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Post by somanyhorses on Jan 16, 2013 19:45:02 GMT 1
"If I can't recognise it as a cut of meat I don't buy it. I ask my butcher to make mince out of a cut I have seen."
If only it was that simple. I was "fed" horsemeat for YEARS wiithout knowing it. No, it wasn't processed food, no it wasn't minced meat. It was a "lovely bit of good quality steak, my dear" as per my then mother-in-law. It looked like beef. It tasted like beef, but really good beef. I had no idea it wasn't beef. I saw it raw, I saw it straight from the butchers. I saw it being cooked. i saw it and ate it cooked. I thought it was a fabulous piece of beef. I could NOT have told the difference in appearance between a beef steak and a horse steak then, and I couldn't now. Only now do I know the taste of beef is nowhere near as good as what I got to eat during those years. I refuse to eat horse on principle, but I can't actually tell the difference when it's raw. And although I totally agree it is wrong, very very wrong, for a multitude of reasons, to find there is anything but pure beef in a beefburger, I am not worried about a health risk, cause horse is healthier than beef. I'm much more concerned about what else might be in these foods, from a health point of view.
And of course I am against the transport of horses going for slaughter etc etc, and that is one of the reasons I refuse to (knowingly) eat meat, here or abroad.
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Post by Solly on Jan 16, 2013 20:49:37 GMT 1
In fact - yes! When I served my ponies' - er - sweetmeats at a dinner party, they had that same dogfoody smell! sorry, but  ?! Well yes, I did, I confess! But they were all warned first, and it was only for fun - there were other non equine courses to eat! One person it seems got a bit of anaesthetic in her mouth ...... |
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jan 17, 2013 14:52:36 GMT 1
Catrin, no one here is encouraging eating horsemeat!
I said I accept it in other cultures, that's a very long way from accepting it mis-labelled in food sold in the UK or encouraging people to eat it!
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Amanda Seater
Grand Prix Poster
Listen to your horse you may be surprised what he may tell you about yourself
Posts: 3,866
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Post by Amanda Seater on Jan 17, 2013 15:31:59 GMT 1
somanyhorses- I too was fed horse meat from time to time as a child, my parent knew. I was also fed "chicken" that was rabbit - cultivated rabbit. I was anti as a child of course.
I won't eat horse meat now but I will eat rabbit.
I suspect your mother in law knew!.
The point I was trying to make on the whole was more about do we REALLY know what is in processed food as a whole. We really don't.
I am getting a little fed up with the veggies thinking they truely know what is in thier shop brought veggie sausages etc.
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Amanda Seater
Grand Prix Poster
Listen to your horse you may be surprised what he may tell you about yourself
Posts: 3,866
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Post by Amanda Seater on Jan 17, 2013 15:37:22 GMT 1
antares- ready meals are only the tip of the iceberg . How do they make the bread so light and fluffy and last so long. How is margerine made? Why do we have to have homogenised milk the process changes teh nature of it in a few ways.
What is that fake "cheese" made out of that is on your pizza.
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Post by cheekychops on Jan 17, 2013 15:46:44 GMT 1
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Post by wabuska on Jan 17, 2013 16:46:35 GMT 1
Cooking from scratch from locally sourced goods... safest way.
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Post by holi on Jan 17, 2013 16:49:13 GMT 1
I eat meat and although wouldn't go out of my way to chose horse I believe it is a food product and if cared for and slaughtered correctly, its ok. I spread this belief to all my shopping and will only purchase meat where I know that it has been kept to high welfare standards. Its peoples choice. In australia I ate croc, ostrich, lizard - tried them all - all a bit boring. Iceland speciality is puffin and lots of people don't like that. I love venison and lamb - cuter animals you couldn't find but I've been brought up on them. I feel the issue is 1) welfare and 2) in this case deception by the supermarkets which is why I try to avoid them and shop local. Mind you I did have a good joke sent to me 'what would you like on your burger sir?' '£5 each way'!!!!! I did laugh  |
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Post by Hannah on Jan 17, 2013 17:13:13 GMT 1
One concern would be where the horses came from? If they came from UK/Ireland, were they passported, horses in this country don't tend to be bred for meat. Sometimes horses are bought to send for meat, but anything else turning up at the knackers yard is going to be old/infirm/ill/mental so were they being given drugs/wormers and was this recorded?
One upside is that *most* horses tend to live a happier life than many mass-produced farm animals but that is not really the point here.
My biggest concern is what else is being mis-labelled? I choose not to eat horse, and would not choose something labelled as containing it. Some people for religious reasons choose not to eat pork etc but the big worry is people with allergies. I heard on the radio an older lady who reacted to a tetanus (I think) injection which was held in horse-serum, she also ate horse-meat on the continent without realising what it was and had an anaphalactic shock. Imagine if she had eaten these burgers...
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Post by Pony-Nutt on Jan 17, 2013 17:22:47 GMT 1
I agree with holi  There is nothing wrong with eating horse meat as long as the horse was handled and treated well up to the point of death. After that it does not matter, the horse knows nothing and certainly I would prefer a pony of mine to go to Turners and be done humanely rather than pass it on and end up in a field starving every winter and being neglected in so called retirement. Anyone who thinks it is wrong to eat a horse because it is a pet animal but it is fine to eat other animals really should rear a pig in the house as a pet and see how they feel then. |
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Post by jackiedo on Jan 17, 2013 17:25:14 GMT 1
Well all I can say is just thank goodness they did not DNA meat at the height of the "troubles" I am led to believe that more than horses, cattle, sheep and pigs went through production plants in those days
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Post by Ally S on Jan 17, 2013 17:25:22 GMT 1
I believe if we want to eat meat, we should be prepared to pay for it and buy it from a quality butcher who can tell us the source. If you buy value burgers from a major supermarket chain you haven't a hope of knowing where the meat came from and in what conditions the animals were kept. That doesn't excuse the inclusion of horsemeat of course. I went to Morrisons the other day. They were selling three whole chickens for £10. It makes no sense, and what hope is there that those chickens had any quality of life?
I went to my local butchers today. They had a sign out saying 'our horse is in the field not the fridge'. Quite right!
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Post by mrsfields on Jan 17, 2013 18:54:11 GMT 1
Cooking from scratch from locally sourced goods... safest way. that's what we do here mostly... we also grow quite a lot of our own fruit and veggies, and on a good year my home-bottled or frozen veggies will last us thru the winter we're lucky around here as there are loads of farmers who will sell their produce at reasonable prices (often cheaper than the supermarkets), but you do clock up the kilometres and it is very time-consuming going from one place to another - we don't have a farmer's market or cooperative-type store here, but some friends are thinking about trying to set one up which would be fab! two local farmers do a scheme where you sign up to buy their (Charolais) beef in bulk twice a year and it works out at 11 euros a kilo for top quality beef - they vacuum pack it and label it and you can pop it straight in your freezer - i'm definitely going to give it a go! |
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Post by specialized on Jan 17, 2013 19:35:16 GMT 1
It's a bit of a never-ending circle really, we would all ideally like to buy our meat direct from the farm but regulations have been brought in to protect us from bad practice in home slaughter and butchery - only to leave us vulnerable to skulduggery from large processing plants.
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Post by mrsfields on Jan 17, 2013 20:08:25 GMT 1
It's a bit of a never-ending circle really, we would all ideally like to buy our meat direct from the farm but regulations have been brought in to protect us from bad practice in home slaughter and butchery - only to leave us vulnerable to skulduggery from large processing plants. i don't know about the UK, but our local farmers here have to take their cattle etc. to proper authorised abattoirs to be slaughtered, so it's all pretty well regulated at least... the thing is, here in rural France, buying from farmers is the cheaper option compared to supermarkets - the locals have been doing that for generations... it's not a "trendy" thing like it has been in the UK in recent years - i always found farmers' markets and farm shops in the UK incredibly pricey - almost prohibitively expensive actually... so it's been nice to discover it's a more affordable option over here... |
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