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=Why the Fries Taste Good=

J. R. Simplot started the french fry business in America at the beginning of the 20th century. He got his start by killing wild horses in the desert, feeding the horse meat to his hogs, and then selling the hogs for $12.50 each. This provided him with the funds to lease 160 acres of land in Idaho and begin his french fry monopoly. Almost all of the french fries which fast food chains sell are flash frozen and come from manufacturers from across the county. The flavor of your favorite fry brand is actually a chemical created in a lab, not the result of fresh ingredients. The cooking oil also contributes to the flavor of the fries; most have switched to extremely unhealthy blends of corn and vegetable oil. These labs are responsible for mixing chemicals for all your favorite products, including gum, hamburgers, and shrimp. Creating flavors for major brand names has become a multi-million dollar industry. The smoky taste in barbeque sauce and hamburgers, and the signature taste of your favorite fries are manufactured in a lab which specialized in these flavor additives. At the factory, the process involved sorting potatoes by size, steaming them, cooling them with ammonia gas, and then sorting them into huge bags.

Additionally, the processing plants where fries come from are polluting the water systems surrounding it. These plants also only use about half of the potato, an extreme waste of resources. These emerging plants have also run many of the family-owned, rural farms out of business. The small family farmers are simply not able to compete with the enormous crop that major companies can produce through heavy use of pesticides and chemicals. The rural farmers use to grow hundreds of varieties of potatoes, but today the large company farms grow only the kind of potato which is suitable to make french fries from. With respect to flavor, chains were forced to get away from the pure beef tallow they used in the 80's. They made the switch to pure vegetable oil, but continue to use a percentage of beef tallow in order to maintain the integrity of the brand flavor. In order to keep the oil fresh for longer, chains have begun to hydrogenate it. This raises the trans fat found in fries, which is known to raise 'bad' cholesterol and lower 'good' cholesterol.

http://www.mcspotlight.org/media/press/potatoes.html

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=7031384

Opposing View: Fast food chains have justified their take over of rural farms by contending that they have offered jobs to those farmers in their factories. They also argue that their potato processing plants have provided jobs in regions where the unemployment would otherwise have been enormous. The major chains claim to have cleaned up their operations in response to complaints of pollution. In response to the poor nutritional content of french fries, the chains can argue that their nutritional statistics are readily available and it is therefore the responsibility of the consumer to use judgement and restraint in their consumption of fast food. They can also argue that the only way to maintain the quality of french fry that their patrons have come to love is to use the unhealthy frying oils. Changing the oil will alter the taste of their product and would probably result in a lose of significant profits. As long as there healthier options available, how can the government dictate a required nutritional value for fast food products?

http://planetgreen.discovery.com/food-health/fast-food-fries-oil.html