Sickening, isn't it? Fortunately, my butcher-department in this small market still gets their beef in chunks (don't know what they call it) and then cuts the cuts and grinds the meat. I never buy the low end hamburger, get the extra lean or, if available, the Humboldt grass fed, it comes from the neighboring county. costs more, so maybe I cut the amount I eat, but I do eat better.

We don't eat much meat any more, mostly chicken if any. Have not been to Mcd's for at least 20 years.

I agree; it's totally disgusting! We don't eat much hamburger, anyway, but now I hesitate to buy it at all.

George, your plan of grinding your own sounds like the safest way to know what you're getting. I doubt the stores would tell me the truth about whether their hamburger contained it, anyway.

Don, we eat a lot of chicken, too. When I buy the parts, at least it's pretty clear what they once were! :>)

Yuk, just one more bad thing about ground beef.

Some years ago I got disgusted with all the bad reports about store bought ground beef, so I bought a meat grinder and grind all my own beef. I buy roasts when they are on sale, grind them up and freeze the meat.

Don, we still go to Mcd's a couple of times a year. DH likes the quarter pounder with cheese and I like the BigMac with medium fries. Yum.
We figure that we are sooo good the rest of the year, that we can afford the extra fat/calories.
On the other hand, Mcd's has tried to go "healthy" on us and removed the good tasting, but bad for us fats. It's not the same as it used to be.

I've been noticing for a while (more than a year) that the ground beef I cook is way "leaner" than it should be, and what did cook out was water, not fat. I've also noticed the taste had turned pretty bland.

After all the "pink slime" stories I hauled myself over to the more expensive grocery story to see what they had. I didn't see any "organic" or other type labels on it (one of the ways to distinguish them), but just picked up a package to try it, and a package of their preformed patties which were on clearance.

Interestingly enough, I didn't see any difference in the packaged hamburger, but the preformed burgers tasted heavenly. I hadn't tasted beef that good in a long, long time. And there was FAT in the pan.

I'm going to try Whole Foods next. They flat out said they didn't use the PS stuff.

Lisa

Laughing......because this is just the tip of the iceberg. Look up wood pulp in foods. I'm not demonising any of the products as unsafe or unhealthy... but I think it's doing the public a disservice when the agencies who allow producers to sell a finished product don't require these sorts of additives to be labeled as such so the consumer can make the choice if they want to eat them or not. Perhaps they are 'safe', but they do take the place of more expensive products the consumer actually believes they are buying and it's all about profit. You expect to get additives in highly processed food, but you don't expect it in something as basic as a pound of ground meat.

Interestingly enough I heard on the news that one or more of the plants that produce this concoction have been closed down. While the loss of jobs is unfortunate, I have to say that I am glad our schools are not serving this to our children. I know that locally, when the news about pink slime came out, the outcry was such that most schools cancelled their orders and switched to regular hamburger. I certainly hope my local grocery does not carry it. They have publicly claimed not to, but, you never can tell. I'm seriously thinking of getting my grinder back from my ds and grinding my own hb.