McDonald's serves chicken nuggets in veggie wraps

Vegetarian customers at McDonald's across the UK have reported finding chicken nuggets in meals that are sold as meat-free.

The fast-food chain launched its spicy veggie wrap in early January but restaurant staff appear to be struggling with the recipe.

Its main ingredient is supposed to be a red pesto vegetarian goujon - customers have been given chicken nuggets instead.

It's been happening all over the UK.

Twitter users in Liverpool, Birmingham, Kent, Lincoln, Yorkshire, Elgin, London and Bristol have shared their experiences.

Vegetarians have been finding chicken nuggets in their vegetarian wraps as recently as this week, despite flagging the mistake to McDonald's on Twitter throughout January.

Rebecca Butcher, a 21-year-old YouTuber and social media manager from Yorkshire, says she was aware of the problem before she bought a vegetarian wrap on 22 January. She says it had chicken in it.

"I wanted to wait a little while because I saw people I knew posting that they'd had chicken in their veggie wrap," Becca tells Newsbeat.

"I gave it a bit of time so it hopefully wouldn't happen to me. I was kind of shocked that weeks later, they're still getting wrong."

"I just felt kind of disgusted."

McDonald's has issued an apology to customers who have found meat in their meals.

'We are disappointed'

"We have a number of procedures in place to avoid inaccurate orders," it said.

"After we saw that mistakes were being made, we introduced a number of additional measures in our kitchens and communicated with all stores to reduce inaccuracies quickly and effectively.

"We are disappointed that mistakes are still being made. We never want to disappoint customers, and any inaccuracy is not good enough."

Becca tells Newsbeat the experience has made her worried about eating vegetarian food in any restaurant

Becca has been a vegetarian for a year and says she quit meat because her dislike for eating animals meant she wasn't eating enough food and became underweight.

She says finding meat in her food isn't a surprise for someone who's a veggie.

"As a vegetarian or vegan, you always have to worry about where your food is coming from, who's making it, if they're going to get it right."

"It's always on your mind when you eat out, because people do get it wrong quite a lot of the time."

After complaining about the wrap with chicken in it (L), her local McDonalds replaced it with the correct filling (R)

Becca adds that when she reported the mistake to a manager, she was told it wasn't the first time staff had inadvertently put chicken into a vegetarian meal.

She worries that big companies are providing meat-free options because it's fashionable, without realising how important they are to the people who live by them.

"I think companies are now catering to vegetarians and vegans more because they're worried about the backlash if they don't," she says.

"Companies are now bringing out vegan food just because it's cool and trendy."

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