Then I am happy to say I am happy for their recent changes, this certainly wasn’t the case a few years ago when I wrote them off, and even more not the case 10 years ago when I was still in the industry. I think it should be promoted as an example that consumer pressure and expectations can cause companies to change for the better.
I will say I remain skeptical on exactly how they can go from the ammonia wash + chemical food flavoring process to using fresh beef and not have any discernible difference in taste or food safety, but kudos to them.
I'm not saying you shouldn't write them off. McDonalds fries are solid, but everything else there is terrible. And fast food is in general bad, and I don't want to be coming off like I'm saying that people should eat more of it.
The ammonia (when it was present) was present in such small amounts that it couldn't conceivably have altered the flavor, and they were never using "chemical food flavoring." The only change they've made recently is using fresh instead of frozen for a few products. It has always been just beef.
Only the quarter pounder is fresh beef. The rest is frozen. If you look at places that review fast food, they unanimously applauded the fresh beef quarter pounder - they did have a discernible difference in quality.
The ammonia is a bad scene, but the idea of using TG to repurpose "trimmings" isn't something we should be demonizing; if you're going to kill animals to feed people, you should be maximizing the yield (of muscle protein, that is). This is just an extension of the idea that if you're going to eat pork chops, you shouldn't be grossed out by the idea of eating offal; however ecologically irresponsible it is to eat meat at all, it must be more irresponsible to waste it because it squicks you out to eat anything but a loin chop.
(TG'd meat was a faddish fine dining trend a few years back, and it's pretty neat; for instance, you can make a solid, ribeye-like slab of skirt steak by "gluing" layers of skirt together, which is pretty delicious. It's also a technique that's been used in sausagemaking for a long time.)
I will say I remain skeptical on exactly how they can go from the ammonia wash + chemical food flavoring process to using fresh beef and not have any discernible difference in taste or food safety, but kudos to them.