Halal Meat

Well, I’m just about to commit a social solecism – I’m going to talk about religion and politics (as well as food, although somewhat obliquely).

Let me say first off… religion is not my thing; I prefer to think for myself and live in the real world rather than follow arbitrary rules laid down by a sky-fairy in a book of fiction. However I’m quite happy for anyone to worship any deity they choose, whenever and wherever they like (you can feel a ‘but’ coming here, can’t you, and you’re quite right)…BUT their chosen belief should not give them any special dispensations or allowances. It is only a belief after all; there's no factual foundation to it despite what its adherents may say.
 
This is what's getting me hot under the collar – my blood pressure went into orbit this morning. What the hell is our Government doing in allowing special rules for halal and kosher meat in this country? Why are they faffing about discussing meat labelling, for crying out loud? Can’t they see the bigger picture?

If I was to slit the throat of any conscious animal I would, quite rightly, have the full force of the RSPCA and the laws of the land thrown at me; so why are Muslims (and Jews) allowed to flout those same laws with impunity just because of their belief? Should religious beliefs allow people to ignore animal welfare?

There is something deeply wrong with this country when the Government panders to religious minorities and allows their brainless beliefs to trump the welfare of sentient beings. Sadly we are governed by hand-wringing, weak-kneed, weary willies who are too frightened of the religious lobby to speak up and say NO. How exactly do they find this barbarism acceptable?

There’s nowhere to go with this, nowhere to take it; there isn’t a politician in the whole bloody country who will say anything against this – they’re all too frightened of the mouthy Muslims (the Jews are saying nothing, they've been getting away with it quietly for years) and too interested in keeping their seat at the next election.

Well, I am not frightened of Muslims or any other religious group nor am I trying to hang onto my job. I can’t do anything to stop this awful practice but I can at least say it stinks and so do the politicians who allow it to continue. It has no place in a civilised society and neither do the appalling people who practice it and defend it.

5-a-day? 7-a-day? 10-a-day?

Who knows? Who cares?

You must have seen it – it’s been all over the news today. 7-a-day fruit and veg 'saves lives'. Saves lives, eh? I’ll believe that when I see it. The fact is we will all die at some point so the best we can do is extend life, not save it, otherwise the world would be full of decrepit people living forever!

I really feel these stupid pseudo-research projects should be consigned to the dustbin; they come up so often… eat this, don’t eat that, eat more of this, eat less of that. God, it’s tiresome; we’ve heard it all before and we all know the ‘researchers’ are just putting out this rubbish to make sure they get another research grant for next year.

 

These people would have us believe their ‘research’ is vitally important when, actually, we're bored rigid and we don't believe a word of it anyway. They can't even get their stories straight; some countries say 4-a-day, some go as far as 10-a-day. So which is it? Do you suppose our Grandmothers were told what to eat in such a prescriptive way? Furthermore, do you suppose they would have taken any notice?

Some days I have barely any fruit and veg, some days I have so much of the stuff it’s a wonder I don’t explode. I’m too old to live my life by arbitrary rules made up by people who just want to keep their job, so I’ll stick with what works for me and they can stick their research papers where the sun don’t shine.

 

Just a thought... I wonder if I could get a grant to prove that the main cause of death is life?

A Couple of News Items

Good luck with persuading people of this, chaps...! There’s more chance of me becoming an international supermodel than there is of getting Mr and Mrs Average to embrace the idea of meatless meals.

Most people, with a few honourable exceptions, are too blinkered and small-minded to give up having lumps of dead animal on their plate. They ridicule veggies because it makes them feel better about themselves; they know they're defending the indefensible but they'll continue to justify their meat-eating by saying they only eat free-range, ethically-reared, organic animals who've had a really happy life. Happy, that is, until they were carted off to the abattoir…


I also happened to read something else today which should put an end to the old chestnut “Humans are naturally meat-eaters – you can see that by our teeth. We need to eat meat” that gets endlessly trotted out as though it’s an indisputable fact. It’s not a fact and it’s not indisputable – meat came very late to the party; up until 3.5million years ago we lived in forests and ate a diet of leaves and fruits from trees, shrubs and herbs, much the same as chimpanzees do today.

Sounds like quite a nice diet actually!

Thoughts from the UN...!

Good grief, I’ve seen some rubbish in the news in my time, but this just about takes the bloody biscuit. The UN wants people to eat insects……dear god!

Leaving aside the fact that in some areas of the world there are plenty of desperately poor souls who are already eating insects just to avoid starving to death, has it never occurred to the brainless fools responsible for spouting this rubbish that there are ways of eating that don’t involve animal protein?

There are hundreds of millions of people around the world who are vegetarian – for goodness sake, wouldn’t you think an organisation like the UN would have enough collective brainpower to see that in the developed world, where we aren’t poor and desperate, we don’t need to eat meat, fish or insects?

I wonder if bugs and insects are on the menu at UN headquarters? No….I thought not.

Emperor's New Clothes

I read in the news yesterday about the, allegedly, top 50 restaurants in the world. Apparently Heston’s ‘Fat Duck’ fell by 20 places. Oh dear, what a shame, never mind.

To be honest I found the video clip here about the No.1 restaurant ‘El Celler de Can Roca’ hilarious. I’m sure it wasn’t meant to be funny, but there was no way I could keep a straight face at the dross they so solemnly trotted out; mind you, give them their due, they at least managed to sound like they believed it. Emotional cuisine, anyone? Oh, please…! These guys are so far up their own rear ends they can hardly see daylight – the word ‘pretentious’ doesn’t even come close to describing them.  Admit it, wouldn’t you just love to go in and ask them what the veggie option is…?

I’m a simple soul. When I go out to eat, which admittedly isn’t very often given the dearth of decent vegetarian restaurants, I like a well-cooked, nicely-presented seasonal meal in comfortable surroundings with excellent service. Perfect.

Frankly, distilled earth and oak smoke in sugar baubles make me think of a conjuror doing his party piece. I almost expect an aging Paul Daniels to pop out from behind a screen, warbling “You’ll like this….not a lot!” I don’t care how much it’s been distilled, ‘earth’ does not make me think of a relaxed enjoyable dinner no matter how outrageously expensive and famous the restaurant may be.

I’m sure there are plenty of people who are taken in by this flannel; there must be, it’s a successful business and as Phineas T Barnum said "There's a sucker born every minute". However, three words keep coming into my head……Emperor’s. New. Clothes.

Vegetarians have healthier hearts...

No, I'm not making it up, it's here in black and white – vegetarians are less likely to die or need hospital treatment as a result of heart disease. Well, there’s a surprise…not!

It’s odd, the Government spends an awful lot of our money putting out all sorts of health advice – eat more of this, drink less of that, have five of these – but never to my knowledge has it ever suggested people give up meat and go veggie; I can only assume that Government ministers are scared of upsetting the farming lobby, but they’re not too bothered about people dying of heart disease…hmmm.

I find the comments at the end of the article by the British Heart Foundation a bit suspicious, too; they seem to be talking down the benefits of going veggie – but, well, they would wouldn’t they? They have a vested interest because if everyone went veggie there wouldn’t be so many people dying of heart disease and there might be no need for the BHF. It’s much more important for them to look after their jobs than to actually give out some advice which would benefit the ordinary man and woman in the street. Oooh, I’m such a cynic!

It seems obvious to me that eating less saturated fat and more fruit, veg, nuts and pulses is almost certain to be a better idea for your health and for your wallet – being a veggie is so much less expensive than being an omnivore – so why don’t more people do it?

It’s certainly the case that people seem to like meat, although the more I read about it the more I wonder why, but in today’s more health-conscious climate why are they still so blinkered? Why do they spend £££ on a gym membership then pick up a burger on the way home? Is the culture of meat-eating so entrenched in people’s minds that they can’t imagine life without it or is it that they still see vegetarianism as some sort of minority pursuit carried out by sandal-wearing tree-huggers?

I’m genuinely puzzled by this conundrum – so put me out of my misery and drop me an email if you think you’ve got the answer.

Burger for lunch, anyone?

Neigh....not for me, thanks! (Sorry, couldn't resist it!)

I'm sure you've seen this report all over the news this morning. Now, I’ve nothing against people eating anything they like, but if they buy a beefburger I think they’re at least entitled to expect it to contain beef rather than horsemeat or pork.

It’s quite amusing to see Tesco, Iceland, Aldi and others taking the products off their shelves and, in very carefully worded statements, immediately blaming their suppliers....“Nothing to do with us, guv…we only sell ‘em”. One wonders if they really don’t know about the content of the products they sell or are they just embarrassed at being found out? What do you think?

Certainly makes me glad to be veggie!

Healthy Food?

I feel I should warn you, I’m just going to have a bit of a rant but, before I do, here are a couple of questions for you:

What do the words ‘healthy food’ mean to you?
Which foods do you consider to be ‘unhealthy’?

The reason I ask is that I am fed up (notice the tenuous foodie terminology there!) to the back teeth with people talking about “healthy food”. Govt ministers, the media and even the medical profession bandy the ‘healthy’ word around at every possible opportunity without anyone knowing what the hell they mean by it. If the powers that be are trying to educate Joe Public about food and nutrition, they seem to be going the worst possible way about it. Don't even get me started about Traffic-Light Labelling...!

So, what is meant by healthy? Is it low in fat or low in cholesterol? Low in salt or low in sugar? High in fibre, maybe, or high in polyunsaturates? Who knows…? But that’s my point; some foods are being promoted as ‘good for you’ whilst others are being demonised as ‘unhealthy’ when they're actually nothing of the sort. The whole thing is a total distortion of the true situation, and the real message of "Moderation in all things" is being lost when, in reality, it's the very message which should be hammered home. It’s a mystery to me why people who ought to have some understanding of food can’t get it through their thick skulls that all food is healthy and no food is ‘bad’ for you!

An example: vegetables are ‘healthy’, apparently. OK, so let’s assume I live on steamed vegetables and nothing else; well, I’ll be really, really healthy, right? NO....wrong! I’ll be short on protein, calcium, fats, salt and sundry other vital vitamins and minerals. You see what I mean about promoting or demonising certain foods? Obviously, I’m not suggesting that living on ice-cream, chocolate and cake is a good idea but I feel we all need to keep a sense of proportion.

In a nutshell, some foods are better for you if they are only eaten occasionally in small portions and some foods are better for you if they are eaten more often in larger portions, but no foods are 'bad' and there is no need to cut any foods out of your diet in order to eat ‘healthily’.

Moderation is all!

Rant over – I am now going off to make some roasted butternut soup.