Popular for its tasty sandwiches, Subway's chicken is one of the fasfood's highlights. However, an unsettling study led by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) uncovered information about what's actually in the sandwich. Researchers test samples of chicken from different fast food chains, including Subway, and consumers may find the results hard to swallow.
CBC tested the chicken at five major fast-food restaurants. Teaming up with researchers at Trent University's Wildlife Forensic DNA Laboratory, they find the results harrowing. Included in the experiment were six crowd-favorite sandwiches: McDonald's Country Chicken (grilled), Wendy's Grilled Chicken Sandwich, A&W's Chicken Grill Deluxe, Tim Hortons' Chipotle Chicken Grilled Wrap, Subway's Oven Roasted Chicken Sandwich and Subway Sweet Onion Chicken Teriyaki (chicken strips).
The study found that Subway's oven roasted chicken only contained about 53.6 percent chicken DNA, while sweet onion chicken teriyaki strips had just 42.8 percent. Subway's results were apparently so shocking that the team tested them again. They performed another biopsy on five new oven roasted chicken pieces, and five new orders of chicken strips, but they still came up with similar results, the AOL reports.
In comparison, other fast food chicken came back between 85 to 90 percent chicken DNA. So what's in those chicken that makes it less chicken? According to the CBC, the chicken samples were chock full of soy fillers, which have about a quarter less protein than consumers would get in a home-cooked equivalent, and they also have higher sodium levels of "restructured" meat, which is found to be between seven and 10 times more in a piece of unadulterated chicken.
According to the Market Watch, fast food stores such as Subway, often times restructure their chicken, in which smaller pieces of meat are bound together with other ingredients to make them last longer and taste better. Also they do this to "add value", which helps the restaurant make more money off less quality meat. While this gives benefits to the restaurant industry, consumers get less protein and less meat quality.
