In an ideal world, when you buy chicken labeled “100% Natural,” you’d expect it to be 100% natural chicken. However, about 30 percent of all fresh chickens sold in our supermarkets are pumped and plumped with as much as fifteen percent salt water; potential cancer-producing carrageenan, and other additives. This equates to consumers paying about $2 billion per year for salt water!
To add some extra zing to your wounded wallet, these chickens also contain about 800 percent more sodium per serving than expected.
That said, paying chicken prices for salt water and additives is yet another insult to hardworking, health conscious Americans. I recommend sticking with 100 percent organic, free-range chicken as your source of protein and forego the supermarket variety entirely.
Unfortunately, unscrupulous practices abound, and Rep. Dennis Cardoza (D-CA) and Rep. Charles Pickering (R-MS) had the good sense to hold a press conference to bring the issue into the limelight.
They’re launching a bipartisan congressional effort to make the USDA’s Food Safety Inspection Service (FSIS) see the light and change its policies on the use of “Natural” on food labels, to stop this type of rip-off through deception-by-omission.
TruthfulLabeling.org News Release May 22, 2007
CSPI May 22, 2007