Recently, the reporter went undercover to McDonald's Zhengzhou Excellence Agricultural Federation Restaurant and McDonald's Jinan University Restaurant, and found that both restaurants had problems such as tampering with food shelf life labels, using expired ingredients, selling food after the expiration date, and cutting corners. McDonald's Zhengzhou Excellent Agricultural Union Restaurant, there is also a situation where the quality of fried oil exceeds the standard.
The business philosophy of "quality, service, cleanliness and value for money" is known as the key to McDonald's success.
Since entering the Chinese market in 1990, McDonald's has adhered to this concept and has been sought after for providing customers with delicious, safe and high-quality food, and has rapidly developed into a giant brand in the domestic restaurant chain industry. By the end of 2023, McDonald's had 5,903 stores in China. According to McDonald's official disclosure, McDonald's China is moving towards the goal of exceeding 10,000 restaurants by 2028.
However, as it progresses, problems occur frequently. On April 27, McDonald's appeared on the hot search because of insulting customers who applied for refunds, causing netizens to question McDonald's "service".
The reporter's investigation found that in addition to frequent complaints from customers due to "service" problems, McDonald's puts the quality in the first place and claims to "strive for the best", which will also be discounted.
"Why don't you follow the standards?" In the face of inquiries, some employees retorted "don't ask too much", and the restaurant manager also acquiesced to the occurrence of such frequent suspected violations and violations.
Expired ingredients are labeled to "continue life"
Frozen bread is a must-have for burgers at McDonald's restaurants, and after such bread is delivered to the restaurant, it is usually thawed in advance. In McDonald's kitchens, after employees take out frozen bread from the freezer, they must label them with a time slip indicating the thawing time, availability time and expiration time, and after the ingredients expire, they must be discarded.
At 10:40 p.m. on March 6, in the back kitchen of McDonald's Zhengzhou Excellence Agricultural Union Restaurant, the bread used to make McSpicy Chicken Leg Burger had expired. The reporter reported this situation to an old employee in the back kitchen, but the employee did not ask the reporter to discard the bread, but warned: "Don't squeak, you just make orders, don't worry about the time bar." ”
Subsequently, the employee used scissors to cut out the time bar on the bread bag and re-posted a new time slip, which was extended from 10 p.m. on March 6 to 2 p.m. on March 7.
That evening, the time bar showed that some of the bread used to make the ban-roasted chicken thigh burger had also expired. At 11 o'clock at night, when a night shift employee checked the bread on the bread shelf, he directly tore off the original time slip and replaced it with a new sign. The reporter compared the two time slips before and after and found that the time slip that originally recorded the expiration of bread at 10 p.m. on the 6th was also postponed by one day and changed to expire at 10 p.m. on the 7th.
McDonald's Zhengzhou Excellent Agricultural Union Restaurant is located at the intersection of Jinshui East Road and Xinyi Road in Zhengzhou City, surrounded by shopping malls and many office buildings. Photo by the Beijing News Investigation Team
The time bar seems to be a taboo that new employees can't touch.
When the reporter checked the time bars of different types of bread, he was also warned by the night shift employee: "Young man, this is not your business, don't worry about it." ”
On March 8, two veteran employees of Zhengzhou Excellent Agricultural Union Restaurant discussed the issue of bread storage. Afterwards, one of the employees explained to reporters that according to the requirements, when making burgers, it is necessary to use the bread closest to the expiration time first. However, they found that the bread placed on the lower layer of the bread rack for spare time was closer to the expiration time than the upper layer of bread that needed to be used in time. The employee said.
Like bread, McDonald's meat ingredients require employees to label when they will be thawed, used and expired.
At 3 p.m. on March 9, when the reporter was preparing ingredients for the back kitchen, he found that the roasted chicken thighs placed on the shelves in the thawing area had expired at 2 p.m. that day. When a veteran employee in the back kitchen learned about it, he said, "The meat is just right." After reading the time slip, the manager on duty did not ask the person responsible for signing the time slip, nor did he ask the reporter to take the ingredients within the shelf life first, leaving a sentence of "you take it first" (take it to the kitchen), and turned to leave.
On March 10, in the thawing area, 8 bags of grilled chicken thighs that expired at 10 p.m. that night were renewed to extend the shelf life by 16 hours, and the new time bar showed that the expiration time of these chicken thighs was changed to 2 p.m. on the 11th.
On March 10, in the thawing area of McDonald's Zhengzhou Excellent Agricultural Union Restaurant, the roasted chicken thigh meat was supposed to expire at 10 o'clock that night, but after the expiration, the employee changed the expiration time to 14 o'clock on the 11th. Photo by the Beijing News Investigation Team
Falsification of expiration dates is not limited to this McDonald's restaurant, but also to another restaurant where reporters are undercover.
McDonald's Ji Restaurant, located in the main campus of Jinan University in the central district of Jinan City, is adjacent to the school canteen, and the customer groups are almost all college students. The situation of changing the label of expired ingredients to "continue life" also happens in this restaurant, and the manager on duty is even directly involved.
On the evening of April 5, the reporter found that there were two bags of roasted chicken thighs that expired that night and needed to be discarded, but the manager on duty at the restaurant asked the reporter to modify the expiration time on the grounds that the time bar was wrong, "If it expires at 9 pm on the 5th, change it to 2 pm on the 6th." ”
The next day, the time bar showed that a bag of chicken breast and a bag of lute legs were due that night, and at 9 o'clock in the evening, the reporter saw that the manager on duty had started to move himself: he saw him take out the old time slip and throw it away, and then rewrite two new time slips and put them in.
The reporter compared the two time bars before and after and found that the expiration time was changed from 10 pm on the 6th to 10 pm on the 7th. During the undercover investigation, the reporter found that under the drive of the manager on duty, other kitchen employees are also up and down, as long as they encounter the expiration of ingredients, they will almost choose to tamper with the expiration time, rather than discarding the ingredients.
Internal quality standards are only implemented at the time of inspection
Quality ranks first in McDonald's business philosophy.
According to the official website, McDonald's restaurants have world-renowned quality standards, and this concept runs through every link from the field to the table, striving to achieve the ultimate so that every customer can enjoy safe and delicious food. In order to ensure that customers eat high-quality food and get the best taste, McDonald's has set the standard of "second shelf life" of ingredients, and all foods that have passed the shelf life are prohibited from being sold to customers.
However, during the reporter's undercover investigation, it was found that these standards were greatly discounted in the process of implementing the restaurant. "Standards are just standards." An employee of the McDonald's Excellent Agricultural Union Restaurant, located in Zhengdong New District, Zhengzhou City, said.
At 4 p.m. on March 9, it was past the peak hour of dining, and in the back kitchen of McDonald's Excellent Agricultural Association, there were still three fried pipa legs that had not yet been sold. According to the regulations, the lute leg needs to be put into the holding cabinet after frying, and the countdown function is turned on, and if it is not sold within 20 minutes, it needs to be discarded.
However, the reporter noticed that these lute legs were not sold until 5 p.m., during which no staff discarded them, and it was not until the dinner rush hour that these afternoon fried lute legs were sold to customers one after another.
During the 9 days that the reporter was undercover in the store, the insulated cabinet was used every day, but the timekeeping function was never turned on once. "It is only opened when there is a leader to check, and we don't open it every day, and the sound of 'Dididi' after the time is annoying." An employee of the Excellence Agricultural Union Restaurant said.
If the chronograph reminder is not turned on, no one will stare at the clock to determine whether the food has passed the "second shelf life" period, and this will also lead to the frequent occurrence of "beyond the shelf life" of food being sold.
The same situation exists in the McDonald's Jinan University restaurant. The reporter observed that only during the day, some employees of the store will use the timekeeping function of the warming cabinet, but even if the food is due, it will not be discarded. "When someone comes to check, whether it's one plate left, or one or two, when the time comes, it will be discarded, and if it doesn't fall, it will be violated, and if no one checks it, it won't have to be dumped." An employee reminded.
Although McDonald's claims that the burgers are freshly made, during peak meal hours, employees will make hamburgers in advance to improve the speed of delivery, and sometimes misestimate the sales volume, which will cause the prepared burgers to be sold for a long time.
On April 5, a burger made at noon was left for too long in the afternoon, and the surface had dried out, and when someone ordered, the manager on duty instructed the staff to repackage the burger, which had no taste at all, and then sold it to customers. ”
On April 5, at McDonald's Jinan University Cafeteria, employees repackaged overdue burgers. Photo by the Beijing News Investigation Team
A veteran employee of McDonald's Zhengzhou Excellent Agricultural Federation Restaurant told reporters that the reason why the finished food should be invalidated after the expiration date is because the temperature of the incubator is high, and the food will become "dry and hard" after being stored for a period of time, which will affect the taste.
In addition, McDonald's also stipulates the time of use of lettuce, custard, tomato and other ingredients, equips it with dials for timekeeping, and clearly stipulates the frequency of washing hands and changing rags for kitchen staff. However, during the investigation, the staff of the Excellence Agricultural Union Restaurant had never used the chronograph dial, and they were indifferent when the set clock reminded them to wash their hands and change their rags. ”
In the McDonald's Jinan University cafeteria, the same is true, the chronograph dial has become an ornament, and as for regular hand washing and changing rags, employees will only seriously implement it when they encounter inspections.
The frying oil is used to exceed the standard, and the amount of hamburger ingredients is reduced
The quality of the frying oil determines the taste and safety of the food. It is well known that cooking oil can produce harmful substances when used to fry food repeatedly. The National Food Safety Standard for Vegetable Oils clearly stipulates that if the polar component value of edible oil exceeds 27, it can no longer be used.
Zhu Yi, an associate professor at the College of Food Science and Nutritional Engineering of China Agricultural University, said in an interview with reporters that edible oil will produce hundreds or even thousands of oxidizing substances in the process of repeated frying, some of which are harmful to the human body, and the polar components are numerical reflections of the degree of oxidation and deterioration of frying oil.
McDonald's, which has fried most of its dishes, has stricter requirements for this value. McDonald's training courses for employees mentioned that before filtering oil every day, the staff needs to test the frying oil, and if the polar component value exceeds 24, the frying oil must be replaced.
The frying area in the back kitchen of McDonald's Zhengzhou Excellence Agricultural Federation Restaurant is divided into 6 oil tanks to fry different types of ingredients. No. 1 and No. 2 oil tanks need to fry five kinds of ingredients, such as chicken wings, chicken strips, large chicken cutlets, spicy chicken thigh steaks, and chicken balls, which are used more frequently, and because of the large amount of frying, the oil deteriorates quickly.
The reporter noticed that the oil in the No. 1 and No. 2 oil tanks was replaced on the evening of March 7, and by the evening of the 9th, it had become inky, and even after filtration, there was still no intuitive change. The duty manager did not ask for a replacement after checking the polar component values.
"This oil is already blackened, don't you need to change it?" Hearing the reporter's doubts, another employee said that it may be because no one checked on Saturdays and Sundays, so he used it first.
On March 9, in the fried area of McDonald's Zhengzhou Excellent Agricultural Union Restaurant, the oil in the oil tank on the left side was still inky after filtration. The results of the test show that the polar component values have exceeded their specified values. Photo by the Beijing News Investigation Team
On the evening of March 9, the reporter took a sample from the No. 1 oil tank and sent it to a company with edible oil testing qualifications in Guangzhou for testing, and the results showed that the polar component value of the sample was 26.6.
The oil in this tank has exceeded the replacement standard stipulated by McDonald's, and only 0.4 is short of exceeding the national standard waste standard, but it is still used until the evening of the 10th.
In addition to the problem of oil, the reporter also found in the investigation of McDonald's Zhengzhou and Jinan stores that in order to save costs, the two stores cut corners when making hamburgers.
Scrambled egg burgers are a type of burger served in McDonald's for breakfast. By standard, the product consists of two freshly scrubbed eggs and served with bacon, pork tenderloin and custard. At the peak of breakfast, employees scramble 8 eggs at the same time, cut them into 4 portions and add them to the burger. However, when the employees of the Zhengzhou Excellent Agricultural Federation Restaurant teach reporters to scramble eggs, they often ask for only 7 eggs to be scrambled. "I can't tell if it's cooked." An employee of the store said.
There are more than 30,000 teachers and students on the main campus of Jinan University, and the McDonald's restaurant in this university is lower than that of McDonald's outside the university, and the meals sold are mainly hamburgers. According to a veteran employee, the restaurant uses several bottles of McFragrant Chicken Sauce at the end of the day, which is the most consumed of all sauces, and the restaurant put the idea on this sauce in order to save costs. "Normally, each burger needs to be beaten with 20 ml of sauce, but they (the store) didn't use a 10 ml sauce gun to save sauce, and they used 10 ml of sauce. Remember, when someone comes to check, replace it. An employee of the store said.
McDonald's food safety issues have been exposed many times
The reporter combed and found that the problem of changing the label of expired ingredients to continue to be used and sold is not the first time that McDonald's has appeared.
As early as 2012, CCTV's "3.15" party named McDonald's Sanlitun restaurant for illegal operations such as refurbishment and resale of expired food. At that time, McDonald's issued a public statement saying that it would apologize to consumers with practical actions and would deepen management of this matter to provide consumers with safe and hygienic food.
In October 2021, McDonald's was on the hot search again due to food safety issues: a video blogger secretly visited a McDonald's restaurant in Hefei, Anhui Province, and found that the restaurant had problems such as lettuce blackened and still in use, and replacing expired food labels. After the incident, McDonald's also responded that it required the general managers of all restaurants across the country to verify the implementation of food safety again.
In March 2022, an employee at a McDonald's store in Nanjing reported that the meat ingredients in the store were still served to customers after they had expired. The employee said that on more than one occasion, at the behest of the manager on duty and the store manager, the store tore off the labels of expired food and replaced them with new ones.
In the frozen warehouse of McDonald's Jinan University Cafeteria, many of the ingredients used in the kitchen are frozen products that need to be thawed in advance. Photo by the Beijing News Investigation Team
During the investigation, the reporter learned that McDonald's has clear regulations on the number of ingredients to be shipped out of the warehouse, thawed and the number of meals to be prepared. McDonald's employees said that these usage data were analyzed by McDonald's based on statistical data. So, why do ingredients frequently expire?
An old employee of McDonald's Zhengzhou Excellent Agricultural Federation Restaurant told reporters that according to the requirements, employees need to thaw ingredients 3 times a day in different periods, and how many ingredients are out of the warehouse when thawing, and the remaining amount of the kitchen needs to be subtracted from the remaining amount of the kitchen according to the specified quantity, but some employees do not have to work, and the amount of ingredients out of the warehouse is too large, resulting in the shelf life can not be used up.
"Why don't you dispose of it according to the regulations?" Faced with a question, the employee asked rhetorically: "You are the boss, do you throw it?" ”
Another employee explained that the store will take stock of the volume of shipments and sales every week and month, and if there are too many discarded ingredients, it will lead to a discrepancy in the data between the two.
The "irregular" delivery of the staff resulted in the inability of the ingredients to be sold before the expiration date, and the store manager acquiesced in the modification of the label in order to reduce the difference between the delivery volume and the sales volume, which should have been the relationship between supervision and supervision, and finally formed a "conspiracy".
"Every few years, food safety problems are exposed, which shows that the food safety awareness of enterprises is very weak, and there is no sense of responsibility for food safety at all." Chen Yinjiang, deputy secretary-general of the Consumer Rights Protection Law Research Association of the China Law Society, believes that this is the result of catering enterprises ignoring the food safety requirements of consumers, blindly reducing costs and pursuing the maximization of economic interests. Previous penalties have not served as a deterrent, and the cost of violating the law is too low to have a deterrent effect. ”
Editor: Li Kexin