forum: Food, Wine and Gardening
#1 Sun 18 Nov 12 8:44pm
hippytea
- Member Occupation Chief cook and bottle-washer
- From Scotland
- Member since Mon 12 Sep 11
High welfare ham?
Anyone had any luck getting higher-welfare ham and bacon in the supermarket? Or pork, for that matter?
I tend to shop in the Co-Op but was putting in an online Tesco order and finding it very hard to get pork products which I could be confident were pig-friendly. The best standard of pork mince was "Finest" and I can't get any outright info about the welfare standards there. There was no organic available, which is usually the fallback when I can't get explicit welfare information, as my understanding is that organic always means free-range.
But the ham was even worse. No mention of welfare on any of the ham products, and again, no sign of organic.
Chicken's come a long way since the old days, but we still seem to be in the dark when it comes to pork welfare. Turkey too - you can buy organic or free-range whole turkeys, but the mince, escalopes etc. are always a mystery welfare-wise. And when it comes to pork and turkeys, no news is definitely not good news.
I have a local farm that sells free-range pork boxes, which is great, but they don't do any cured meats. A problem.
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#2 Sun 18 Nov 12 9:40pm
mummza
Occupation avoiding housework
- From The land of song.
- Member since Tue 04 Oct 05
Re: High welfare ham?
I have not noticed meats marked as 'higher-welfare' but I know I have seen things maked' farm assured ' and in the co-op 'red tractor'
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#3 Mon 19 Nov 12 4:01am
Ashen
Occupation Why is the Rum always gone???!
- From out to lunch
- Member since Sat 07 Jan 06
Re: High welfare ham?
I have to say one of the scariest things I see as a trend these days, is high end chefs pushing for free range pork , coupled with a recommendation that pork can be eaten pink .
Swine are omnivores and this means they are very susceptible to trichinosis in a free range environment. There is no way around the fact that free range means more chance of trichinosis, which means that finished cooking temps need to be very tightly monitored. It is possible using a highly accurate thermometer to cook slightly pink but to a safe temp. Unfortunately the general public just doesn't fill me with confidence in their ability to accomplish this.
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#4 Mon 19 Nov 12 12:53pm
hippytea
- Member Occupation Chief cook and bottle-washer
- From Scotland
- Member since Mon 12 Sep 11
Re: High welfare ham?
I'm not a fan of pink meat anyway, and I would run a mile from pink pork. So don't worry on my account! I'm old-school Scottish, when I cook meat, it KNOWS it's been cooked.
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