Urban Food Legends

Elissa R. Henken (2002) describes many urban food legends that revolve around fast food. She writes how various dangers about food are associated with fast food or foreign restaurants. I think these American legends place so much danger on eating at such places because of media influence and past events at fast food chains. Both of these combined paints a picture in our minds that this is where a food related sickness must have happened.

Growing up, I ate at McDonalds once or twice a week. It was the norm, as my father had eaten there with his father while growing up as well. Then when I started to get older, around 12 or 13, I began watching the news more and more, and reading on the internet about fast food chains. I read articles and watched news stories how fast food is very unhealthy for me due to the trans fats, high sodium and fat contents. Not just regular fat, saturated fats which I further found out promotes the production of bad cholesterol. This began my curiosity about whether or not I should continue eating fast food.

After reading about the unhealthiness of McDonalds, other fast food chains, and foreign restaurants, a story surfaced how rats were found in Taco Bell meat. I remember watching a special on Dateline how food safety investigators had found rats eating out of Taco Bell meat holders and scampering throughout the restaurant. This further painted the picture in my mind that these places are unsanitary, unhealthy and just an overall bad place to eat.

When I hear a story about someone getting sick with food poisoning, there is a imaginary trigger in my brain that says it was associated with a fast food restaurant. This trigger offsets because of my prior readings and watching of television programs. Due to this, I associate these events with fast food or foreign restaurants. One factor that may affect the association with foreign restaurants is that they are not from the US. I have also seen on the news stories relating to