I Thought That Whopper Tasted Kinda' Funny!

[jezr74]

Is horse meat comparable to beef in taste and texture? My wife and I swapped out beef with kangaroo meat at a barbie one night. No one knew and thought it was steak. Some refused to believe me after coming clean, was hilarious and allot cheaper at the same time.

Can you actual get horse meat here at a butchers?

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[granfire]

You really believe that?

cross species contamination.
Yes, it should be.

 

[Tez3]

In Europe horse meat is available at butchers, in the UK you can easily find butchers who sell it. I think the problem with horse meat is that horses aren't bred and kept for meat so there's no control over what they are fed or what medications etc they are given so it makes it riskier.
http://www.marketplace.org/topics/world/drugged-american-horsemeat-sold-europe

 

[celtic_crippler]

You'd think Europe would have taken some steps to improve the insepction of meats after the Mad Cow Disease fiasco. In 2009, 166 people in the UK alone were killed because of "infected meat".

Were no new protocols implemented?

 

[granfire]

In Europe horse meat is available at butchers, in the UK you can easily find butchers who sell it. I think the problem with horse meat is that horses aren't bred and kept for meat so there's no control over what they are fed or what medications etc they are given so it makes it riskier.
http://www.marketplace.org/topics/world/drugged-american-horsemeat-sold-europe

well, I'll bite, because I am a veteran of that merry go round discussion....

Approximately 100.000 US horses a year go by way of slaughter for human consumption, currently they go by way of Canada or Mexico.
That is about 1% of the population.

The majority are quarter horses and horses that look like them. Easily done, it is the world's largest registry.

However, I - personally - think the risk of drugs is overstated.
While it is true that drugs are more prevalent in the barn first aid kit than I have experienced in Europe, I also believe the people who pull out the bottle at every turn are in the minority and are also not likely to let their pet go for food (now turning the 1200 pound animal into toxic waste is another matter which we won't touch on today), by selling it down the road.

Horses are given mostly the same drugs as cattle. There is the things about the FDA: you have to pay for the extensive tests to prove or disprove you medications. Since horses are - generally - not bred for meat or kept for that purpose, it is a net savings for the pharma company to avid these added cost.
But cattle, pigs, sheep, poultry...all is treated at some time or another and the withdraw periods are(hopefully) observed.

There is the issue of 'Bute' and I have to look the real name up....it's a painkiller, not like NSAIDs. It is known to cause cancer in humans. The official stand is that any animal ever treated with that is not fit for human consumption. Where I can't wrap my little mind around is, unless it is a heavy metal that won't be expelled from the body ever, should it not be metabolized and eliminated some time in say, six month or so? That just as a side note.

In Europe there is a passport system established. As I understand, it's a two way deal: Horses you don't mind going for steak, and the My Pretty Pony...it includes detailed restrictions on what you can treat a horse with.

The EU has also established new regulations for the plants that process meat for them. That does include the Canadian and Mexican ones as well.

The sellers are to fill out forms, documenting the medical history or 6 month period of withdraw....is their room for wrong doings? I am sure there is.

The US lacks a centralized tracking system for horses. I know it sounds like a Big Brother scare, but it is not a bad thing for the industry.
Breeding and sport go hand in hand and it is beneficial for breeders to track their product or riders to follow the lineage.
Right now the situation looks more like in Black Beauty: With every new home the history is lost.


As European countries get richer, the taste for horse meat diminishes, although interestingly enough, during the mad cow scare the demand for Cheval increased. But in the past especially the Eastern countries loaded up their product by the train load to ship to France. A riding school my sister took lessons at made a pretty good living by selling the Polish bred horses as riding horses.


However, the idea of cross contamination should worry the officials. It means that hygiene was not exactly primary concern and the cleaning protocolls were likely not followed. It could be a bacterial contamination next!

 

[Tez3]

You'd think Europe would have taken some steps to improve the insepction of meats after the Mad Cow Disease fiasco. In 2009, 166 people in the UK alone were killed because of "infected meat".

Were no new protocols implemented?

The company concerned with the horse meat being found in the Burger King burgers is in Eire so not covered by UK legislation.The testing was done by the Irish Trading Standards people. I'm presuming that BK used the cheapest company there was rather than a British one, their new contractor has quite exhaustive checks on what comes in and goes out.
While 166 people did die from BSE it wasn't in one year, the firgures are 'by 2009 166 people had died'. The disease has a very long incubation period ( up to 8 years). Nearly 5 million cattle were destroyed in the 1990s to eradicate the disease here. One interesting fact was that in countries where grass alone is used to feed cattle they don't have BSE (but yes it's in North America btw), in the 20 years or so farming methods for beef cattle have changed here as has what is allowed into the food chain both theirs and ours.

It's not just horses that get 'Bute' it's a favourite of jockeys too!. Though you can't eat them, absolutely no meat on them whatsoever! that particular drug is used here a lot by vets.

 

[granfire]

It's not just horses that get 'Bute' it's a favourite of jockeys too!. Though you can't eat them, absolutely no meat on them whatsoever! that particular drug is used here a lot by vets.

ah, they probably just got trace from walking through the barn....




Warning: Probably not work safe, Definitely not Husband safe.

it's all lean muscle mass.

 

[Tez3]

ah, they probably just got trace from walking through the barn....




Warning: Probably not work safe, Definitely not Husband safe.

it's all lean muscle mass.

Do your racehorses not have nosebands on their bridles? See, how tactful is that lol! He's nice but short lol!!

 

[Steve]

Personally, I have no problem with the idea of eating horse. The troubling thing here is that bk is serving one thing but selling another. In other words, I want to know that when I order beef that I'm getting beef.

I've heard of something similar with regards to some places using pork instead of veal.

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[granfire]

Do your racehorses not have nosebands on their bridles? See, how tactful is that lol! He's nice but short lol!!

can't double check right now, Hubby is sitting behind me.....

(but there is a general aversion towards hair in this country....whiskers are routinely trimmed....)