PrintIs Kobe beef unethical?
I just read the article in Gourmet - it might make you rethink Kobe beef:
http://www.gourmet.com/magazine/2000s/2007/12/kobe_beef_estabrook?currentPage=all
Traditional Japanese producers, Blackmore said, raise their 1,600-pound cattle in highly confined areas. “From the time they are a week old until they are three and a half years old, these steers are commonly kept in a lean-to behind someone’s house,” said Blackmore, “where they get bored and go off their feed. Their gut stops working. The best way to start their gut working again is to give them a bottle of beer.
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4 Comments:
It very well may be, but it's too expensive for me to worry about.
seyo at 4:40PM on 01/22/08
I don't think Wagyu raised in the US is treated this way. I understand that it is just an intensive grain baised diet, and the specific physiology of the breed that allows the intense, fine-veined marbeling. I'm no expert but I think the beer thing is a common misconception. In brewing areas globally, the grain left after the wort is pressed from the mash is fed to livestock. I think this is what is happening in Japanese cattle as well. The rumen of all cattle will stop being effective with a lack of grass to keep it running, in larger operations this is replaced with artificially produced bacterial compounds, in smaller or grassfed operations it is natural.
coolname at 6:29PM on 01/22/08
I am not quite sure what the author means by the image of cows standing "contentedly in a sea of waving grass." He provides no source for that image. Have I missed some commercial or memo? I am under no allusions that cows are frolicking in huge pastures under rainbows playing with their bunny friends. Especially in Japan where the article correctly notes space is at a premium. The author comes off as naive.
I don't purchase 'kobe' beef because of the living conditions of the cows but because we can raise similar types of cows here which not only costs less but has less impact on the environment.
bravian at 6:52PM on 01/22/08
It's certainly not any more unethical than the practices behind veal or foie gras...and I'm not going to stop eating those any time soon.
Like seyo said, it's too expensive for me to worry about. I'm more concerned with fast food, preservatives and high-fructose corn syrup than some fancy beef.
sheeats at 6:31PM on 01/23/08