Turkey burger with cheese please!

With all this great weather we've been having lately, I planned this cookout for a for people that I work with. I wen't shopping for supplys, you know the burger meat, buns, potatoe salad...stuff like that. Once I got to the meat section, I started remembering FFN and more specifically Schlosser's encounter with the slaughterhouse "In the high plains." I started picturing the gory process by which cattle is turned intothe proportional pattys were use to seeing at the supermarket. I then started reminising on all the "stuff" that was found in the meat in Ch. 9 of FFN. Needless to say, I made a mad dash for the turkey burgers. I know that FFN was talking about the meat that wen't into the fast food industry directly but I couldn't help but feel like the meat found in the supermarket has the same grousome history. When I brought the safe alternative (turkey pattys) back to the cookout I made sure not to tell anyone until after they tried the burger. Not only did no one complain about a differance in taste, no one even noticed. I couldn't keep my vigilant attempt of a healthier lunch go unnoticed. Before I told everyone I made sure to tell them about FFN and Schlosser's description of where the meat that McDonalds and other chain restaurants come from, they were relieved when I told them that the "Beef" bacon cheeseburgers that they just swallowed whole were actually made from ground turkey meat. Go Turkey burgers!!

Grand Finale

I just finished the final chapter of Fast Food Nation entitled "Global Realization/Have it your way." The chapter opens up with a discussion of Plaven Germany and it's history. This part of Germany was the first place outside of Bavaria to adhear to Nazi regime, until 1990 when it was the first town in East Germany to host a McDonald's restaurant. I think this depiction of Nazi Germany being a host to McDonalds, essentially comparing the two and if you think about the way in which both the Nazi movement lead by Adolf Hitler and McDonalds gained substantial amounts of global influence and rapidly after both were introduced. This comparison was captivating and in my opinion the best way to begin the end of this trechorously informative novel. This novel explores the many faces of the incredibly lucrative fast food industry, ultimatly holding the US responsible for its Global infectious spread. Beginning with fast food's founding fathers, Carl Karcher bought a single hot dog stand in California and expanded. This expansion is the key to the Fast Food industry's sucess,  like the mass production and distribution of the ingredients by which the food is put together on a makeshift assembly line. I was horrified at the way in which the large coorporations today treat their employees and even more horrified by the conditions of the Slaughterhouse examined in the High Planes in Chapter 8. My favorite chapter in the novel however was definatly Chapter 9: Whats in the Meat, because after reading it, I swore off fast food perminantly. 35 million pounds of ground beef being recalled by Hudson Foods because of an E Coli outbreak! Yuk.

I'll have a cheeseburger with a side order of E Coli please

I read Chapter 9 of F.F.N entitled, "Whats in the Meat." The chapter opens with the largest food recall in our Nation's history. In 1997, 35 million pounds of ground beef was recalled by Hudson Foods because of a horiffic strand of E-Coli which is a bacteria that often festers on raw meat. Unless processed correctly, meat is easily suseptable to being contaminated by the many bacteria's that exist. By the time the 35 million pounds was recalled from local shelves, it was estimated that 25 million pounds had already been bought and consumed by the public. This was so scary to read about because of how high the sales of meat in our nation is compared to the also high recorded cases of "meat borne illnesses." Schlosser also made an interesting connection between the mass production and distribution of meat has caused a terrifying increase in outbreaks and contamination because of the speed and amount that is mass produced and sent out to stores. Schlosser also explores the parrallels between a potential illness like E-Coli and the sexually transmited killer, "AIDS."  There are many strong similarities between the two very differant illnesses such as the rate at which both can spread through the public once exposed to a particular area. It was stated in chapter 9 that 200,000 people are sickened by a food borne disease every single day. These numbers mirror the incredibly high record of AIDS in our nation, especially between the late 1980's and 90's. I thought this chapter was incredibly informative about the risks involved with the meat industry, which is a crucial part of America's fast food restaurants. The idea that 200,000 people get sick from bad food processing every day in the US is insanly high and definatly causes me to shy away from the many fast food restaurants that litter our streets.