What’s Inside a Slim Jim?. (Wired)

Beef
It’s real meat, all right. But it ain’t Kobe. The US Department of Agriculture categorizes beef into eight grades of quality. The bottom three—utility, cutter, and canner—are typically used in processed foods and come from older steers with partially ossified vertebrae, tougher tissue, and generally less reason to live. ConAgra wasn’t exactly forthcoming on what’s inside Slim Jim.

Mechanically separated chicken
Did you imagine a conveyor belt carrying live chickens into a giant machine, set to the classic cartoon theme “Powerhouse”? You’re right! Well, maybe not about the music. Poultry scraps are pressed mechanically through a sieve that extrudes the meat as a bright pink paste and leaves the bones behind (most of the time).

Corn and wheat proteins
Slim Jim is made by ConAgra, and if there are two things ConAgra has a lot of, it’s corn and wheat.