Donkey, goat and water buffalo

Ray · 2013-02-27T10:38:54+00:00

If you eat meat, and in particular, processed meat, then you have been eating donkey, goat and water buffalo. How does that make you feel? Me? I don’t worry...

Donkey, goat and water buffalo

Manfred-Klose

well donkey tasted good so far. ?

...in next weeks news : taylor swift wrote another song....

P.s: i cant help notice the ad on guitarforum on the right "5 simple and natural ways to increase the bond between you and your horse"

Chocklit_Thunda

All I can say is, "Mmmmmmmm!" ?
Because if that WAS donkey, goat or water buffalo (where the H3LL do you even get those???) it tasted pretty good when I ate that Russian.... And I'm still here aren't I?
Hakuna Matata. ?

Attila

I don't know I you guys remember but in Kempton Park CBD there was a butcher who had a large yellow sign which said "Horse Meat" and he was there for years might still be there.

Which is obviously great as you knew what you were buying upfront assuming of course that you swung that way

RobbieZ

The best steak I ever had was horse meat.
I agree, we need to know what is in the processed meat. But, I am and always will remain a carnivore :woohoo:. If I go a few days without meat I get withdrawal symptoms!

flatfourfan

SO I was watching the new season of top gear last night............the STIG is 46% horsemeat.

joealien22

I don't know the big deal is. There's far worse stuff that goes into our food than foreign meats.

Shibbibilybob

There are two big issues here:

The first is the source. Meat labelled as what it is seems more likely to be healthy, fresh meat from a legitimate source. If you're putting other ingredients into your product, it's because it's cheaper, which suggests that,although I have no issue with eating donkey meat, that the donkey meat that finds its way into "beef" products is hardly likely to be your premium meat.

As for horses and donkeys and why people dont like eating them, that is a stigma from around 150 years ago. Horses and donkeys were the engines of the world before the industrial revolution. Horses were more useful alive than dead, and were worked hard. So when a horse did die, they were likely old and very tough and not so pleasant to eat. This made horse meat cheap and gave it a stigma of being eaten by poor people. So it's kinda a class thing too.

singemonkey

Did you guys read Bob's response? The issue is that there is no tracking and history on those kinds of meats. They might contain disease or drugs that shouldn't enter human circulation.

If the meat isn't what it says it is, you don't know where it came from.

flatfourfan

Plus..........all these slaughter houses are registered for certain animals only, none are for donkey, goats or water buffalo.......

so somewhere they are being brough in through the backdoor......

Bob-Dubery

flatfourfan wrote: Plus..........all these slaughter houses are registered for certain animals only, none are for donkey, goats or water buffalo.......

so somewhere they are being brough in through the backdoor......

Meat is now an international commodity. A mate of mine is a meat trader. He brings meat into this country from all over the place.

He has sources that he knows and trusts, but if demand is high, supply low or the customer's primary concern is price then he has to get what he can get, and he may not be able to establish the provenance of the meat.

Again, this is not a local problem. It's an international problem. Been following the news in the UK (which is where the scandal first erupted)?

The days when the meat you bought came from the farm down the road (or at least in the same province) are long gone. A lot of meat consumed in the UK is reared and slaughtered, maybe even butchered and packaged in Eastern Europe. A lot of meat consumed in SA is reared and slaughtered and packaged in South America.

flatfourfan

1 more reason to buy from a butcher who knows where his meat comes from. And another reason to stay away from processed foods.

Sean

Attila Barath wrote: I don't know I you guys remember but in Kempton Park CBD there was a butcher who had a large yellow sign which said "Horse Meat" and he was there for years might still be there.

Which is obviously great as you knew what you were buying upfront assuming of course that you swung that way

Assuming of course it really was horse meat ?

Bob-Dubery

flatfourfan wrote: 1 more reason to buy from a butcher who knows where his meat comes from. And another reason to stay away from processed foods.

How many butchers KNOW exactly where the meat came from, and how do you know which butchers know?

A butcher might buy from my mate. My mate might buy from a wholesaler he knows in Argentina. Who may have bought from a farmer who bought cattle from another farmer.

It comes down to chains and control and trust. And cost.

One of the interesting stories to come out of the skande in the UK was given by an anonymous person working for a cold-storage haulier. He told how some shops would not only vet the paperwork for the meat but then physically inspect it - which costs them time and money. Sometimes they would reject meat. He'd just stick it back in the van and go to the next shop who might just off-load the required quantity and not check a thing.

Yes, if you buy from a butcher who has carcasses hanging in the store, who cuts from a carcass whilst you're in the store and then butchers the meat in front of you then you're almost certainlly getting the meat that you asked for.

Ray

Well, for me the important thing is to know how the animal lived and died. I dont much care what the heck it is.

flatfourfan

X-rated Bob wrote:
Yes, if you buy from a butcher who has carcasses hanging in the store, who cuts from a carcass whilst you're in the store and then butchers the meat in front of you then you're almost certainlly getting the meat that you asked for.

Bingo.........

My butcher has had the same supplier for the last 40 years and they ONLY deal in complete carcasses. I honestly don't know why people even buy meat from a supermarket when it's a HECK of a lot cheaper buying it from a good butcher.

Gorgeous Ribeye steak.........R59-99p/kg, cut and trimmed while you wait.

Ray wrote: Well, for me the important thing is to know how the animal lived and died. I dont much care what the heck it is.

really?..........what was the last meal containing meat that you ate and where did it come from?

Bob-Dubery

We can link this thread to the Oscar Pistorius thread with the old lawyer's joke about the law and sausages: You might like them, but you don't want to see them being made.

babbalute

flatfourfan wrote:
X-rated Bob wrote:
Yes, if you buy from a butcher who has carcasses hanging in the store, who cuts from a carcass whilst you're in the store and then butchers the meat in front of you then you're almost certainlly getting the meat that you asked for.
Bingo.........

My butcher has had the same supplier for the last 40 years and they ONLY deal in complete carcasses. I honestly don't know why people even buy meat from a supermarket when it's a HECK of a lot cheaper buying it from a good butcher.

Gorgeous Ribeye steak.........R59-99p/kg, cut and trimmed while you wait.

Ray wrote: Well, for me the important thing is to know how the animal lived and died. I dont much care what the heck it is.
really?..........what was the last meal containing meat that you ate and where did it come from?

I wonder if this butcher can produce any certificate qualifying the meat being free from any drugs, medicines, dips.... etc that are not supposed be present in the meat. We all know that SA meat contains lot of antobiotics. This causes the meat to retain lots of water. You can see if it antibiotics when you cook your nice juicy steak in a pan or on the braai. If it shrinks in size and the pan contains a lot of "juice" then you know. The butcher is not qualified nor does he have the recourses to check the meat for any "foreign" constituent. One needs test kits and in many cases a laboratory setup for this. None of the suppliers of meat(the farmers etc) do any decent meat testing to qualify thier meat. And do not think that Woolworths does this aswell on abig scale. They simply trust their (linked) suppliers. This si the big discussion in Europe at the moment where they want to hold the supermarkets responsible for the their current problem. Euroepans are also not to clever I think as the supermarket sells a finished product, they do not manufacture it nor do they have to do any test to ensure that a banana is banana and Cow meat is indeed cow meat(without mixing it with horesemeat or like in SA waterbuffalo, donky and god knows whatelse they put into it. The manufacturer of the meat should be held responsible all the way this should include the farmer, the meat processor or the one that packs it and then supplies or sells it to the supermarket. They are the ones handling the product and they should have to provide proof tof what they supply, manufacture etc. This should be a nice job creation point at the source employ a few laboratory people to certify the "farmed meat" proof that it is free of pesticides, antibiotics, dips or any other foreign matter they fed it before they killed it. Ofcourse prices will go up dramatically, another saw point in Europe at the moment. But if you want to know what you are eating then one has little choice as we simply cannot trust the people who handle the meat before it is packed.

flatfourfan

Yup..........the certificates are on the wall where they serve. Like I said, I'm fussy where I buy my meat from.