But what’s puzzlin’ you is the nature of my game.
I was deeply disappointed to see McDonalds among the list of restaurants for the Go Texan Restaurant Roundup this past week. It is in such poor taste on so many levels that I’ve chosen to boycott the event altogether.
In visiting the website, one can read that to qualify, establishments must be located in Texas and serve Texas products.
“The GO TEXAN Restaurant Round-Up is the perfect opportunity to celebrate the restaurant owners and chefs who care about serving the freshest local ingredients and who pride themselves on Texas quality,” Texas Agriculture Commissioner Todd Staples said.
While McDonald’s spends over $100M on Texas-produced beef annually, that beef is processed with animals raised in other states. One cannot point to a burger and say with authority that it was raised (in its CAFO), slaughtered, processed and transported all within Texas – and served in a Texas store. Traceability has long been a spectre over the fast food industry, and with this particular marketing initiative (Texas beef) the cows have come home to roost. My attempts to contact McD’s corporate for any sort of comment have been unanswered.
If, due to my inquiries, or this posting, I do receive an answer, I will still not be satisfied until I’ve personally been given a tour of the “Texas raised beef” system McD’s claims, from living cow-in-a-CAFO to burger. This, of course, will not be granted, because factory feed lots and processing facilities, under the guise of being “proprietary” and necessarily “sterile” are verboten to consumers’ eyes. The fact is, many of us have seen Fast Food Nation. It, combined with Food, Inc., FRESH and others forthcoming, has and will make a difference. You can’t let people in to see how the beef gets cooked; they might not want to eat it anymore.
I got no sympathy for the devil.
Now, let’s enjoy a little Rolling Stones!
