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Dry aged

Jerome Marot

Well-known member
I had the privilege to visit a butcher specialising in ageing meat last year.

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Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Perfect images to make you want to become a vegetarian!
It’s very brutal what we do, but really, Nicolas, we are still just apes, albeit with language, writing and gadgets.

I just had an extra, before bedtime snack of pineapple, blackberries, (carnivores of sheep they trap in their spikes), blueberries and several slices of freshly roasted succulent chicken!

I feel no guilt eating the unlucky birds!

We, like the blackberry plant and the lion, eat meat, merely because that our nature!


But I do think slaughter houses are cruel as the animals waiting can hear the noises and the yard is full of stinking poop that smells a 1/2 mile away. Fortunately my BMW, (that I just gave to my wonderful steel mechanic), has a filter that gets rid of all such of All such horrible odors. But it must be unpleasant for the cattle waiting for death!

Also sows are in a tight chained enclosure when the boar is brought to mount her and they don’t have a chance to even be social. It’s animal rape.

Chickens bred to grow fast, are packed in overcrowded shelves, overfed and some cannot even stand on their feet!

All this is do unnecessary, cruel and unfitting for civilized people.

But we go to a sanitized supermarket where the packed meats are clean with no blood and we can choose keeping out hands clean as the supermarket plays music as if food comes from the wand of a magician!

Asher
 

nicolas claris

OPF Co-founder/Administrator
@Asher Kelman Je suis complètement d'accord…
Un seul lien, juste un seul…
That does exists in France too as well as all over the world.
SHAME.
 

Jerome Marot

Well-known member
More pictures...

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As to meat: I am not a vegetarian. I agree that we should avoid unnecessary cruelty but in the end, meat is always a piece of dead animal.

As all this is rather for the luxury market, I suppose that the cows and oxen had a peaceful life.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
I am stunned as to the nature of the workers. This reminds me of the guards at Auchwitiz, Treblinka, Dacheau and 10,000 sub camps were Jews and homosexuals undesirables were worked to death or shot, burnt or gassed on an industrial scale.

By telling us,

“Man is made in the image of God!”

We become deluded into thinking we are some noble creatures, apart from wild animals.

In fact I insist we are just another species of apes able to trick friends and enemies alike with our delusions of kindness and civility.

By admitting we are just animals, we at least know we have to learn new behaviors.

Right wing xenophobia are only a few clicks away from the ravages of the jungle.

At least if we admit we are apes, we can set ourselves goals to lift ourselves up to be civilized.

Asher
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
My dear friends,

I am still suffering from viewing the movie, something I couldn’t even complete.

I feel like horrified and frightened by these men.

Does anyone know where this was filmed and whether or not the company and men were held to account and prosecuted?

Asher
 

Jerome Marot

Well-known member
Does anyone know where this was filmed and whether or not the company and men were held to account and prosecuted?

The cited article explains the slaughterhouse is in Belgium, near the French border and was prosecuted for several violations. The slaughterhouse was closed after the movie went public in 2017 but we don't know if it reopened.

I am a bit surprised by some of the scenes. Pigs are actually dangerous animals. Probably these were stunned beforehand.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
The cited article explains the slaughterhouse is in Belgium, near the French border and was prosecuted for several violations. The slaughterhouse was closed after the movie went public in 2017 but we don't know if it reopened.

I am a bit surprised by some of the scenes. Pigs are actually dangerous animals. Probably these were stunned beforehand.
I didn’t read the article, I am afraid to admit, just watched most of the movie until the creatures were in hot water and screaming!

I would imagine that the men would either start up as psychopaths or surely get PTSD!

The first Wehrmacht soldiers shooting groups of Jews in ditches, (or gassing them in mobile vans), were severely traumatized and some proportion rendered wretched shells and apparently unfit for military service! All the culture of villages and towns in Germany, (with all the traditional values in schoolbooks), can’t be simply erased by “Sharpen Your Knives” Nazi songs of the brown shirt thugs or the chants of the Hitler Youth Camps.

What demented men were these? Was it merely the “Commercial Entity” that was prosecuted or also the management and perpetrators?

I would fear they would get to work as school bus drivers, janitors or aides in retirement homes!

What discussion was their by politicians, judges, philosophers, social activists!

Today you guys gave me visions of shameless wanton cruelty that shocked to the marrow!

Asher
 

Jerome Marot

Well-known member
I don't think the comparison between pigs and humans is valid. I see that the video was designed to this effect, but the video is just propaganda from animal rights activists.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
I don't think the comparison between pigs and humans is valid. I see that the video was designed to this effect, but the video is just propaganda from animal rights activists.
Worked on me, LOL! I was so traumatized!

Are the pictures real or faked or looped to seem worse
 

Jerome Marot

Well-known member
The pictures are probably real. What they miss is the context. This slaughterhouse kills 1,4 million pigs a year. On the video, we can count about a dozen where the stunning process failed. Not that the process does not need improvement, but killing animals is intrinsically messy.

Just as an exercise in thinking: if you had to kill 100 thousands pigs next month, how would you do it?
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
The pictures are probably real. What they miss is the context. This slaughterhouse kills 1,4 million pigs a year. On the video, we can count about a dozen where the stunning process failed. Not that the process does not need improvement, but killing animals is intrinsically messy.

Just as an exercise in thinking: if you had to kill 100 thousands pigs next month, how would you do it?
“Messy” is one hell of a sanitized abbreviation, LOL!

🙀


What about the hot water and the suspending of live animals?
 

Jerome Marot

Well-known member
What about the hot water and the suspending of live animals?

I am slowly feeling I am getting too involved in these explanations...

When an animal is slaughtered, first the blood needs to be drained. That is why meat is able to age without rotting. To drain the blood, the animal is hung by the rear legs or one rear leg and the jugular vein is opened. You see this at some point in the video.

At some point, normally after the vein opening (if I recall correctly), the animal is washed in hot water. This cleans and sterilises the skin and also (again: if I recall correctly) makes the skin easier to detach from the body.

Pigs are quite resilient animals, they take a long time to die from blood drain. This is why they are normally stun unconscious either by electric shock or by CO2 poisoning. That later method is the one used in that particular slaughterhouse but is not very efficient so some of the pigs wake up. Part of the legal action was about getting that firm to change their stun system (again: if I understood correctly).

I don't think anyone wants the pig to wake up in that bath, because then it will drown and get some of that dirty water in the lungs.

BTW: pigs are about as intelligent as dogs and can be tamed just the same. They also are capable to kill and eat a grown up man, just like dogs. Just that dogs need to be a pack. The wild sort are quite dangerous, also for hunters. If you ever hit one with your car, do not step out of the car to check if the animal is still alive. If he is, chances are that you won't be.

In a next episode, we may discuss what is done to human corpses so that they can be presented to the family at the funeral. Sorry, maybe not. Erase that.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Yes, Jerome, Death is messy at times.

On a massive scale, still horrible!

I won’t hold you accountable and I apologize for putting you on the spot.

In Kosher slaughter houses, each animal is cut completely to sever both jugulars, carotid sand nerves with a knife that has to pass scrutiny each time before use.

We have no knowledge of the pig industry butvtge numbers you give are mind boggling.

What is happening meanwhile is that high biotech is moving fast growing animal cells in industrial scale. It uses a tiny fraction of land and resources and cost will be about 1/6th of ranch grown meats.

Jews will be no longer forbidden to eat pork as it will not come from an animal in a pig sty!

The ranch land value will
Plummet and the vast lands can be returned to Forrest’s and carbon capture!

I really believe that in several generations, animal ranching might be something quaint like Irish dancers or Yoddling across the mountains in Bavaria!

Asher
 

Tom dinning

Registrant*
I walked past the butchers today and took note of the dry hung carcasses in the window.
Since I can’t afford it I’m not influenced by the stories told here.

Detachment from such actions is easier if you can’t afford it.
We tolerate what we can afford to pay for. Outrage is expendable.

What do we call it in an Honest War?
Soft collateral. A necessary evil for the sake of someone’s survival.
 

Jerome Marot

Well-known member
Since I can’t afford it I’m not influenced by the stories told here.

The butcher offered steaks for sale, but I declined the offer as I found the price a bit high. Besides, I understand the attraction but I am not that fond of extra aged meat... for steaks. The butcher cooked a soup for us and that was interesting.

This being said, meat is unreasonably cheap in the European Union and particularly in Germany. Even though: I usually hunt for meat which is priced down as it is close to its limit date. I also know how to prepare stuff that other people do not like to eat. Once the poor beast is killed (hopefully without unnecessary suffering), we might as well eat it.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
As to meat: I am not a vegetarian. I agree that we should avoid unnecessary cruelty but in the end, meat is always a piece of dead animal.

As all this is rather for the luxury market, I suppose that the cows and oxen had a peaceful life.

More pictures...

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I am impressed by the pristine presentation.

obviously it’s very necessary for such air dried meat to be absolutely clean or else it would rot.

I wonder how do they prevent bacteria growing.

I know that sometimes the fat might be green at the edges perhaps due to sone acceptable mold!

Asher
 

Jerome Marot

Well-known member
obviously it’s very necessary for such air dried meat to be absolutely clean or else it would rot.

Apparently not and I found that rather surprising. I should say that the top carcasses are kept in a cold room, but the rib steaks at the bottom were not. It was not entirely clear to me how the maturation process works. Obviously, the meat is drained of blood and that helps but I do not know what else is necessary.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
This is the fungus:

“The genus Thamnidium, in particular, is known to produce collagenolytic enzymes which greatly contribute to the tenderness and flavor of dry-aged meat.“

Asher
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Brilliantly clear explanations here!


Jérôme,


We’re the places you visited refrigerated as in the article or at room temp?


If the latter, I suspect an extra step like salt or some other agent to inhibit bacterial growth, until the fungus creates a shell around it!

Asher
 

Jerome Marot

Well-known member
Were the places you visited refrigerated as in the article or at room temp?

The large carcasses above were in a cold room. The rib racks were stored at room temperature, which was close to outside temperature (I would say 16-18°). Possibly, they had just been taken outside of cold storage and were supposed to be handled after our visit, I do not know.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Jérôme,

I think that once the fungus has coated the outside with its mycelium, it out competes bacteria.

No doubt they are meticulous in washing (and I suspect they might even splash on the common produce spoilage inhibitor, potassium sulfite or similar, whatever doesn’t hurt the mold! These careful traditional steps, like wine making, could be like the family secrets in wineries. Just a guess. The claim is that the precisely controlled, moisture-removing low humidity cold air, and the fungus is all that is used.

Asher
 
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