurry that goes into the Taco Bell products is only 36% beef, how can you advertise it as beef? FDA labeling standards require that, when describing a food product, ingredient
s are listed in descending order of content %. For example, take a look at some of the cheaper meal products at the store, like some of the On-Cor products. One example is “Gravy and Sliced Beef”, not “Sliced Beef and Gravy” because the greater percentage in the package is the gravy.
qball says
That is a very good point, and you made it without using descriptors like “clustermass of disgust” and “gruesome.” It’s this inflammatory language that immediatly turns me off to most food reporting.
Michael says
It sounds like Taco Bell uses what is traditionally called a panade–a mixture of bread and liquid–in its beef filling. And that is the smart thing to do when you cook ground beef and one does not want the beef to dry out. So before you get grossed out, realize that meatballs and meat loaf and many other ground beef products contain water and bread to ensure that the beef does not get dry.