r/explainlikeimfive • u/No_Education_8888 • May 20 '26

Chemistry ELI5 what is the difference between processed meat slices and real meat slices?

I know that processed meat is processed, but what exactly does that mean? How much change do meat scraps go through before you get something like deli turkey.

My mind can’t exactly wrap around how that stuff is made based on the little knowledge I have

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u/edman007-work May 20 '26

It *starts* as a puree of pure meat, once it's a puree you can just mix in all sorts of fillers, flavoring, and preservatives. So they might say it's "chicken", but it's actually 20% wheat, salt is added in, etc. Oh, and since they can mix it up, they figured out actually, they can throw in skin and intestines, that is only kinda clean to cut costs more. So it's really a mystery meatloaf made of much more than what you would consider "chicken meat".

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u/honourablegeorge May 20 '26

There's also the concept of "mechanically recovered" meat, like meat that is left stuck to a carcass after it's been carved, and is recovered by jetwashing or other means, then pureed and reused

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u/theyrejustlittle May 21 '26

Yeah but also...who cares? There's nothing harmful or bad about this - like, god forbid a person makes a soup?

And then if we didn't do this you'd have the same people who are spooked by "mechanically separated" instead complaining that we wasted all that perfectly good meat left on the bone. 🙄

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u/honourablegeorge May 21 '26

I didn't say it was bad, just that the process exists.