No Clean Cheat, FDA Refutes McDonald's 'Real Cheese' Claims in Advertisement

Few weeks back, McDonald's faced a crisis regarding the alleged use of analogues and substitute cheese in its menu. In response, the company released a full-page advertisement claiming to use real cheese in all their offerings. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA), which conducted a state-wide inspection, including in Mumbai at McDonald's outlets, has not confirmed such claims.

McDonald's advertisement states, "Now serving the real truth," and asserts that they have been using 100% real cheese since 1996. Nevertheless, this assertion has been contradicted by the FDA, which recently discovered analogues and cheese substitutes and instructed McDonald's to take corrective action. An FDA official refuting these claims said, "We have not given any clean cheat to McDonald's, nor we got any report from FSSAI of verifying the 'McDonald's using real cheese', our stand is still the same we have found analogues and asked them to either change the labels or the use real cheese, said an FDA Official, while speaking to LokmatTimes.

Some outlets in Andheri and Bandra, as observed by LokmatTimes, have either removed the term "cheese" from certain menu items or added Cheddar to specific items. McDonald's wrote to the FDA in December 2023 saying they had renamed the products by deleting the word "cheese". This reportedly proves their cheese has never been real.

Further, the advertisement claims that NABL-accredited labs have confirmed McDonald's usage of 100% real cheese and the absence of any cheese analogues or substitutes. Additionally, FSSAI verifies that McDonald's India's (W&S) products contain cheese and do not contain any analogues in the dairy context or any form.

Earlier, an FDA officer mentioned, "During the inspection, our officers did not find any mention of cheese analogues anywhere. Items such as 'cheese nuggets,' 'cheesy dip,' and 'cheeseburger' were being labelled as such without indicating that the cheese was a substitute."

Action against McDonald's commenced in October with an inspection of their Kedgaon branch in Ahmednagar. Upon discovering that at least eight items contained cheese analogues, the FDA issued a show-cause notice to the establishment.