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When I lived in NL, I took a trip to Maastricht which is a beautiful place right in the South and tried a popular local dish - Zoervleis[0] which is traditional
by 12ian34 4y ago
When I lived in NL, I took a trip to Maastricht which is a beautiful place right in the South and tried a popular local dish - Zoervleis[0] which is traditionally horse meat. It was delicious. It always amuses me that when I tell this story, it's often met with disgust - even by meat-eaters! "But, how could you eat horse! They're so nice!". Yeah... you eat beef, have you ever met a cow up close? They're also lovely creatures! I see this as double-standards - similar to how most meat-eaters also seem so disgusted by the idea of eating dogs in certain parts of Asia.
[0]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zoervleis https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zoervleis
- xattt 4y agoYou also get this reaction if you declare having eaten what I would call secondary meats (rabbit, duck, lamb).
- jhrmnn 4y agoInteresting! Is this US-specific?
- dreamcompiler 4y agoRabbit is readily available in the rural US if you hunt and skin it yourself. I could eat forever just on the population in my yard. But alas...tularemia is a thing.
- 0n0n0m0uz 4y agoI actually contracted tularemia while rafting and camping along the Colorado river in Utah. The campsites attracted alot of critters, especially desert jackrabbits. I got bit by a flea or horsefly that was infected from the rabbit and about 3 days later I had a 105 fever and literally couldn't get out of bed for 3 days. Sickest I have ever been in my entire life.
- interestica 4y agoAlso 'rabbit starvation' is a thing... https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protein_poisoning https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protein_poisoning
- Moto7451 4y agoRabbit isn’t common in US grocery stores but Duck and Lamb are, especially around winter holidays.
- bombcar 4y agoDuck is a bit harder to prepare but is common - the local store even has Cornish game hens. Meat rabbits are still grown in some areas, but it's relatively rare to find on a supermarket shelf.
- hvs 4y agoNot the OP, but I'm in the US and.. it's complicated. I would say, in general, meats like lamb and, especially, veal have fallen out of favor due to the perceived poor conditions and youth of the animals. Rabbit isn't common in the US (it's not generally available in stores) but the "cuteness" factor plays a role here as well. This has changed since the 80's when lamb and veal were more popularly consumed. I'm guessing PETA's work has moved the needle in this area. Living in Minnesota, however, wild game is more widely consumed so things like duck, geese, pheasant, etc. aren't seen as odd or offensive. Horse is considered taboo for consumption in the US. I would say, in general, Americans can be turned off a meat source if it is perceived to have produced from poor conditions or is "cute". This, however, does not apply to beef, chicken, or pork. (Though you can squeeze a few more bucks out of people by calling something "free range").
- happyopossum 4y agoLamb is completely common - you can buy it at Costco for crying out loud. Heck, I even had some at a FAANG cafeteria the other day. Lamb’s consumption is not unusual in the US, and is completely unrelated to the veal issue.
- jupp0r 4y agoI was about to write the same thing when I read your comment. Additionally, duck and geese can be bought at my local whole foods and often sell out.
- dreamcompiler 4y agoMy SO who lived for a time in the UK refuses to eat lamb in the US because "it's terrible." Apparently lamb in the UK is the gold standard for quality.
- WastingMyTime89 4y agoTo go with your SO, meat is generally of a higher quality in Europe than the US due to the far more stringent regulations regarding production. It's also why Europeans tend to be far more relaxed than Americans regarding how meat is cooked.
- gundmc 4y agoRabbit, Duck, and Lamb are all pretty common meats to eat in the US. Usually in finer dining, but I've never seen anyone raise an eyebrow at these. Horse, on the other hand...
- Turing_Machine 4y agoDuck tends to be pretty expensive in upscale restaurants, but is generally available at a much more reasonable price in any good (but not necessarily fancy) Chinese restaurant.
- xattt 4y agoMy experience with squeamishness around meats varies depending on the crowd. People I know who I would consider to be a sample of the Canadian general population tend to stick to the meat trinity. Folks who are from multicultural groups are definitely more experimental with other kinds of meats.
- prawn 4y agoYou can get lion meat in the USA if you want to shock people: https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2013/03/25/175296454/why-illinois-is-roaring-mad-about-lion-meat https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2013/03/25/175296454/wh... Lamb and duck in particular are very common here in Australia. Personally, we seem to eat them more often than chicken.
- nwallin 4y agoThe conservation status of lion is threatened. I feel the same way about eating lion that I do about southern bluefin tuna; it's not sustainable, don't do it. I'd eat mountain lion or dog, but not lion or grey wolf. nb: wild carnivores are almost always infected with parasites like trichinosis. If you do eat them, cook it well done.
- bennyp101 4y agoIt’s quite common to eat rabbit, pidgin, pheasant in the UK, and duck and lamb are standard dishes
- collegeburner 4y agowhere are you in America? i never got anything like this.
- microtherion 4y agoMy (Swiss) kids enjoy eating chicken. I love eating duck, but I have to be VERY discreet about it, lest I want to be looked at like I'm a serial killer. Having referred to my food as "Donald" on one occasion probably didn't help…
- Sharlin 4y agoThe psychology of eating animals is definitely a great example of how people compartmentalize and simply avoid thinking about the details too much in order to evade cognitive dissonance. Which is also why so many respond with hostility when prompted to do so. (Disclaimer: I'm an omnivore.)
- layer8 4y agoAs an omnivore, at some point avoiding the dissonance became a zen of embracing the dissonance.
- collegeburner 4y agotbh i dont get why people arent ok eating horse or dog. i've had both and they're fine, like why is this a problem? i will be the first to call out veganism but i also have literally been lectured by meat eaters about how me eating those 2 is wrong and then they have eaten a burger or steak in the same day.
- Sharlin 4y agoMany social norms are arbitrary. People don't do things because you're not supposed to do things and nobody else does (or at least admits doing).
- dahfizz 4y agoDog is clearly a special case. It's the most common pet in the USA; many people consider their dog part of their family. Dogs are known for forming such strong connections to their humans. On the spectrum between farmed-for-food and totally-off-limits, it's not hard to guess where we would put dogs. It's just like indians and cows. Cows have a special place in their culture, therefore they don't eat beef.
- atdrummond 4y agoI’m not a vegan but I had a few cows growing up that basically became like pets. They would come up to me just to spend time and receive physical affection, they knew my voice, etc. I’m not sure if this reason for not eating dogs stands up to scrutiny for me.
- treeman79 4y agoMy small child. How do you spell chicken? Not the kind you eat, the bird. Oh my. We had some tears that day.
- dreamcompiler 4y agoOne can get horse meat in Japan too. (I think they mostly import it from France these days.) I had a nice cheval carpaccio there once, at the insistence of my Japanese hosts. It tasted good, but I have no desire to eat it again. I don't intend to ever try dog. From what I've heard the meat of carnivores tastes unpleasant, but that might be folklore.
- myshpa 4y ago> I've heard the meat of carnivores tastes unpleasant People eating salmons and other predatory fish would disagree. Horse meat is really good, and dogs probably taste like chicken anyway ... But no meat beats well-prepared tofu & seitan ;p
- dreamcompiler 4y agoAgreed. I've only heard the legend in relation to land mammal carnivores.
- ciguy 4y agoDog tastes nothing like chicken it's a much darker meat. I had it in China and it wasn't exactly unpleasant but definitely what we in the USA would describe as gamey. Basically pungent and heavy on flavor. The preparation I had was in Sichuan so they added tons of red chilies as well so it was very spicy. I wouldn't eat it again, once was enough.
- em-bee 4y agothe primary problem with dogs is that you don't know where they come from. there is no guarantee that dogs are raised in a healthy way specifically to be eaten, like sheep or chicken, but there is a high risk that the dogs are caught on the street, and have been feeding on whatever trash they found. and you don't know what kind of diseases they had either. basically, i would treat dogs like rats, unless the restaurant can certify that their dogs actually came from a farm for that purpose.
- 4y ago
- jules 4y agoIf I'm not mistaken, the preparation of the dish (meat boiled in vinegar for several hours, then sweetened up with gingerbread and reduced apple juice) was traditionally intended to tenderise the tough meat of old farm horses that had been used for ploughing the land. Almost all restaurants prepare the dish with beef nowadays.
- bombcar 4y agoMany old dishes are like this - slow cooking, for example, really comes into its own when you're slow cooking a egg-laying chicken that is 3-5 years old vs the "grown for meat" ones these days that are barely 8 weeks.
- xkcd-sucks 4y agoI'm reminded of an old Joy of Cooking recipe for raccoon: Boil it in baking soda overnight, then throw away the water and braise it for another few hours iirc
- seanwilson 4y ago> It always amuses me that when I tell this story, it's often met with disgust - even by meat-eaters! "But, how could you eat horse! They're so nice!". Yeah... you eat beef, have you ever met a cow up close? They're also lovely creatures! I see this as double-standards - similar to how most meat-eaters also seem so disgusted by the idea of eating dogs in certain parts of Asia. Doesn't this more indicate that many people deep-down think that eating animals is wrong and have these thoughts overridden by cultural preferences and tribalism, and that instead of resolving the above double-standard by embracing eating every kind of animal they could resolve it by not eating eat any? Where do you draw the line? You can find places and times in history where people ate dolphin, whales, cat, gorilla, and elephants too I think.
- bombcar 4y agoMore likely that we've been disconnected from the realities of the food chain; in general people didn't eat horses because they're more valuable as work animals vs meat. Farmers et al who deal with animals day in and day out don't seem to have much problem also eating them.
- rapnie 4y ago> Doesn't this more indicate that many people deep-down know that eating animals is wrong I am severely limiting my meat intake, both from environmental as well as animal welfare pov. But what you express is an entirely cultural opinion. Humans are by nature omnivore animals. They always ate meat. But we do it now on industrial scale, eating way too much. There's very few hunter-gatherers in their traditional habitat driving a spear to the wild animal's neck left.
- seanwilson 4y ago> I am severely limiting my meat intake, both from environmental as well as animal welfare pov. But what you express is an entirely cultural opinion. I think claims about environmental damage and animal welfare are objective, not opinion. > Humans are by nature omnivore animals. They always ate meat. But we do it now on industrial scale, eating way too much. This is just naturalistic fallacy. We do lots of things in our modern lifestyles the last 100 years we never used to and stopped doing things we used to commonly do before that. Humans don't require meat to thrive any more plus climate change is a new problem we have to adapt to.
- rapnie 4y agoAlso NL. I feel that the opinions have shifted last couple of decades. Anectdotal maybe, when I was younger eating horse meat wasn't something one thought about much. My mother used to go into town especially for buying horse steak, because "they are way better than cow beef steak". Recently I asked her if she still buys it. "Horse meat? No!". She forgot about how we always ate it.
- bombcar 4y agoIn the US at least there's a perception of it being "lower quality/class" meat, so that may also play into it (especially in media, etc).
- wsc981 4y agoWhen I was young I lived in the province Drenthe. We visited our grandparents every weekend. My grandfather would often have horse meat for dinner. At the time I quite enjoyed it. I was young and didn’t think much of it. Once I got a bit older my father mentioned once that he thought horse meat smelled like pee. At that point I stopped eating horse meat. However I am not even sure if there was some truth in what my father said at the time … seems unlikely.
- rapnie 4y agoHe likely got you with that joke :D
- swayvil 4y agoChickens, otoh. They are filth and evil enanimalfied. Let their suffering be infinite.
- FactolSarin 4y agoI would argue horses are different than dogs. Dogs a are bred to attach to and love humans. Horses.... tolerate us. They'll fall in line if you demonstrate you're the leader, but they don't bond like dogs do.