Mechanically separated meat

[gfish]

So, there is a picture floating around of a big pile of mechanically separated meat. And, yeah, it's kind of gross looking. But the fuss being raised around this image really kind of annoys me. First of all, aren't we a bit beyond equating visually unpleasant with morally questionable? It's the same tactic those hideous abortion protesters use with their giant posters. I suspect an appendectomy isn't very pretty either, but that doesn't make it a bad thing.

But also... am I the only person who already knew what mechanically separated meat was? It's not exactly a new invention. Everyone knows that chickens don't actually have nuggets, right?

Comments

[basal-surge.livejournal.com]

I call shenanigans, as I said when someone posted the same image on FB: Actually, that's more likely to be a mislabelled shot of an icecream extruder - because it looks an awful lot like the ones I've seen in the food chemistry field trips I did back in the nineties, and I've been heavily personally involved in cutting/slicing/dicing/mincing and grinding animal carcases on and off for twenty years, both as a hobby and in various interactions with freezing works via the farm, and that does not look like any processed meat colour and texture I've been involved in. Plus, my chemistry sense is tingling and that colour and texture being extruded screams hot icecream with a colour 110 or similar, just pre-freezing, not pulverised meat product (Icecream goes into cardboard for freezing, too; meat doesn't, or at least, not in the places where the workers bother to wear gloves...). The mechanically recovered meat industry is remarkably scary, but it doesn't look like that.

[gement.livejournal.com]

I was curious about those points, but didn't have enough background to speak up.

Mind you, if it did look like that, my only response is "Neat!" I like the commenter who pointed out how expensive eating the wacky parts of animals is at a sushi restaurant. (I do not appreciate sushi personally, but appreciate the stand against hypocrisy.)

[basal-surge.livejournal.com]

Snopes already has a partial disclaimer up, but it doesn't address the image; However, having spent more time than the average lurker inside both icecream factories and abbatoirs/meatworks, I'm fairly certain the image is from the former, not the latter.

[bopeepsheep.livejournal.com]

This. I worked at Mattessons (http://www.mattessons.co.uk/) during my college holidays, and did a stint on a chicken processing plant as well. Never saw anything that looked like that. MRM came out of a drum looking more like sawdust (this was 1990-ish, so I accept that practices have changed!), and it was never that colour.