Posted on by

Why 20 McNuggets for $4.99 is Actually a Bad Deal For You

24 Replies

McDonald’s is aggressively pushing its Chicken McNuggets with a deal that prices each nugget at just one quarter.

Sound good?

What you need to know:

A serving is 4 McNuggets, according to McDonalds. So this deal is supposed  to feed 5 people. Yeah, right…

Each “serving” is 190 calories, 10 grams of protein, and 400 mg of sodium. There’s no fiber or any other nutrients worthy of mention. If you share the deal with one friend, you need to multiply the data by 2.5. You’ll be consuming 500 calories, and 1000 mg of sodium (over 40% of the daily max).

Here’s the ingredient list (over 30):

White boneless chicken, water, food starch-modified, salt, seasoning [yeast extract, salt, wheat starch, natural flavoring (botanical source), safflower oil, dextrose, citric acid], sodium phosphate, natural flavor (botanical source). Battered and breaded with: water, enriched flour (bleached wheat flour, niacin, reduced iron, thiamin mononitrate, riboflavin, folic acid), yellow corn flour, bleached wheat flour, food starch-modified, salt, leavening (baking soda, sodium acid pyrophosphate, sodium aluminum phosphate, monocalcium phosphate, calcium lactate), spices, wheat starch, dextrose, corn starch. Prepared in vegetable oil (Canola oil, corn oil, soybean oil, hydrogenated soybean oil with TBHQ and citric acid added to preserve freshness). Dimethylpolysiloxane added as an antifoaming agent.

What do you think?

Shouldn’t chicken nuggets be made from just 4 ingredients – chicken, bread crumbs, eggs, and frying oil?

Only if you made them at home. But McDonald’s over-processes the chicken meat to a point where what you are eating has nothing to do with the original meat.

So why is this a bad deal?

- Because the second ingredient is WATER! Water is cheap. So is the food starch, that when mixed with the water and added to the pulverized chicken bits creates a much bulkier product than just chicken.

- Because the product itself is made from the lowest quality ingredients, including controversial additives such as TBHQ and Dimethylpolysiloxane.

- Because most likely you’ll be tempted to add a coke and fries for another $5.

Get Fooducated: iPhone App RSS Subscription or Email Subscription

Follow us on twitter: twitter.com/fooducate on facebook: facebook.com/fooducate

Get Fooducated

Download APP

Subscribe

Follow

  • http://ginabegin.blogspot.com @ginabegin

    Just wrote a post on the movie “Fathead” this morning. (http://cot.ag/gw7C1Q) I can’t believe some of the statements they made & tried to send off as fact. It seems like propaganda from the Fast Food Industry… Thank you for furthering the correct cause!

  • http://twitter.com/lauren_015 Lauren Smith

    And, let’s be honest, chicken nuggets are ridiculously easy to make at home and way better for you, especially if you oven-fry them.

  • http://www.culturezest.org/home/users/detail?UserHexID=73427218-9BE9-4919-8842-F2D519B90147 Morgan

    The fact that there are so many ingredients in McDonald’s chicken nuggets is terrifying. It’s no wonder that they don’t taste like actual chicken. It would be so much better for people to make their own nuggets at home, they’re not that difficult to make.

  • Mirandarice

    Ewww….gross! And people wonder why I don’t eat fast food – “how do you resist it?” they ask…LOL!

  • http://www.thefrugaldietitian.com Nancy – The Frugal dietitian

    Sounds like the new Dominos chicken ads too!!
    http://www.dominos.com/pages/nutrition.jsp
    3 pieces: 150 calories, 6g of fat, 440mg of sodium, and 12g of protein. The sauces range from 50 to 200 calories per package.

  • http://www.thefrugaldietitian.com Nancy – The Frugal dietitian

    Sounds like the new Dominos chicken ads too!!
    http://www.dominos.com/pages/nutrition.jsp
    3 pieces: 150 calories, 6g of fat, 440mg of sodium, and 12g of protein. The sauces range from 50 to 200 calories per package.

  • Vividrose

    Not only is this “food” bad for your health, it supports the very inhumane treatment of living creatures who are being exploited and abused for the sake of our misdirected taste buds. I encourage everyone to do their own investigation into all of the damage done to our health, the animals and the environment through “factory farming”. We can surely do better than this as humans, and we can vote with our pocketbooks to demand healthier and more human alternatives.

    • Vividrose

      Sorry, “humane” alternatives.

    • Mark Dimson

      Get over yourself. :)

  • T Gariepy

    I’ve seen pictures of mechanically separated meat before it is your nugget kind of thing and man … I can’t believe I ever ate them, and yet at the same time … man i love the taste of them. its a thin thin line.

  • Lisa

    “Dimethylpolysiloxane added as an antifoaming agent.”

    Yeah, you know you’ve got a problem when you have to keep your food from FOAMING. Rabid chickens? ;)

  • http://www.cspiscam.com/background.cfm OriginalBuddha

    “- Because the second ingredient is WATER! Water is cheap. So is the food starch, that when mixed with the water and added to the pulverized chicken bits creates a much bulkier product than just chicken.”

    You’re splitting hairs here. If fresh chicken from your local market was required to put percentages of water / protein / fat etc on a label water would be pretty high up there.

  • Nick

    or because you can get just as many wendy’s spicy chicken nuggets, which are WAYYYY!!! better, for $4

  • Paranormalkitty

    I’ve made a lot of chicken in my day and never had a problem with it foaming … how is that even possible?

  • devilwymyn

    @ Mirandarice. people ask me the same thing & I say ‘How do you NOT resist it?”

    Just the thought of putting over processed food into my body makes my belly gurgle. You are only as healthy & happy as your colon after all. Since my son suffers from severe depression I changed our diet to organic, minimal amounts of meat & high doses of vitamins and no fast food or processed foods. I make what we eat and proud to say no Rx meds & he is doing splendid.

  • http://lookgoodfeelgreatalways.com Chong Su Lee

    Good to let mothers know what they are feeding their kids with!

  • zyzz

    Lettuce be reality for a second. Unless you never marinate your chicken, never use salt and pepper, and never buy it from a normal chain store, you’re never going to get “chicken” as an ingredient. Hell, there’s probably a handful of ingredients in ketchup alone. Who the hell cares. If you want pure chicken, go slaughter one and cook it on a stick over a fire. Better add stick particles to your list of ingredients, though.

    • 100% Human – Unprocessed

      Maybe you should put that as the epitaph on your gravestone.  Then the rest of us can use you as an example to educate our children why they should care about what’s in their food.

    • Perem

      You are a moron… And one of the reasons our food industry is in the state it’s in. Educate yourself, or
      not, I don’t care. Reading your comments make me feel better about myself.

  • http://www.facebook.com/WolverinesFan99 Beau McClelland

    McNuggets are awesome. I can eat 20 in one sitting and still not be full.

  • Chuck Brock

    and god love em

  • Ben Gray

    I enjoy mcnuggets… It is pretty self explanatory that when you step foot into mcdonalds you are going to be consuming absolute rubbish that is bad for your health… From the delights of sweetened drinks to processed “meat” and chemical filled bread. However on occasions I still enjoy going to eat this crap. Thank you fooducate for presenting this information! It is vital that foods remain clearly advertised and labelled and that everyone can make an informed decision on their lifestyles. At least then we only have ourselves to blame.

  • Alejo

    I think the “argument” that water is cheap is kind of void. That said, I was expecting to find financial reasons why it isn’t a great deal. Misleading title, good article, but not what I was looking for. As someone said before, it’s pretty well-known that fast food is not healthy, but I eat what I like to eat, who knows, maybe tomorrow I get hit by a bus and I never did what I like, in order to be healthy

    • rick

      or maybe in 10 years you’ll die of colon cancer because you ate processed shit every day of your life