Here's a followup to my earlier post about McDonald's fries. In 2013 Food Babe posted the ingredients for McDonald's fries in the US and in the UK.
The US fries have 14 ingredients, while the UK fries are restricted to potatoes, two kinds of oil, and (sometimes) dextrose. Notably absent from the UK fries is methylpolysiloxane, a commonly used anti-foaming agent that's also an ingredient used to make Silly Putty.
When I compared the ingredient list of McDonald’s french fries in the US vs. the UK version, I was floored to witness the drastic differences. Europeans do not use dimethylpolysiloxane. Look closely at the ingredients in McDonald’s french fries [above]. Do you see how the french fries in the U.K. version are basically just potatoes, vegetable oil, a little sugar and salt? How can McDonald’s make french fries with such an uncomplicated list of ingredients all over Europe, but not over here? Why do McDonald’s french fries in the U.S. have to have an “anti-foaming” agent? Do the brits like extra foam? No, they don’t, Europe actually regulates this ingredient because they know this man-made chemical was never intended to be consumed by humans. This whole time McDonalds has known about this and chooses to continue to serve it’s US citizens silly putty.
Personally, I'm more concerned about the hydrolyzed wheat and hydrolyzed milk in the US fries than I am about methylpolysiloxane, because I avoid excitotoxins when possible.
UPDATE: As far as I can tell the ingredients list posted by Food Babe is correct. Here is a link to the UK McDonald's page for its fries. Many kind readers have commented that Food Babe is not generally to be trusted with food science, however.
