鈥淧ink slime鈥� may be off the menu for many US school children after the US Department of Agriculture (USDA), which provides a fifth of school meals in the US through its , yielded to demanding the withdrawal of the meat product from the school menu.
However, the beef industry, the company that makes the product and campaigners against food contamination have fiercely defended the safety and value of the product, officially called 鈥渓ean finely textured beef鈥� (LFTB).
So what鈥檚 going on? What is 鈥減ink slime鈥�, and is it being unfairly demonised?
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What on earth is this stuff?
Essentially, it is beef recovered from slaughterhouse trimmings 鈥� the fatty off-cuts and slivers from cuts used for steak and roasts. Normally, these would be discarded or added to pet food, but 10 years ago, of Dakota Dunes, South Dakota, devised a way to separate the remaining meat from the fat and concentrate it into pellets.
How is 鈥減ink slime鈥� made?
First, they simmer the off-cuts to tenderise them, then separate the fat from the meat using a centrifuge. The separated meat is then sterilised using a small amount of ammonium hydroxide, compressed into pellets and frozen for delivery.
How is the product used?
LFTB is used in a wide range of beef and meat products, including beefburgers, hamburgers, chillis and sausages. McDonald鈥檚 and Burger King recently following the public outcry.
What is its nutritional value?
Rick Jochum, a company spokesman, told New 杏吧原创 that LFTB is 94 to 97 per cent lean beef, with similar nutritional value to 90 per cent lean ground beef, and besides being very high in protein and low in fat, contains iron, zinc and B vitamins.
So what prompted the campaign to get rid of it from school meals?
The trigger was an online petition launched in early March by freelance food blogger . This morning it had 235,970 signatures. In her blog, she cites safety concerns raised by microbiologists formerly employed by the USDA, and a story from 2009 in that exposed three incidents of Escherichia coli and 48 cases of Salmonella contamination, all of which were intercepted before the product reached customers.
What do the microbiologists have to say on the subject?
Former USDA microbiologist Gerald Zirnstein coined the term 鈥減ink slime鈥� in 2002 in an internal memo. He and fellow microbiologist Carl Custer both say they had misgivings about the product when it was being reviewed by the USDA in the early 2000s. Quoted recently on , their objections seem to concern whether consumers are being conned into buying products they think are pure beef, but which have been bulked up with LFTB.
How has the USDA responded to the petition?
The USDA appears to be capitulating to campaigners by offering schools a . 鈥淒ue to customer demand鈥�, it says schools will now be able to order products 鈥渆ither with or without LFTB鈥�. It also reaffirmed its earlier judgement that the product is safe to consume.
What is Beef Products Incorporated doing to counter the bad publicity?
Spokesman Rick Jochum rejected many of the charges, including claims that the product includes cow intestines and connective tissue such as tendons. 鈥淭his is absolutely not true,鈥� said Jochum. 鈥淚ntestines never enter our plant, and never enter the beef processing facility from which we purchase our trim,鈥� he says. 鈥淪imilarly, tendons are removed at our suppliers鈥� facilities.鈥�
The company has set up a web page challenging the . It points out, for example, that many media outlets reporting the controversy have used a picture of pink goo that is not actually LFTB. Also, it rejects allegations that the 鈥減uff of ammonia鈥� used to sterilise the product is dangerous, pointing out that it has been used to sterilise a wide range of food products since 1974 when it was approved for use by the US Food and Drug Administration.
Who else is backing the company?
The , as have several prominent figures within the industry.
Perhaps more significantly, Nancy Donley, founder of the campaign group STOP Foodborne Illness, whose own son died from E. coli beef food poisoning in 1993, has . 鈥淚 have personally visited their plant and the categorisation of calling their product 鈥榩ink slime鈥� is completely false and incendiary,鈥� says Donley.
鈥淐onsumers need to understand that this product is meat, period, and that the use of ammonia hydroxide in minute amounts during processing improves the safety of the product and is routinely used throughout the food industry,鈥� she adds.
