8 replies to this topic

[Gul_Dekar]

I went to Sunny Meatmarket yesterday (Baldwin & Spadina) and they were asking people to help them sign petitions because the government was banning the sale of chickens with heads still attached.

Does anyone else know more about this? And what would be the reason behind this alleged ban?

[jayt90]

I don't know what this is all about. Maybe the birds are uneviscerated and the local public health officers object. Or perhaps not inspected at all.
A few years ago there was a fuss raised in Kensington mkt. and Chinatown over live chickens being sold for food. I think the city got rid of the live birds then.

[Farmer Dave]

Maybe something to do with the regulations of processing....it is very automated and the birds are decapitated after a shock I believe.....the method for killing them and keeping the head on involves a knife into the back of the beak severing the spine and an old timer told me this is actually more "humane" (sorry about all this graphic description) if it is done "right"........(can you tell we just use our chickens for eggs here..?)
The regulation of anything to do with a food process has been targeting a lot of what could be called "artisinal" methods...a knee jerk to mad-cow possibly...but I can't see why the dangerous decisions a huge corporate system using animals as a commodity driven by profit should blanket the creditability of someone milking a few goats for cheese, stuffing a sausage to taste like the "old country", making sushi using un-frozen fish, or butchering a chicken head-on for luck or taste...
Oh yea, taste, good taste.....now there's a concept the government could consider.

[jayt90]

Maybe something to do with the regulations of processing....it is very automated and the birds are decapitated after a shock I believe.....the method for killing them and keeping the head on involves a knife into the back of the beak severing the spine and an old timer told me this is actually more "humane" (sorry about all this graphic description) if it is done "right"........(can you tell we just use our chickens for eggs here..?)
The regulation of anything to do with a food process has been targeting a lot of what could be called "artisinal" methods...a knee jerk to mad-cow possibly...but I can't see why the dangerous decisions a huge corporate system using animals as a commodity driven by profit should blanket the creditability of someone milking a few goats for cheese, stuffing a sausage to taste like the "old country", making sushi using un-frozen fish, or butchering a chicken head-on for luck or taste...
Oh yea, taste, good taste.....now there's a concept the government could consider.

I have to agree, but if a chicken was sold without inspection of the internal parts, there would always be someone complaining, or worse yet, sueing after a co-incidental upset stomach.

[Farmer Dave]

Good point......and since all of the organs are removed in a conventional chicken that would leave the problem of an organ remaining in the carcass of the chicken with the head on.....namely the brain.........which we probably agree is not a
large organ with chickens..

[Gul_Dekar]

When I buy those chickens with head on, they already come gutted. I get a separate packet of gizzards + liver with every bird however.

[Farmer Dave]

is there a brain in the packet...?

[Gul_Dekar]

is there a brain in the packet...?

Nope, dont think so.

[mizducky]

The regulation of anything to do with a food process has been targeting a lot of what could be called "artisinal" methods...a knee jerk to mad-cow possibly...

In the case of chickens, it might have more to do with growing fears about bird flu than mad cow disease (More info on bird flu/avian influenza from the US CDC). I have no info or opinion on whether there's reason yet to majorly fear bird flu in Canada, or even whether this head-on chicken issue is even related ... just offering the info I've got, for what it's worth.

Edited by mizducky, 02 March 2005 - 07:12 PM.