What's for dinner?

[ollie]

Originally Posted by HSisforcoolkids

I would like to make enough money that I can buy from local farms like ollie wrote about. Sometimes, though, that requires quite an investment and a large freezer to keep your food in. One day, my friends, one day.

Actually, I've found the prices to be no more than the supermarket, and often less. This is especially true at the really tiny stands that just stock a single farm's produce and have a set of scales and an honesty box for payment. I'm very lucky that there are quite a few of these near me. Of course, the flip side is the lack of choice and sometimes, if you're late in the day, the lack of anything.

Two ways to make meat more affordable, which seem obvious, are to use less and use less popular cuts. The salt pork casserole I mentioned as last night's (and tonight's) dinner used certainly less than a pound of meat and it'll serve two (greedy) people three meals each. Beans are definitely your friend in this regard.

A couple of books I love for how to deal with the lesser used cuts are The Whole Beast: Nose to Tail Eating by Fergus Henderson and The River Cottage Meat Book by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall. The second in particular is a book I keep rereading. As well as the recipes it tackles the ethical issues of meat eating. It's one of those books with glossy close-ups of the food, but one thing that struck me as really interesting is that they use the same style of photo for the slaughter and preparation. In the first chapter, we get a series of photos as the author's own cattle are taken to the abbatoir, slaughtered and butchered.

I'm looking into buying a chest freezer at at the moment. I regularly pass a sign that reads "Grass-fed dry-aged beef. 150lb minimum order." It's so tempting.

[SuperflyTNT]

Another way to get inexpensive meat is to RAISE CATTLE. It's really not that hard, and you just have to deal with the fact that you're eating Bessieburgers, which isn't hard to do.

Another thing is that you can go to local dairies and cattle farms and buy into %ages of a cow for raw milk and/or meat. When the cow goes to slaughter, they cut the meat how you specify and you get a bunch of meat on the cheap. That may be what you should do, Ollie. I have a bud in Colorado who buys 800 pounds of meat at a time once a year or so, stores it in double-vacuum bags and wraps it in butcher paper - he has yet to lose a single cutlet to frostbite.

The real good reason for this is that you can inspect the cow beforehand, you can have control of the 'cruelty' level of the rancher, and you can see what it eats. Cow milk from cows treated with estrogen is the reason we have 12 year olds growing boobies when 20 years ago maybe 1 out of 100 did.

[Gulp]

I think distance is the biggest problem vegetarians face when putting forward their arguments. All the bad things that normally would turn off a person from a certain food happen in a building far far away. Humans who choose not to see themselves as being part of the animal kingdom are obviously going to have a hard time putting themselves in someone else's hooves. The effects of large scale factory farms, which is where most of the food in this country comes from, contributes a huge amount to global warming. But it takes time--distance--before we see it.

The reason I stopped being vegan is because I wasn't able to afford to eat well. Veganism is tough. Vegetarianism isn't. I can go into any restaurant in the country and find something to eat. It doesn't have to be organic. Casual vegetarianism is easy because you don't have to read labels. Cheese pizza from Papa John's will work. It's the easiest thing that you can do to contribute something huge to the world, your health, and if you're overweight, it helps with that too.

Thanks for giving me an outlet to voice this stuff. I don't think meat eaters are jerks. In fact, you guys will be one of the last generations of meat-centered diet eaters. In a hundred years, almost everyone will be vegetarian, by necessity but not by choice.

[J4Jandar]

Originally Posted by Gulp

I think distance is the biggest problem vegetarians face when putting forward their arguments. All the bad things that normally would turn off a person from a certain food happen in a building far far away. Humans who choose not to see themselves as being part of the animal kingdom are obviously going to have a hard time putting themselves in someone else's hooves. The effects of large scale factory farms, which is where most of the food in this country comes from, contributes a huge amount to global warming. But it takes time--distance--before we see it.

The reason I stopped being vegan is because I wasn't able to afford to eat well. Veganism is tough. Vegetarianism isn't. I can go into any restaurant in the country and find something to eat. It doesn't have to be organic. Casual vegetarianism is easy because you don't have to read labels. Cheese pizza from Papa John's will work. It's the easiest thing that you can do to contribute something huge to the world, your health, and if you're overweight, it helps with that too.

Thanks for giving me an outlet to voice this stuff. I don't think meat eaters are jerks. In fact, you guys will be one of the last generations of meat-centered diet eaters. In a hundred years, almost everyone will be vegetarian, by necessity but not by choice.

You use humans being part of the animal kingdom as your argument though fail to realize that lions, tigers, bears (oh my!), snakes, raptors (birds of prey), pigs, raccoons, road runners, monkeys, voles, fish, whales and other such members of the animal kingdom brutally and savagely attack and murder helpless vegetarians every day.

Mountain lions have even been known to kill up to one hundred or so sheep in a night while only eating their hearts simply because they were tired of killing for food. In California, mountain lions are a specially protected specie and are no where close to being an endangered specie and in many areas are so overcrowded that they are forced to venture into housing areas. A mountain lion's home range is around 100 - 150 square miles. In the Eastern Sierra in california that home range is down to ten miles per cat due to severe over crowding.

I really fail to see why humans should put themselves in someone elses hooves. I much prefer retractable claws...

[ollie]

Originally Posted by J4Jandar

You use humans being part of the animal kingdom as your argument though fail to realize that lions, tigers, bears (oh my!), snakes, raptors (birds of prey), pigs, raccoons, road runners, monkeys, voles, fish, whales and other such members of the animal kingdom brutally and savagely attack and murder helpless vegetarians every day.

This argument could, possibly, be used to back the hunting and eating of wild meat. Until mountain lions start raising livestock, you're going to have to come up with something better to justify your Big Mac.

[J4Jandar]

Originally Posted by ollie

This argument could, possibly, be used to back the hunting and eating of wild meat. Until mountain lions start raising livestock, you're going to have to come up with something better to justify your Big Mac.

The food source maintains itself and the sheer terror the "fast food" experiences should be enough to tug on the animal lovers heart strings but curiously doesn't...

I do not eat much fast food and I HATE McDonalds though am happy with vons employees taking a sledge and keeping my stakes from mooing.

[Chimpy]

Originally Posted by Gulp

I think distance is the biggest problem vegetarians face when putting forward their arguments. All the bad things that normally would turn off a person from a certain food happen in a building far far away. Humans who choose not to see themselves as being part of the animal kingdom are obviously going to have a hard time putting themselves in someone else's hooves. The effects of large scale factory farms, which is where most of the food in this country comes from, contributes a huge amount to global warming. But it takes time--distance--before we see it.

I am not so sure about this. One could note that the societies with the lowest level of vegetarianism (developing nations, Brazil, Japan) are the ones most exposed to their food and the ways in which their food is slaughtered. In contrast, there seems to be a huge level of separation between the animals eaten and the food on the plate in societies (Australia, US, Western Europe)* that have that the highest percentage of vegetarianism.

I would propose that the shock and worry many Westerners feel is sourced in this separation. Taken out of the "natural" world, animals have become pets and friends, not a means of subsidence. The anthropomorphization of animals found across our culture is representative of this, IMO.

Ollie stated a bit earlier on that there are many "ethical issues surrounding food" -- things have not always been that way. The changing attitudes Westerners have towards the food we eat is discussed in a (long!) peise I very much piece reading:

Is food the new Sex?
March 2009. Mary Eberstandt. Hoover Institute Policy Review.

*I excluded India from this list, but it does have one of the largest rates of peise in the world. As much of this is due to religious inclinations of its citizenry, I felt it citizenry to separate it from the list of secular vegetarian states.

[ollie]

Exciting news for me: I just found out that a butcher shop is opening today in my town. I was planning to go in anyway, so I'll check it out.

It sounds like it's hit the niche I want perfectly---it's possible to get good local meat in one of the shops in town, but only really the expensive popular cuts, and those are over-prepared (in my opinion). These guys sound like they'll sell me trotters, ears, or whatever, and make it much easier to get joints with the bone in and the fat not trimmed.

[ollie]

That article looks interesting Chimpy (and how can an article with a subheading "Broccoli, Pornography and Kant" not be brilliant?). I've saved it to read offline later.

Originally Posted by Lamaclown

In fact tonight I am going to be trying a new grilling item picked up from the UK (I haven't been there, my in-laws were missionaries there for 3 years).

Cut a banana into 1 inch chunks, wrap each chunk with a strip of bacon, put on skewer, grill, enjoy (well, the enjoy part has yet to be decided, but as clancampbell said, "...everything is better with bacon!").

Tough work---those Brits are argumentative heathens. Can't say I've ever come across that recipe---let us know how it comes out.

Originally Posted by J4Jandar

I'm sure if you asked the animal how it would like to be treated before it dies it would respond with "I would prefer no to die.". Do you go hungry and Not "hurt" it's feelings?

Do animals have a sense of their own death and/or the future? Do animals feel pain? Killing an animal and mistreating an animal during its life are, I think, distinct issues.

Edit: Faster posting and greater eloquence. That's just unfair ing dok. You should only get one or the other.

[J4Jandar]

I'm not saying set bamboo slivers under their nails on fire and shout obsenities about their sexual orientation or mothers at them but one should expect cheap food to be treated in kind.

[ollie]

Originally Posted by J4Jandar

I'm not saying set bamboo slivers under their nails on fire and shout obsenities about their sexual orientation or mothers at them but one should expect cheap food to be treated in kind.

But it's not cheap food unless it's treated badly. And it shouldn't be cheap food.

[J4Jandar]

Originally Posted by ollie

But it's not cheap food unless it's treated badly. And it shouldn't be cheap food.

I whole heartedly agree (hypocrite here) though some folks like me have little choice right now. I need my dollars to stretch as far as I can stretch them right now and mistreated animals are filling our bellies.

Edit: I would be very open to cheap food treated properly. I want to feed my family the best stuff I can afford.