Working in the fitness industry, I often encounter new terms to make food sound better and/or healthier. The new term I heard today is "Humanely Harvested." What does this mean? Did some hippy give the animal a hug before it was killed and butchered?
Sounds like a classification of processing standards that costs $ to get, such a good idea let's tax it.
Why can people not just call it what it is? It doesn't matter what it is, everything that we eat dies. Whether it's a plant or animal, we kill whatever we eat. It's part of living. I swear, people need to get a grip on reality.
What it means is that the hunter followed a code of ethics and killed the animal with as little suffering as possible. It's not humane to cripple an animal, take a shot that's too risky, etc.
My wife and I were just talking about this last night. Her friend (not a hippie by any standards) was at a party in the hippie part of town. A lady at the party actually said, sincerely, that a certain resturaunt bought meat from animals that had been treated well and hugged before killed and that you could "taste the difference" ... this is what's wrong with America.
I know with pork you can tell by the quality of meat if the pig was stressed before it was butchered.
I think "humanely harvested" is a joke. At the same time, the different hormones that are released in a stress event do affect the flavor of meat. I don't that you would be able to tell if you weren't eating the two side by side, but there is a difference. The best example I can think of is an antelope. One that is shot and drops right away isn't too bad. Not great but edible. Antelope that is shot while running or one that takes off on a run after the shot before dying is bad. Just my experience.
Actually, yes...lactic acid can build up in the muscles...the same can occur in deer. It's one of the reasons I can't understand those who hunt deer with dogs.
I know when I fix ribs that sometimes the membrane pulls off easy...sometimes I just give up on pulling it off. Kind of leads me to believe that how an animal is killed doesn't make much difference. The the qualities of the animal's meat are unique to that animal. A popular wive's tale around here is that deer killed in front of deer dogs are tougher because they have been run before being killed. I could never tell the difference myself. But, maybe my tastes aren't as refined and discerning as other's.
Aldo Leopold pretty much said there was a danger to society when he said that when people only know that heat comes from the furnace and breakfast comes from the grocery store is not a good thing.
It amazes me how many people don't know the reality of the world. So many people have never experienced even a night out in the woods to give them an understanding of how fragile our lives are without all the creature comforts we have developed. People who are against hunting, but happily eat meat from the grocery store are hypocritical idiots. People that think their dinner should be hugged are idiots. I saw a show once where they took some of these people into a processing plant so they could see the reality of their food. It was kinda interesting to see their reactions. They genuinely had no idea what it takes to get food to the table.
I am so glad that my kids were raised in a place where we grew our own food, they helped butcher and feed.
Well when it comes to Beef, it means the processing plant was able to successfully "Stun" 95% of the cows when processing them. I love how they use the word STUN to describe shooting a stainless steel bolt onto the head to knock the cow unconscious before slaughtering. But if you knocked it unconscious with a sledge hammer it is not as humane.
...and people like her get to vote....scary. I am a commercial feedlot operator. We sell the cattle to a Packer such as Tyson that "kills" or "slaughters" the animals as humanely as possible. I refuse to use the word "harvest" when referring to livestock albeit that is the politically correct terminology.
want to freak out a vegetarian? tell them they killed the lettuce so they could eat it! plants a just as much alive as animals are.
