"LunchMeat" news and stories

Ever grab a prepackaged pile of cold cuts, only to be greeted with a less-than-appetizing film of slime?

Photo: Hardee's.

Hardee's is having startling success with a humble Appalachian lunch meat long considered too provincial for nationwide tastes, and nobody's more surprised than the fast-food chain's top brass.

"We were concerned it would be too regional," Executive Vice-President of Marketing Brad Haley says of Hardee's new Oscar Mayer Fried Bologna Biscuit. "But sales have increased every week we've had it."

While bologna is a staple of lunch counters and school cafeterias across the South, Hardee's found inspiration for its menu item at a few roadside diners that sandwiched grilled bologna between biscuit halves for breakfast. For Hardee's, the preparation stood seductively close to the final meat frontier.

"We've done virtually every other meat you can think of on a biscuit," Haley concedes. "We've had country ham, chicken, pork chops, smoked sausage. We even had turkey."

A lot of people are uncomfortable eating meat that looks like part of an animal, so pre-packaged and process meats are popular. This lunch meat, however, must be one of more disturbing things to ever have been featured in the deli meat section of a grocery store. The problem isn't that it is 80% pork with coloring added to it, but that the coloring is added to make it look like a clown face. It is clearly intended to be appealing to children, it actually explains why some children are afraid of clowns. After all, if you discovered a face in your sandwich when you were in kindergarten, you would be traumatized, too. This meat might also be a factor in why some children become vegetarians.

At least soylent green didn't look like people.

[via Neatorama]

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