The rosy meat from humanely raised male calves is reviving U.S. appetites
By Jane Black
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
Eating veal -- or not eating it, to be more accurate -- is one thing many carnivores and vegetarians can agree on. For most, the methods used to produce tender, milky-colored meat aren't a worthwhile trade-off. But what if eating veal were no less ethical than eating pork, chicken or lamb? What if, under the right circumstances, eating veal were actually more ethical than shunning it?
This is not that veal: the mostly flavorless meat from calves raised in crates so small they can't turn around. Humanely raised veal -- sometimes called pasture-raised, sometimes called rose veal because of its color -- comes from calves that drank their mother's milk and ate pasture grass. Its producers argue that if male calves, an otherwise useless byproduct of the dairy industry, are not ethically raised for meat, they are sold to less-humane veal producers or destroyed.
It's the way the veal is raised, not it's age why most people will not eat veal. That's my reason. I saw a TV program on how bad the conditions are for the calves in the "factory farms" when I was a wee lass and decided I wasn't going to contribute to it. Taken away from their mothers at birth, stuck in a pen so small they can't turn around or lay down and kept in the dark to make them endemic so their meat is pale white. I would eat veal if it was some of the kinder raised.
__________________ Most of all, cook from the heart, and you’ll never be lonely when the dinner bell rings! - Chef Robert Irvin
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