Maybe it's silly...

[johnpalmer]

Maybe it's silly, but I found myself deciding that Italian sausage was a better idea for holiday lasagna than ground beef.

I guess what bothered me was reading the news story. This animal couldn't move under it's own power, see... so they slaughtered it anyway, but packaged the brain and spinal cord for testing.

Look, I know that there are statistical methods of measuring risk, and it might well be that I've eaten meat from sick bovines many a time, and never cared, and never been in danger, but it's just like "You *KNEW* this animal was seriously ill, and you *still* killed it and started chopping it up for human consumption? What's *wrong* with you people?"

So, I think I'm going to start preparing stuff to make lasagna later, and absolutely refuse to think about animal handling and meat packing procedures in US meat farming.

(Those of you who are unaware: there appears to have been an episode of mad cow disease here in Washington.)

Comments

[kightp.livejournal.com]

Italian sausage lasagna sounds absolutely yummy, my dear, BSE scare or not. (You'll want to brown the meat and drain off most of the fat, I think).

I had my "Christmas dinner" last night - a whole Dungenness crab, roasted vegetables and a nice bottle of chardonnay. I think today's meal is going to be nothing more than potatoes mashed with the leftover roast veg (leeks, fennel and garlic).

US meat processing - eh. You're right, it doesn't bear thinking about. It's one reason I like to buy from the Meat People at the farmers' market - I know their animals are reared and slaughtered in a humane fashion, and to very high standards. The cost is high, but I don't eat that much meat anyway, so the tradeoff is worth it.

(Hm. Speaking of which, I still have that leg of lamb in the freezer ... I do believe I'll start it thawing for this weekend.)

[lblanchard.livejournal.com]

There's mad sheep disease, too, you know -- or a sheepian form of mad cow.

(Replete with prime rib that I brought home in a Brinks truck)

[serenejournal.livejournal.com]

We had a combination of beef and italian sausage, for what it's worth -- we eat so little meat that I just called it an acceptable risk and went with it.