December 18, 2012

• The Mystery of McRib.

  
  The McRib is a product of “restructured meat technology.” Carumba, not sure I would eat anything that uses restructured meat technology but hey baloney and McNuggets have been a staple of my diet for years.

  Rene Arend, McDonald’s first executive chef and inventor of the Chicken McNugget, came up with the idea and design of the McRib, but it’s a professor from the University of Nebraska named Richard Mandigo who developed the “restructured meat product” that the McRib is actually made of.

  Neither of these folks will be appearing on Iron Chef any time soon.

  According to an article from Chicago magazine, which cites a 1995 article by Mandigo, “restructured meat product” contains a mixture of tripe, heart, and scalded stomach, which is then mixed with salt and water to extract proteins from the muscle. The proteins bind all the pork trimmings together so that it can be re-molded into any specific shape — in this case, a fake slab of ribs.

  • 12:46 pm
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