Meredith Melnick reports for Time, ... the McRib has more than ground pork, bun, onions, and barbecue sauce. The sandwich has 70 ingredients (34 in the bun alone), including azodicarbonamide, ammonium sulfate and polysorbate 80 ... although these components are in small enough quantities to be (supposedly) innocuous, “it’s still a little disconcerting to know that, for example, azodicarbonamide, a flour-bleaching agent that is most commonly used in the manufacture of foamed plastics like in gym mats and the soles of shoes, is found in the McRib bun. The compound is banned in Europe and Australia as a food additive. (England’s Health and Safety Executive classified it as a “respiratory sensitizer” that potentially contributes to asthma through occupational exposure.) The U.S. limits azodicarbonamide to 45 parts per million in commercial flour products, based on analysis of lab testing.”
