here's another thing Granfire, I was having a highly intellectual argument about the old adage, "you are what you eat" with one of my work buddies, an Indian dude who is some kind of veg-o type and who places some kind of spiritual importance on cows or yaks (or some thing with horns, I forget, that's not important anyway). He has an issue with all the cold cuts of beef, beef shakes, chicken, various animal carcasses I consume through the day in his close proximity. : )
Cows eat grass, right? So that makes a cow like a mix of 95% grass and water, pretty much. Right?! Right.
If I then eat a cow, all I am essentially doing is eating a whole lot of grass or grass derived "stuff". meat is just a form of grass-product... grassy stuff...
Consuming large quantities of cow is really akin to being a veg-o. As the cow is what it eats and I'm eating that cow.
I think I made my point.
Second hand vegetarian, eh? Sounds good to me.
Around here, you get the evil eye suggesting horse is edible. For the same pseudo spiritual reasons.
(I don't do religion anymore.)
If you get good beef, you are still doing the bodily temple some good.
Unfortunately, something like 98% of all beef consumed in the US is processed in one of 4 plants.
And to supply the need for cheap meat (because we are all constantly broke) the cows get more than just grass to eat.
part of the discussion is the 'finishing' with grain (the majority is done this way), the cows are corralled in feed lots, eat grain, chew cud and hang out (PETA thinks it's cruel...). Use of pharmaceuticals is also possible....plus, of course, the large amounts are a strain on the surroundings, and the low price a burden on the producers.
You will probably not go back to supermarket meat (if you can afford to) once you had some raised by a small farm, processed by a small abattoir. (there also seems to be a lot of water in commercial meat....that's why they have to put those diaper thingies in the packs, and as it seems, it's part of the poundage in some stores)
And of course it keeps the small farm near the urban centers from selling to developers.....
I am not too far removed from people who had meat only a couple of times a week.
Of course, one of my favorite things in the world is Black Forrest Ham - not the junk sold here under the label! The good stuff, not cooked into oblivion, but cured and smoked to perfection, with a small remnant of silky fat around the edge.....hmmmmmmmmmmmmm
Prosciutto is a rather expensive substitute....
The problem is that we have become so affluent in the last half century or so, we forgot that vegetables are the base of the meal, meat the flavoring, not the main part. The balance is out of whack.
And we eat too much.
And we fell for the commercial spiel, concocted after WWII, when the companies who supplied the troops with grub needed to find civilian ways for their prepared food lines. Enter the TV dinner.
Plant a victory garden, keep some chickens....feed clean grass to your cow, and you have clean meat.
(and yeah, that reincarnation thing....just imagine the cows were politicians in a past life - they deserve it!)
.....I hope Mr Tez recovers fully and continues to do well
actually help with going vege!! : )
