A Coles customer has hit out at the supermarket giant, accusing it of ripping off customers by selling reconstituted meat.
The buyer was left furious after claiming he had unknowingly bought poor quality beef in Cessnock on the NSW Central Coast.
“Brought this back from Cessnock Coles the other day and apparently they aren’t making enough money off of us that we are now getting glued reconstituted meat instead of what is labeled Jan not happy,” he wrote on Facebook.
The customer shared a photo of his haul after paying $9 for the packaged meat.
Flanks of Australian beef were seen on “thinly sliced oyster sheets” with large holes.
In a fiery social media post, the customer took issue with Coles claiming it is selling reconstituted meat.
The packaging says the meat is “always sourced from Australian farms.”
Reconstituted meat is a liquefied meat product that contains less fat, pigment, and less myoglobin than unprocessed dark meat.
Social media users had mixed responses with many suggesting the man received exactly what he paid for.
“You paid for a shitty cut of meat and you got a shitty cut of meat… a lower quality cut of meat,” one said.
A second added: ‘It’s not stuck. There is fat in meat. It would be much more expensive to add glued meat to the processing line and do this than to sell it as cut.
Coles says they partner with Australian farmers and suppliers “who share our passion for meat, including where it comes from and how it is produced”.
“These products mainly contain meat glue, such as ham or turkey bread.”
Others suggested the Coles customer should take his business elsewhere.
‘Local support. Go to the butcher shop and this will be avoided,” wrote one.
‘Instead of complaining on Facebook, why didn’t you take the meat to Coles?’ added another.
In response to questions from WhatsNew2Day Australia, Coles responded: ‘We always strive to meet our customers’ expectations and the quality of our meat is very important. We never add any binding ingredients to our fresh beef steaks. This package of meat does not meet our high quality standards and should have been identified and sorted in production.’
“As always, we encourage customers to return any items they are not 100% satisfied with to their nearest store for a full refund or replacement.”
