I know this is a touchy subject and have heard all sorts of arguments for and against the topic of horse slaughter.  One common misconception about the “ban” on horse slaughter in the United States was that the practice was altogether banned — that is not the case.  The funding to support the inspection of horse slaughter is what hit the chopping block, thereby indirectly stopping the practice.

2. Stepping Back a Few Decades

Our Meats Laboratory is about 50 years old and since then has become a repository for all sorts of meat information.  Recently I found a 25 ruble note from 1961, and two saved boxes for horse meat products (burgers and flaked/formed steaks).  I have no idea about the age of the horse steak packaging — some storytelling and we guesstimated they were probably from the late 1980′s.  Given that the packaging for these products was saved for 20+ years, that tells me they were a novelty worth keeping, that horse meat products were a real rarity during (and prior to) the past few decades.

3. This Isn’t Happening Overnight

The ban on funding horse slaughter inspection has been lifted, but still the challenges training, staffing, and inspecting — not to mention finding the funding itself — has happened.  There’s still a lot of paperwork to be done, though it may occur quicker in states where the development of state programs has been under consideration.

I picture a Farmers’ Market or other direct-to-consumer scenarios – a common factor being that they often cannot  accept credit or debit card payments.  About two weeks after my iPad-paid Pad Thai I encountered mobile payment once again at an Apple store, this time using iPhones.

Curiosity got the best of me, so I went out and found the right attachment (it was about $10, and that can be recovered using the service) and signed up for an account with SquareUp.  This just happens to be the one I found … there many other tools like SquareUp available.  In about 10 minutes of setting up the gizmo that pops into my iPhone headset receiver and signing up for an account using a web browser, I charged myself $5.00 (plus a $2.00 tip to see if the tip function worked).  Soon enough, it credited my account and all I lost in this experiment was 2.75% of the total transaction.

Such tools can be used by individuals having a garage sale, a waiter taking payment at the table, or an agricultural entrepreneur selling green beans and gourds at a Farmers’ Market.  Beef, pork – or even if you’re a custom venison processor looking for payment options – this could be an option for you.

Last week in the Des Moines airport I picked up a copy of Men’s Health to read during my flights back to State College.  It’s been awhile since I purchased a printed magazine because I usually read them on my iPad (yes, I’m one of those people) — but I can only take so much SkyMall reading during that pesky “below 10,000 feet no electronics” rule.  I’m glad I picked up the mag because it featured a pullout poster identifying the “125 Best Foods For Men.”

My first observation was that everything on this list was in some way processed and pre-packaged.  When I found the article online, the page tab read “The Best Packaged Foods…”  Tallying through the list, 25 of the 125 products featured the word “organic” in the product name; however, in the brief note explaining how items were chosen it was never stated that a preference was given organic or otherwise “natural” items (but I have to wonder).

The last section of the list was the Proteins section.  There are a few points of concern worth addressing:

(1) In the description of #119, the best ground turkey, one of the justifications included was that it had “no added hormones, steroids.”  Point of clarification:  Added hormones or steroids are not used in poultry production in the United States.  This should be in fine print on the product label.

(2) #120 describes the bacon as having no added nitrates.  Point of clarification:  Sea salt and certain vegetable juice powders (commonly celery) are used as a naturally-occuring source of nitrate.  This should also be included in the fine print on the product label. Even the corporate web site addresses this and says those ingredients are in their products. (Kudos for the thorough explanation, Applegate.)

(3) These are the only two items on the entire list that feature an absence claim (i.e. “No [this or that].”)  Why not the other products?  Not even dairy?

Today the Niche Meat Processors Assistance Network (NMPAN) conducted a webinar titled Working Effectively with Your Processor.

For those of you not familiar with NMPAN, it is an eXtension initiative intended to help small-scale meat processors with various aspects of their business.  The interests of NMPAN affiliates vary — some are there to assist processors and some are there to assist livestock farmers.  My notes and thoughts about this webinar are outlined below.  Presentations were made by Kathleen Harris of Northeast Livestock Processing Service Company and Bruce Dunlop of Island Grown Farmers’ Cooperative.

Take Home Messages

I was attentive during the hour-long webinar and scribbled down some point that I thought were very important.  To be honest, I was skeptical of how good the program was going to be when the webinar started with “small plants are more humane and food safety is better.”  Just like farms, small size is not an automatic qualifier for food safety and humane practices.  Then, the meat presentation became much more palatable.  Key points made:

Scheduling and Delivery:  Though you might have to schedule something six months an in advance, that’s the reality of the situation.  Visit with the slaughterhouse or nearby livestock farmers to see if there are other animals that can go on the truck to fill the load, making travel to and from the processor more efficient.  Be punctual with animal drop-off and meat pick-up.

Communicating with the Processor:  Use the butcher’s cut sheet.  This serves as an order form and is usually indicative of what the processor is capable of doing.  Make sure all of the directions are provided at the time the animal is dropped off at the plant.  Also, it typically does not help the farmer or the butcher when the farmer contacts the butcher all the time.  When the order is complete, you’ll be contacted.

Cooperating with the Processor:  Personally, I found these points to all be excellent.  In fact, 5 of the 10 “Commandments” as they were called, had little to do with the animal or the meat — it was about how to treat the processor.  The messages included:

• Don’t be demanding
• Be sensitive of their time
• Compliment them on their work
• Be grateful and appreciative
• and respect them

It sounds like a lot, I know.  Yet one of the concluding messages was simply  that the processor / butcher / slaughterman or whatever you want to call him or her is providing the farmer with a service that the farmer is either unwilling or unable to do.

The farmer and the butcher couldn’t go on without one another, yet there are a lot more farmers than butchers.  That means that the butchers has to deal with many different farmers and (coming from a family of famers) understand full well and good that such a situation means being faced with a lot of strong opinions and personalities.  The farmers often say they’re frustrated.  Well, so’s the butcher, so maybe we should just step it back a notch and figure out how to work together on this.

There are various campaigns designed to encourage reduced meat consumption in much of the Western World.  The three most common “benefits” I observe used in such campaign promotion include:  (1) Human Health, (2) Animal Rights and/or Well-Being, and  most recently (3) Environmental Impact.

Export Markets and Population

All of that can be perfectly well intentioned; however, the thought that reduced meat consumption will result in fewer livestock animals and thus, fewer GHG’s, seems oversimplified and flawed.  Why?  Because the food system is global and what we don’t sell domestically we can likely be export.  As of Feburary 2011, 27% of U.S. pork and 12.9% of U.S. beef was exported (Source:  U.S. Meat Export Federation).

Major export markets for U.S. meats include Mexico, Republic of Korea, Canada, Japan, Egypt, Vietnam and Russia.  The list of other markets is expansive.  We should also remember that Europe (11%) and Northern America (U.S. + Canada; 5%)  – where much of the emphasis on meat consumption reduction is concentrated — constitutes 16% of the World’s population.  That is nearly the same as food-insecure Africa (15%).

Finding New or Larger Markets

Yes, the U.S., Canada and Europe consume a lot of meat, much more than many other places.  One reason for this is that much meat is produced there (or elsewhere and imported).  Increased economic prosperity almost always results in increased meat consumption, and universal adoption of an effort to make conscious food choices (that’s one description I’ve read of Meatless [insert day] campaigns) seems unrealistic.  Have you ever gotten the chain E-mail fwd: about Wal-Mart in China?  As more countries continue to develop, their demand for meat will grow.  Even if we all go meatless for a day in the U.S. (this is a popular example) — one day per week — that means a 14.3% (1/7) more meat would be available for export.

Be it independent farmers or agribusinesses, small butcher shops or packing industry giants, I bet that they would figure out a way to export meat to new or larger markets rather than reducing the size of their herds, flocks, and businesses.

As a separate document, the Environmental Working Group published the their methodology for “Meat Eater’s Guide.”  Before reading the final report, it is beneficial to read the methods for the research presented in the “Guide.”  To develop their life cycle assessment (LCA) of GHG’s associated with meat consumption, many assumptions had to be made.  This is certainly true of any LCA — assumptions, empirical data, averages, all of that has to come into play.  In the introduction it is stated that the objective was to model what could be considered the “conventional” process from conception to consumption.  The report from the EWG provides a good basis for questions to be asked and future research to be conducted.

Some Notable Assumptions

1. The role of maternal maintenance and production volume (i.e. litter size), and the associated assumptions, varied from species to species and did not necessarily reflect all co-products (i.e., cows that produce milk and eventually become meat) in a realistic or “conventional” way.
2. Processing data is based upon New Zealand’s processes.  Abattoirs in New Zealand tend to be more automated than the US and it is very likely that the energy required to operated that equipment is greater.
3. Shipment of sheep meat from Australia and New Zealand for US consumption is reasonable, yet this is the only species for which import/export shipping is considered.  The U.S. imports and exports a lot of beef and pork.
4. I am bewildered by the use of a cow/calf feedlot in Nebraska for the model.  This is simply not how the vast majority cow/calf beef cattle farms are operated.
5. Admittedly, I know little about chicken production in British Columbia.  It is very interesting, though, that production is regulated and that they seem to target only consumption by Canadians (per this Supply Management message), yet was included in this study.
6. The home storage and cooking section kitchen do not reflect what happens in my kitchen, but that’s just me.  How does it relate to you?
7. The attempted LCA only includes what EWG deems “conventional” and no investigation regarding what they deem to be “best practices and/or organic” is included.
8. Nor is it firmly stated that some “conventional” practices increase productivity and reduce GHG emissions, therefore never considered to be a “best practice.”

Which leads me to:

Recommended practices omitted from the methodology

The recommendations seem to be a catch-all of trendy meat choices (if one opts to eat meat) that extend far beyond the GHG LCA — which, as I understand it, was the intent of the Meat Eater’s Guide.  Few comparisons of “best practice and/or organic” to “conventional” were ever made, yet some recommendations (in addition reducing the intake of animal products) are to consume organic or other “certified XYZ” animal products.  We have read many of the recommendations before, and yes, they are all popular for various reasons.

The list of recommendations taken from the EWG site, my comments are in parentheses:

1. Grass-fed or pasture-raised meat (included in LCA, lots of gray area with “pasture-raised”)
2. Lean cuts (makes sense, but that’s related to the LCA how?  end-point body condition was included where?)
3. No antibiotics or hormones (Why this specific recommendation when using them can reduce GHG?)
4. Certified organic (references pesticide use, etc., which fits the GHG message how?)
5. Certified humane (some can argue that certain “certified humane” requirements can be detrimental to animal health and well-being)
6. Unprocessed, nitrite-free, and low-sodium (What does this have to do with the GHG LCA?)
7. Sustainable seafood (the point about avoiding airfreighted food makes complete sense; but what about avoiding airfreighted “sustainable” meat?) 

Growing up, when we had steak for dinner it usually meant that everybody got one serving of steak — or in our house, one steak per person.  And, if someone at the table couldn’t finish their steak, there was no problem finding someone to finish off those leftovers.  Never in our house did we think of a “serving” of steak as being 3 oz. of meat.  Depending on where you look, you’ll find that a serving size of meat is 3 ounces and 2-3 servings of meat per day is the usual recommendation.  On the upper end, that’s 9 oz. of meat a day, or just a little more than 1/2 pound.  Lamb, pork and veal cuts will be omitted from this discussion (less one price mention below) because they are generally, though not always, smaller and more akin to a single “serving” of meat than beef; thus, the focus of this post will be on beef.

Context

A simple reference, a serving of meat is roughly the size of a deck of cards.

It is not uncommon to see steaks on a menu tipping the scale at 18 oz. or more.  A petite tenderloin or sirloin cut might creep up from time to time, and if memory serves me well, might be in the 7 oz. neighborhood.  [Bear in mind that the recommendations take cooking into account.]  That single 18 oz. steak, a strip steak let’s assume (we don’t need to confound this with bone-in vs. boneless, etc.) is 6 servings of meat, or roughly 2 days worth.  The more common (my observation) 12 oz. strip steak would be 4 servings, enough to justify vegetarian meals for the rest of the day.  One burger of two- 1/4 pound patties fulfills the day’s meat needs as well.  And don’t forget those 3 lb. burger or 72 oz. steak challenges.

The standard presentation of nutritional information is based upon portion size — 3 oz.  The question is, however, who eats meat 3 oz. at a time?  Or more importantly, where can you get a steak that is roughly 3 oz. in size?  It’s been stated that 3 oz. of beef provides less than 10% of a day’s calories in a 2,000 calorie/day diet and that it’s a nutrient dense food.  It really is a “superfood.”  But what about moderation?  On a serving basis, this could easily be extrapolated to that 18 oz. steak: “One of our steaks provides less than 60% of your day’s calories.”  This is simply because the “portion” is so incredibly huge.

Portion Controlled Cuts

A few years ago I met a butcher named Kari Underly.  She’s pretty much awesome and recently released a book, “The Art of Beef Cutting.”  One of Kari’s previous endeavors was to work with The Beef Checkoff and the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association to develop “Beef Alternative Merchandising” (BAM) a few years ago.  This concept was recently covered in a Drovers article.  A demonstration of some the BAM cuts can be found here.  From the article about reasonably portioned beef cuts:

“…consumers appreciate cooking tips and detailed recipes. They also prefer smaller cuts with less trim. ‘The right-size portion for many of them seems to be a 4-ounce (oz.) portion,’ she says.  That might seem discouraging, considering the impetus was how to deal with larger carcass size, but it actually opens more doors in beef marketing, Underly says.”

Alas!  A steak portion cut nearly the size of a serving of meat.  As well, there is an opportunity to improve upon eating quality of meat by just portioning it differently.  Let’s consider the traditional way to cut a ribeye steak.  Just cut across it and there you go, that’s your steak.  Well (and this is why some people say ribeyes of cattle be too big — they can be), in order to get a 12 oz. steak, the steak has to be cut rather thin and the eating experience is just not the same as eating a thick, properly prepared steak.  I know this is an old example, but a relevant one here.  Instead of sandwich-type steaks, that ribeye can be cut a bit thicker after the cap has been pulled off (see the BAM videos) and then halved to create two ribeye steak.  And, that’s just one option to creatively cut them.

Some of you might be thinking, so what?  Why doesn’t the consumer just cut up the steak in their own kitchen?  Two things to consider.  (1) There is a certain pride of ownership by having your own steak, even if that just means that someone else cut it up for you, and (2) pork loins.  It’s not uncommon to find whole pork loins at the supermarket for a cheap price, then see pork loin chops right next to it that costs more.

]]> http://meatblogger.org/2011/07/21/a-glimmer-of-single-serving-hope/feed/ 5 craines http://meatblogger.org/2011/07/19/0-4-and-that-includes-horses/ http://meatblogger.org/2011/07/19/0-4-and-that-includes-horses/#comments Tue, 19 Jul 2011 21:29:47 +0000 Chris Raines http://meatblogger.org/?p=1892 Continue reading →]]> “Meat Eater’s Guide”

On Monday the Environmental Working Group released their version of a life cycle assessment for meat production and consumption.  From what I know, this is the first attempt to to model the entire meat system instead of only modeling livestock production.  That effort deserves some applause.  But hold on … you really need to read the document.There are multiple shortcomings and assumptions that do not seem reasonable in the report — certain items were deemed “typical” when they simply are not.  The “Meat Eater’s Guide” is somewhat loosely collected and is, at best, representative of where meat production and consumption is today.  It does not recommend what cannot be improved upon, how the system can be changed / improved / altered to enhance its “sustainability.”  Instead, the recommendation surfing across the interwebs is essentially a repackaging “Meatless Monday” to include cheese.

Confounding messages

I will be writing about the report over the course of the next week or two.  For now, I encourage you to read the document and do so carefully.  The messages are mixed, you will constantly encounter the word “confined.”  The most egregious head-scratcher is the the technology aversion that permeates the document.  Grass-fed only, no rbST, other “good” things are recommended although the actual adoption of such technologies usually results in reduced GHG emissions per unit of meat or milk than if the technology is avoided.

A whopping 0.44%

In regard to avoiding meat and cheese for a day, that’s somehow close to removing 7.6 million cars from the road over the course of a year according to EWG.  We could, however, back-calculate some numbers from the EPA.  This point was made by Dr. Judith Capper (Washington State University) recently at the annual meetings of the American Society of Animal Science and the American Dairy Science Association.  In the United States, animal agriculture is reportedly responsible for 3.12% of GHG emissions. Cutting out products of animal agriculture one day a week would equate to:  3.12% GHG / 7 days = 0.44%.  This is simple math applied to existent EPA data.

That number includes horses that we do not (and unfortunately cannot) consume (but that’s an entirely different can of worms to sift through).  According to Dr. Capper, the portion of animal agriculture that we should consider is <3.1% since the original call for Meatless Mondays cited red meat and cheese as the villain and thus, poultry and horses should be removed from the do-not-eat list of GHG emitters.

slaughter c.1300, “killing of a cattle or sheep for food, killing of a person,” from O.N. *slahtr, akin to slatr ”a butchering, butcher meat,” slatra ”to slaughter,” and slattr ”a mowing;” related to sla ”to strike” (see slay), from P.Gmc. *slukhtis. Meaning “killing of a large number of persons in battle” is attested from mid-14c. The verb is from 1530s. (Source:  etymonline.com)

Intentionally Changing Language

In the last two decades many of those directly involved in agriculture, as well as those who like write or report on agricultural happenings or issues, have decided to change the English language.  Not by inventing new words LOL OMG, rather, the changes have been in the form of modified definitions.  There are many examples of this, including the often criticized broad-spectrum use of various label claims.

Examples of this include factually wrong statements such as “hormone-free” or loosey-goosey interpretations of “natural.”  ”Sustainable” can probably be added to that list, too, if perhaps only for the different synonyms (again, usually wrongly) associated with it.  Frequently, those involved in or supportive of contemporary agriculture dismiss label claims as unnecessary simply because the product is not superior to “unnatural (?)” items in any way other than a few words on the label.  This redefinition of words has been done in the interest of marketing.

Slaughter is Harvest is Process, Somewhow

While many can agree that the deliberate altering of word meanings for the sake of marketing is sometimes understandable but usually meaningless, there is one pesky word for which there are two different schools of thought about its appropriateness.  Slaughter.  There are people who simply call it slaughter because, well, that is what it is.  And, there are the others who have decided, somehow, that the word “slaughter” is simply too much for consumers to handle and have decided that the “correct” term to be used in place of slaughter is harvest.  Both thought processes have some justification behind them, perhaps.

One words means to kill an animal for use as food and the other word means to gather crops from the field.  Which one sounds like the one that applies to farm animals that will become meat?

Instead, we now “harvest” livestock at “processing plants.”  It has been argued that slaughtering animals in slaughterhouses is too graphic.  This brings up many interesting points regarding word use and assumptions regarding what “consumers” find acceptable.

Implications of the New Diction

• Currently, we harvest pigs, cattle, chickens, corn, soybeans and hay.  Yet, we milk cows and shear sheep.  In a dilutive effort to make agricultural terms more palatable, perhaps we should have milk harvesting parlors on dairy farms and wool harvesters should replace sheep shears.
• There is a general frustration within some agricultural circles that “consumers” do not have an understanding or appreciation for where their food comes from, and I certainly understand this perspective.  To garner better understanding, perhaps, terms suited (or even created for that specific process) should be used to described what is happening at various stages of the food production system.
• Glossing over the fact that animals die certainly does not help achieve any sense of transparency within agriculture.  If one cannot accept this fact then perhaps meat is not for them.  By renaming the slaughter process to “harvesting” there might appear to be an intentional effort to disconnect people from this fact.
• Harvesting and processing (at least in my mind) of animals sounds rather industrial, as in “I just sent a load of livestock to the processing plant.”  All the while there is much frustration within contemporary agriculture caused by the phrase “factory farm.”  Well, when the “correct” term of “processing plant” is used to describe the fate of the “crop,” that sounds pretty factory-ish to me.

Where we Are

This semantic blindfolding has crept up quite a bit in the last week among my colleagues and friends.  Last week a friend of mine presented some data to a group of agribusiness salespeople and used the term “slaughter” in the presentation.  My friend was then told that she *must* change the term slaughter to harvest because that is such an unsavory term.  Mind you, this was a presentation directed to vendors of livestock feeds.

Another friend of mine decided to post photos of on-farm beef slaughter to her blog as part of her “ranch life” photography series.  Simply, livestock ranches and “ranch life” would not exist if there is no death of something.  She was contacted by a beef organization and essentially chastised for posting images that would (in a somewhat decisive tone) turn people away from eating beef.  Was there a beef market crisis the day after Oprah aired her video tour inside a cattle slaughterhouse?  Nope. And, Oprah even called it a slaughterhouse!

A few months ago I posted a picture of a steer being exsanguinated or “bled” during the slaughter process and asked for feedback.  I received about 100 responses, some in favor and some against posting such a picture.  One observation I made is that those who have not been somehow indoctrinated into what is “agriculturally p.c.” said that I needed to posted, that such imagery is what they wanted to see.  Conversely, those directly tied to agriculture told me that it was “too much” for consumers (a.k.a., the the people who wanted to see it and saw it) could handle.

Slaughter Beach, Delaware. Would renaming it to "Harvest Beach" help with tourism? Probably not.

Regarding many of the food safety interventions practiced by many meat processors, a pH fluctuation is often used to to kill bacteria.  Just what is pH and how does it impact various foods?  In the technical sense, this is pH:

I also realize that this only means something to people who get really jazzed about pH (such as me).  The majority of people probably just care to know that pH is simply a reference for how acidic or alkaline something is.  The pH of food is an incredibly important property.  Not only does it impact a product’s flavor in many way (lemon juice would’t be lemon juice if it didn’t have a relatively low pH), but it also impacts a foods functionality.  pH is very relevant to protein function — it effects how proteins are folded and interact with one another.  pH also outside of a given bacteria’s “comfort zone” means that a tweak in pH, often just a temporary tweak at that, is enough to kill it.  The meat generally buffers the pH swing such that the end pH of the product is hardly changed at all.  An exception, of course, is fermented products like pepperoni or Lebanon bologna for which the reduced pH (acidic) is desired.

Below are some illustrations of the pH scale in relation to different consumer products as well as various foods.  Briefly, pH becomes “basic” or “alkaline” as the pH moves above 7 (which is neutral), whereas pH becomes “acidic” as it moves below 7.

A generic pH scale with reference points of various consumer products. Source: Wikipedia

This image is not one I created and does contain many inaccurate points about meat ... the normal pH of beef, pork and lamb is usually in the neighborhood of 5.6-5.8. I decided to show this image (source: theinformationnetwork.com) to illustrated the wide range in pH among some common foods. Some of the pH differences have likely been exaggerated.