An alarming new report claims that the meat Subway serves isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.
An astonishing report from the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation claims that DNA testing shows that chicken meat served at Subway restaurants may only contain about 50 percent of chicken DNA. CBC sent researchers from Trent University’s Wildlife Forensic DNA Laboratory samples of chicken from several fast food chains, including McDonald’s and Wendy’s along with Subway.
Obviously, chicken from a supermarket should have 100 percent chicken DNA, but that number can drop if it is heavily seasoned or prepared. However, most of the restaurants scored reasonably high, around 85 to 90 percent chicken DNA. Subway was the big glaring exception.
“Subway’s results were such an outlier that the team decided to test them again, biopsying five new oven roasted chicken pieces, and five new orders of chicken strips,” CBC News stated.
Over roasted chicken had only 53.6 percent chicken DNA, but it gets worse: the Sweet Onion Chicken Teriyaki chicken strips had just 42.8 percent chicken DNA.
So what’s the deal? CBC claims that Subway appears to be using soy as a filler, although Subway Canada issued a statement saying they couldn’t “confirm the veracity” of the lab testing.
“However, we are concerned by the alleged findings you cite with respect to the proportion of soy content,” the CBC quoted Subway as stating. “Our chicken strips and oven roasted chicken contain 1% or less of soy protein. We use this ingredient in these products as a means to help stabilize the texture and moisture.”
“All of our chicken items are made from 100% white meat chicken which is marinated, oven roasted and grilled. We tested our chicken products recently for nutritional and quality attributes and found it met our food quality standards,” the statement continues. “We will look into this again with our supplier to ensure that the chicken is meeting the high standard we set for all of our menu items and ingredients.”
Wanda B. Hewlett
Wanda B. Hewlett (Contributor) is a freelance writer from the UK. When she’s not busy writing she loves to spend her time traveling, exploring and running.