I’m not eating fast food since years now and don’t want to defend their business, but I always thought that the fast food you get at a huge chain like McDonalds is probably the most thoroughly tested you can buy.
McDonalds is definitely superior to some of their peers, but I would be surprised if their actions in the US were as good as their actions in Europe. From what I've read, Western European countries have superior standards when it comes to food production.
You know, I don't believe most of the urban legends about McDonalds, and there are things they do that I can even respect (for instance, their contribution to french fry science [really], or their [very, very, very, very] gradual adoption of humane farming guidelines.)
But make no mistake that McDonalds is a business that is, if not as harmful as Philip Morris, gradable on the same scale. For the most part it's a company whose core business model is "leverage unfathomably vast marketing resources to coerce large numbers of people into making the least healthful dietary choice available to them at any given moment".
Let nobody suggest that I am a foe of the french fry or the well-constructed burger, but there's a difference between an occasional indulgence --- or even between the ambient availability of that indulgence and any group of people's poor decision making [oh, hi, me!] --- and the business model that depends utterly on persuading the most persuadable people to harm themselves, for no other reason that they were persuadable.
And so it's in that light that I think cynicism towards new "honest" attempts at persuading people is fair game.
I'm not snobby enough to never go to McDonald's (a McMuffin aint too bad in the morning after a long night out) but I agree that most of the menu, specifically the burgers, taste artificial. I joke that their burgers don't taste like meat, they simply taste like "McDonald's" as if it's its own patented flavor. Anyway, if only because of their size alone (35k stores) McDonald's can't materially improve better food any more than Sears can compete with Amazon or IBM can become a cloud company.
To start off: Using McDonalds' facts sheet as data regarding the content of their products is not really a valiable source of information, as this is heavily biased towards their product (ref. http://news.yale.edu/2010/11/08/fast-food-restaurants-dish-u...).
Let's recognize the fact that McDonald's food actually tastes good to a large portion of the population, for better or worse. To do otherwise is, IMO, harmful to the discussion of improving what we eat as a society.
Accusing McDonalds of Intense Animal Farming could be a bit overhasty. In Germany they clearly state being different, here is a report from 2014, check page 5, 'Best Beef' (English):
McDonald's has been a leader in "Corporate Social Responsibility" since that court case forced them to rebut (or attempt to rebut) every single claim made in that pamphlet.
If you compare it with its competitors on many issues McDonalds is rarely the worst, for instance, portion sizes at other restaurants like Applebees are much more "supersized". McDonalds did keep with styrofoam packaging long after most competitors had gone to "wax" papers but now we know those are loaded with dangerous PFAS.
Not to defend McDonalds but their prominence does mean people are very aware of the issues they have and thus they feel a lot of need for PR.
My RSS reader YOShInOn keeps statistics on what things the HN community finds interesting and one that surprises me a little is that it seems I can never get an upvote on anything about advanced plastic recycling technology such as chemical recycling to the monomer, making alloys of two plastics, biobased plastics, etc.
Do you really know though? McDonalds has lied in the past quite a bit. For example, they touted their hamburger meat as 100% beef with no additives for quite awhile, then had to fess up when the truth about Pink Slime came out.
Then when they tried to climb on the vegan/vegetarian bandwagon, they had to quickly admit that their fry shortening had beef flavoring added to it, then switch to an entirely different shortening.
Except the comment you replied to wasn't a criticism of McD's.
He's pointing out a very important fact: McDonalds is not that tasty. What I make without these recipes using incredibly simple methods (as described above) tastes better. Frankly, these are elaborate instructions on how to make disgusting food.
Some people must think they taste "good enough", given their popularity. Convenience and price obviously play big roles here, but they are also likely choosing McDonalds over other options on at least some basis of taste.
> But make no mistake that McDonalds is a business that is, if not as harmful as Philip Morris, gradable on the same scale. For the most part it's a company whose core business model is "leverage unfathomably vast marketing resources to coerce large numbers of people into making the least healthful dietary choice available to them at any given moment".
In Australia, they actually [no doubt due to social pressures] a large range of "healthy options" that are actually half-decent. I'm not sure whether they offer this stuff in the US, but compared to the numerous fried chicken, roast chicken and Burger King restaurants here, they are leagues ahead.
Note that I'm not defending their past behaviour-which I think we can agree was abysmal-but they have at least tried to reform and for a business of their size and brand, is no easy feat.
This is McDonald's we're talking about. They are very much more concerned with mad science than taste. They're concerned with keeping costs low and their food easy to transport, store and cook (or reheat).
[1] http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2014/10/23/358324106/don...
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