The Truth About Fast Food Restaurants
4 Myths About Fast Food Safety and Cleanliness
Rumors and myths have plagued the fast food industry for decades, and some have even become long-lasting urban legends. You might have heard these myths in the past, read newspaper articles about them, and even received emails with this information. So let's dissect some of those fast food myths, one at a time.
1. Kentucky Fried Chicken changed its name to KFC because they have replaced using chickens with a genetically created food-animal that has no beak, feet or feathers and is fed through a tube until it reaches the proper size.
Not true. The company says it shortened the name to place less emphasis on the word "fried," because it was believed that mentioning fried food would be unappealing to many people today. The company has recently begun to refer to itself again by the full name, perhaps because of the urban legend.
2. Snapple is owned by Osama Bin Laden.
In the months after Sept. 11, a rumor spread quickly by word and through the Internet that Snapple, the beverage-maker, is owned by Osama Bin Laden. It might sound ludicrous, but Snapple took it seriously enough to issue a stern denial. CEO Michael Weinstein said that "Snapple has never had -- and does not now -- have any direct or indirect relationship of any kind whatsoever with Osama bin Laden or any other terrorist group or supporter."
The myth might have found its source when Snapple terminated a relationship it had with a Saudi Arabian food distributorship by a company "that had an investment from The Saudi Binladin Group." In truth, the Binladin Group is one of the many corporate entities owned or participated in by any number of Osama bin Laden's relatives, many of whom spell their surnames as Binladin.
But it is generally believed that these relatives of the notorious terrorist have no other link to him other than blood ties.
3. McDonald's shakes are made from reconstituted animal fat
This is a myth and nothing more. Circulating for decades, the story was that the liquid poured into the milkshake machine was reconstituted fat from pigs or chickens. But fast food restaurants like McDonald's are required by law to make the full nutritional information of their products available to consumers.
Here is what constitutes a McDonald's shake: Whole milk, sucrose, cream, nonfat milk solids, corn syrup solids, mono and diglycerides, guar gum, vanilla flavor, carrageenan, cellulose gum, vitamin A palmitate.
4. Fast food causes obesity.
Yes and no. The people who choose to eat fast food are responsible for their own health, but the burgeoning fast-food industry and its tendency to serve up fatty foods at low prices is also clearly at fault. Research published by the medical journal The Lancet concluded that people who eat fast food frequently are more likely to gain weight and develop insulin resistance, and such eating habits may increase the risk of obesity and type 2 diabetes.
According to the report, about 30 percent of Americans are overweight or obese, compared to only 23 percent during the period 1988 to 1994. The numbers of overweight children and adolescents rose by 50 percent in the past decade, and obesity is responsible for 300,000 deaths and $100 billion in annual health-care costs, according to the researchers.
