Jack Morgan
Harper
English 10
11/5/14

Summary of Chapters 5-8

In the novel, "Fast Food Nation," Eric Schlossen takes a look at the step by step process that goes into the making of a fast food meal.  All of the items that you find on the menus at fast food places, such as french fries, hamburgurs, and chicken entrees, are produced as cheeply and efficiently as possible in order to obtain maximum profit.  Not only is maximum profit one of the main goals for fast food companies, but maximum flavor is as well.  The author highlights how the use of natural flavor in the ingrediants of fast food items is designed so every single product will always taste the same every time it is ordered.  Even the french fries, fried strips of potatoes, have natural flavor added to them.  What seems like a relatively healthy, tasty compliment to your meal is actually riddled with chemicals that make the consumer crave the next bite.  The chickens that are used to make chicken items at fast food resturaunts are also modified to satisfy the consumer.  The chickens used in the making of Mcdonal's famous mcnuggets are genetically modified so they have bigger breasts.  The mcnuggets also do not come from the breast meat of a single chicken, as it is simply chunks of brest meat from different chickens clumped together.  Eric Schossen also mentions how meat used in a fast food hamburger has to go through dirty, chemical filled slaughterhouses before it is edible.  Similar to the chicken mcnuggets, a fast food hamburgur does not contain meat from a single cow, but up to 100 cows.  The author also notes how these slaughterhouses where the meat is produced are among the most dangerous places to work in America.

Slaughterhouses like this one are among some of the most dangerous places to work in the United States.  The injury rate at slaughterhouses is 3 times higher than the rate at a normal factory.  Roughly 40,000 men and women suffer a work related injury each year.