What Cut Of Meat Is McDonald's McRib Made From?
For fans of the iconic fast food sandwich, the McRib and its many limited-time-only returns to the McDonald's menu can be important. But when you're holding that unusually small rack of ribs in your hand, with bone-like shapes that are not bones, it raises the question: What kind of meat is this, exactly?
All McRib sandwiches use ground boneless pork shoulder. Pork shoulder is an inexpensive cut of meat that's a great choice for barbecue. This makes it perfect for the flavor profile that McDonald's is going for and for the business realities of buying enough meat to fuel another McRib comeback.
The McRib patty isn't 100% pork shoulder, though. The ground meat is mixed with water, spices, dextrose sugar, preservatives, and a bit of rosemary extract in an emulsion that improves flavor and texture. The patty also contains a touch of liquid smoke, lending the fast-food sandwich a hint of smoky barbecue flavor.
Where did that rib-shaped pork patty come from?
The pork patty's components are relatively straightforward, but the entire McRib has a whopping 70 ingredients, suggesting a highly-processed sandwich. Most of these ingredients are in the bread and sauce, but the patty is also heavily processed — a triumph of military engineering.
In the 1960s, U.S. military researchers discovered a way to bind small pieces of meat together, known as reconstituting meat. This opened the door for new, shaped meat products made of animal remnants that might have previously been considered waste. McDonald's later adopted this technology — not first for the McRib, but for chicken McNuggets.
This new chicken snack in fun shapes proved more popular than expected, and the company couldn't keep up with demand. McDonald's created the now-iconic McRib to alleviate McNugget market pressure with a different reconstituted meat product. Although modern McNuggets are made from all white meat chicken, the elusive McRib still uses reconstituted pork.