New York
The world’s biggest hamburger chain says it is testing a version without artificial preservatives.
It’s the latest move by McDonald’s to try to catch up with changing tastes and turn around its business, which has lost customers in recent years.
The new McNugget recipe is “simpler,” and “parents can feel good” about it, the fast-food company said.
While McDonald’s did not give full details about what is or isn’t in the test recipe, it said the new McNuggets do not have sodium phosphates, widely used food additives that the company has said can keep chicken moist. Also, the McNuggets will not be fried in oil containing the artificial preservative TBHQ.
Chicken McNuggets have become an often-mocked symbol of heavily processed fast food since they were introduced in the 1980s. The breaded and fried nuggets are made of ground-up chicken rather than intact chunks of meat and are delivered to stores frozen. The company said it began testing the new recipe in about 140 stores in Oregon and Washington in March. The test was first reported by Crain’s Chicago Business.
As people pay closer attention to food labels, companies across the food and drink industry have adjusted recipes to remove ingredients that may sound unappetizing.
Paris
After appearing before investigative judges Wednesday afternoon, Abdeslam faces charges of terrorist murder and possession and use of weapons and bombs, according to Frank Berton, his French attorney. Jean-Jacques Urvoas, the French justice minister, announced that Abdeslam would be held in solitary confinement in a maximum-security prison near Paris.
Although complete details of his role in the November attacks remain unclear, Abdeslam is suspected to have been among the logistical planners, organizing the hotel rooms and rental cars that facilitated the bloodiest massacre on French soil since World War II.
Abdeslam, a 26-year-old Belgian citizen of Moroccan descent, was arrested in the Brussels district of Molenbeek on March 18 after having eluded authorities in Belgium and France since the Nov. 13 attacks, which killed 130 people. He was apprehended just a short distance from his childhood home, four months after the attacks.
His capture came just four days before the March 22 bombings at Brussels’ international airport and one of the city’s metro stations that left 32 people dead and hundreds injured.
Since his arrest, Abdeslam had been detained in a prison in northern Belgium. His transfer to France follows a European arrest warrant that was issued immediately after his capture.
Abdeslam’s arrest was a watershed moment in the ongoing investigation into a cell of largely European-born jihadists who are thought to have orchestrated the Paris and Brussels attacks.
Authorities believe these militants were inspired by the Islamic State and used their European citizenship to ease their way across borders and other potential checks.
— Wire reports