Day 88: Nutrition | What's the Big Deal About Pink Slime?

Nutrition and exercise go hand in hand, with that in mind here is some insight on food nutrition and the mass food production industry specifically the dreaded “Pink Slime”.

Recently I had a conversation with a friend of mine about the food industry and in particular Jamie Oliver and his quest to have “Pink Slime” removed from our food.  I work with companies in the food industry and have access to all sorts of information. For example chicken nuggets, even white meat chicken nuggets are in fact a minimum of 10% chicken skin.  We all eat fried chicken skin so why would this bother people?

Anyways, on to Oliver and his crusade against ammonia in our food supply. While it made a sensational news story there is nothing dangerous about “Pink Slime” and I think it is important to put ammonia consumption into context.  First ammonia is a naturally occurring substance that our own bodies use and produce.  It is found naturally in our digestive system and urine.  Second I think one must consider ammonia in a PPM (parts per million) aspect of our food.  Hamburgers that are mixed with ammonia treated filler come out to about 200 PPM.  Is that high, well let’s compare it to other foods where it is found naturally in abundance. 

Blue Cheese: 1376 PPM

Salami: 1112 PPM

Cheddar Cheese: 1104 PPM

American Cheese: 813 PPM

Mayonnaise: 411 PPM

Catsup: 352 PPM

Onions: 269 PPM

Potato Chips: 240 PPM

(This list is a lot longer than the few examples I have here I just picked some of the more common foods)

If you ate a Blue Cheese crumble hamburger with mayo, catsup, and onions with a side of potato chips you will digest close to 8 times the amount of ammonia from your condiments and side dishes than from your meat patty. Eat a salami sandwich with cheddar cheese and you will consume 11 times more ammonia than from a pink slime hamburger.   Most foods that have to ferment, like cheeses, contain extremely high concentration of ammonia as a byproduct of the natural production process.

Now why would Jamie Oliver leave out information like this?  Maybe it is because he simply hates fast food and want everyone to stop eating it or maybe because he is just ignorant to the facts about ammonia. 

Personally “Pink Slime” doesn’t bother me and I will continue to eat at McDonald’s when I get the craving for a quarter pounder with cheese and yes I want that fry supersized.  Same goes for Taco Bell where every once in a while I want a Nachos Bell Grande. In moderation there is nothing wrong with consuming greasy high calorie fast food.   

Daily Recap:

Matt: 35 Minute Weight Lifting (Heavy)

Kelly: 1 Hour Personal Trainer, 30 + Minutes Cardio