Horsemeat found in Taco Bell beef
LOS ANGELES, CA – APRIL 19: Customers walk to a Taco Bell and Pizza Hut restaurant during lunchtime on April 19, 2012 in Los Angeles, California. Yum Brands Inc., the parent company of KFC, Taco Bell and Pizza Hut chains, reported dramatically strong first quarter earnings.
Taco Bell's reputation for serving fresh, all-natural food has taken a hit with a startling discovery: there's more than beef in their beef. There's also some horse in there.
Four beef products sold by Bird's Eye, the catering company that supplies the United Kingdom Taco Bell locations, have been found to contain horse DNA, BBC News reported.
"Some batches of ground beef supplied to us from one supplier in Europe tested positive for horsemeat," said Taco Bell UK said in a statement.
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"We immediately withdrew ground beef from sale in our restaurants, discontinued purchase of that meat, and contacted the Food Standards Agency with this information."
How bad is it? Britain's food regulator said Friday that it had conducted 1,797 tests on the beef products. The majority of those samples came back negative for "horsemeat levels at or above 1 percent," Reuters reported. So, British Taco Bell fans, remember to keep this in perspective: you didn't eat a horse, you just ate a really tiny part of a horse.