“After avoiding beef for a while, my first tastes of it were amazing: bloody, mineral, animal. It hasn’t bored me since. But now with Mad Cow back on the radar, I’m thinking again about my boycott. I’m considering doing it again, but doing it for real this time. There is a big part of me that would love to be able to say that I eat meat—happily, voraciously—but only meat that is responsibly produced. By that, I mean in terms of the animal, in terms of the environment, and in terms of the people who work so hard to raise and process the stuff. But here’s my problem: My favorite taco truck doesn’t cook with that kind of meat, not for two bucks a taco. It’s vital to know where your food comes from, but that doesn’t just mean what farm it was raised on. It goes through the hands of cooks, and emerges the product, too, of their skills, their sweat, their culture. It’s a human process, a process in which I can’t imagine myself not participating, not wanting to engage.”
-Beefcott Dilemma- Gourmet Magazine
The topic of encouraging our country to have a higher standard of animal welfare is really important to me. I try and make it through every week (small goals) knowing that everything Jacob and I have consumed was farmed organically (preserving clean water resources) and humanely. The only thing the gets in the way is going to restaurants. I’ve made the decision to never go to a mediocre restaurant again. I can just make far better food at home anyway.
I’m really surprised that after going through so many years of the American education system, never was there even a mention of organic farming (or how choosing how you eat and purchase your groceries), has such a huge impact on the future of our environment and the health of the coming generations. It makes me really sad and it also answers some of the not so mysterious questions of where the American diet went wrong.
