Horsemeat and turkey: butcher shops vs resto menus

[John Talbott]

My old food mentor/advisor/finder and I were musing today on some differences between what is sold on our street and seen on restaurant menus.

Only a few years ago in our shopping/schlepping area we had 3 horsemeat stores and 4 regular butcher shops; granted the horsemeat places were one man hole-in-the-walls while the butcher shops employed 2-5 men and women in larger spaces, but in any case there was and is a significant demand for horsemeat vis a vis other meat. In addition, we have a rotisseur who always had and has dinde on the counter.

So why are neither to be found on Parisian menus? Is it that Americans would shudder at eating horse; no, they put bunny and Bambi on the carte. Or think turkey was banal or only for holidays; unhuh, chicken breast and salmon are banal too and are common and holiday treats such as foie gras and caviar can be found much of the year. Is it that folks eating out want upscale products and a higher class experience when eating outside the home? No, one finds plenty of what were once trash fish as well as cheaper products such as calamari and chicken livers on menus. Perhaps we live in a non-standard, irregularly-eating, strange demographic area? Can't be, folks come from all over to our markets. So there must be another explanation. Which is........?

[Dave Hatfield]

Can't be, folks come from all over to our markets.  So there must be another explanation.  Which is........?

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Ok, I'll bite.......What?

My simplistic answers. Horse meat is, perhaps, considered too cheap and mundane to grace a restaurant menu. People don't go out to a restaurant to eat horse meat.

I do remember many years ago eating horse meat in a student restaurant somewhere near the Sorbonne.

As for dinde I see it on menus down here all the time all year long. You just have to hang out in the cheaper restaurants. What I don't see any more is whole dinde in the shops, not even our local poultry specialist has it outside the holiday season. I'll have to try a special order in July & see what happens.

Related question; I can't recall ever seeing a recipe for horse meat in a cook book.They must exist; mustn't they?

[The Old Foodie]

Can't be, folks come from all over to our markets.  So there must be another explanation.  Which is........?

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Ok, I'll bite.......What?

My simplistic answers. Horse meat is, perhaps, considered too cheap and mundane to grace a restaurant menu. People don't go out to a restaurant to eat horse meat.

Related question; I can't recall ever seeing a recipe for horse meat in a cook book.They must exist; mustn't they?

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My understanding is that horsemeat is eaten for health reasons - it has a long history in France this way.

There is a thread on horsemeat here:

http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=62176

You are right about the dearth of recipes for it .

There was an intermittent campaign to promote horsemeat in the 19th Century - as a food for the poor folk of course. Several promotional banquets featuring it were staged in the 1860s' by well-intentioned gentlemen who presumably never intended to eat it regularly themselves. I posted a menu for one of them on the above thread.

[Ptipois]

Also, quite a few people are naturally averse to horsemeat. Historically, it has never been easy for horse-eaters and horse butchers.

First of all there were religious taboos from the early Middle Ages (horse-eating was associated with paganism) and the Catholic Church forbid horse eating rather constantly during French history.

When the religious factor weakened, there was the commercial factor. Corporations and unions of butchers - who never sold horsemeat - fiercely fought the horse butchers, who were always clandestine (and performed their skills in very unhygienic environments like the Montfaucon dumps) and were said to treat horses very inhumanely before killing them. Note that horse butchers in France, even after becoming socially accepted, always had their own shops and that their trade never mingled with "mainstream" butchery.

One should not forget, also, the noble status of the horse, which gives that animal a quasi-human aura, many people being reluctant to eat it. This state of mind is very ancient and has been permanent for centuries, and now that horse power is no longer important it is still very strong.

Furthermore, given the clandestine status of horse butchery and exceptional nature of horse eating in France, horse eating was always associated with emergency (as well as being considered poor people's food). Horses were butchered in days of war and in besieged cities, like the 1870 war when Parisians of all classes ate rats, cats, dogs, giraffes and elephants from zoos, and horses. That memory was always associated with horse meat, making it less acceptable.

In the 19th century, though, a group of influent physicians called "Hygienists" recommended the consumption of horse meat for health reasons, provided that the horse butchers had an official status and a structured activity. Hence the creation of "boucheries hippophagiques". But for a long time those shops were marginal and the status of hippophagic butchers was always difficult. The hygienists insisted on the wholesome qualities of horsemeat, and also claimed that it was free of parasites: for a few generations horsemeat became more widely consumed in France. It was relatively successful during the most part of the 20th century, given to sick people and children, presented as steak tartare (the original version of the dish) or grilled steak haché, and people who frowned upon it were frowned upon because "it's so good for you". Horsemeat became some sort of special, virtuous meat. Still many people did not want any, either through cultural conditionment or through real disgust. In the 1950s, and later in the 60s and 70s, it was discovered that horsemeat was not free of parasites (like trichinosis). So its healthy status suffered. By then many shops had already disappeared.

During the last quarter of the 20th century, boucheries hippophagiques (also called "boucheries chevalines") disappeared almost completely. A few remain in some popular areas, provincial towns, street markets. You still can find horsemeat at some supermarkets. On one hand there are pressure groups against hippophagy, with the slogan "A horse is not for eating". On the other hands a portion of the population still craves horsemeat, but I've also met many people (I'm one of them) who won't touch it.

All that makes it a bit tricky to let it appear on restaurant menus. This reluctance never applied to bunnies or bambis. Contrary to the US, cuteness is not an issue when it comes to eating creatures. But the noble status of the horse and a rather complicated history always made it hard to accept it as a "normal" meat.

[annecros]

Bambi and Thumper certainly aren't safe in the US either - much less lovely quail and dove. But horse meat just isn't "done" and honestly I would have trouble with it.

Bo Derek (a B-List actress and avid meat eater) felt so strongly about it that she spearheaded a group to ban EXPORT of horse meat to Europe and Asia, and is half way there with legislation passed in the House and still pending in the Senate.

http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2006/10...0615.shtml?s=ic

I've never knowingly eaten horse meat, nor have I ever knowingly eaten dog. It feels like the same sort of "companion" animal issue to me, and sort of a short step from cannibalism.

Now, the USDA has no problem with horse meat, properly inspected of course:

http://www.igha.org/USDA.html

We have had a problem in Central Florida recently concerning horses and meat. A family pet horse called "Snowdrift" or "Snowball" or something was butchered in a field in the dead of night and the prime cuts were taken. Whoever butchered Snowdrift knew what they were doing, and the sherriff's department is hard on the trail, suspecting Carribbean immigrants.

I am not sure what will happen to the horses that are sold for slaughter when those slaughterhouses get shut down.

Now turkey, I put it away over the holidays and love a good turkey sandwich!

[Dave Hatfield]

Wonderful answers from the erudite concerning cheval, but

What about the turkey's, Turkey's?

[John Talbott]

Thanks to all, especially Ptit who, as usual, blends historical/sociological/culinary info. I resonate with the connection of horsemeat to hard times; indeed, my first experience with it was during WWII when the Harvard Faculty Club famously continued to have it on their menu while not having other meats, a conceit that lasted until 1983 according to Wikipedia. Other trivia from the Wikipedia piece – in Switzerland, horsemeat can be used in fondue bourgignon, it’s “taboo” in the UK, US, Australia and Brazil and among gypsies and Jews, and, this doesn’t come from Borat – it’s popular in Kazakhstan. However, my question was not why it’s unpopular, infradig, taboo, etc., but why it represents (or did until recently) 43% of shops butchering meat in my area but is unrepresented on resto menus, even in places like Aux Zingots + Ribouldingue. It is this discrepancy between "eating in and eating out" habits that interests me.

As for

nor have I ever knowingly eaten dog

I have something to say on that but it’s better left to the Asian Forum.

Finally to turkey.

What about the turkey's, Turkey's?

The reason my friend (referred to above) and I got into this discussion was because he’d seen turkey Saturday on the menu of the Repaire de Cartouche and thought that this was more or less a first versus seeing cuisse de dinde daily at our rotisserie shop and again I was puzzled about the difference eating in and eating out. I don’t want to put money on it, but I’d guess that in upscale delis and at catered meeting lunches in the US, sliced turkey, especially in sandwiches, is as popular as tuna or deli meats.

[Ptipois]

Wonderful answers from the erudite concerning cheval, but

What about the turkey's, Turkey's?

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Turkey is okay and there is no historical taboo about it but, setting apart the farm-raised, organic-grain-fed, skin-off-the-buttocks-costly dindes fermières, it is considered mass-produced, cheap meat and that is why you will seldom find it on restaurant menus, except at cheap restaurants and in collective catering. Notwithstanding the fact that a properly roasted rôti de dindonneau can be a delicious thing indeed.

[annecros]

As for

nor have I ever knowingly eaten dog

I have something to say on that but it’s better left to the Asian Forum.

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I know, I know.

But, I would rather not know...

[Ptipois]

it’s “taboo” in the UK, US, Australia and Brazil and among gypsies and Jews, and, this doesn’t come from Borat – it’s popular in Kazakhstan.  However, my question was not why it’s unpopular, infradig, taboo, etc., but why it represents (or did until recently) 43% of shops butchering meat in my area but is unrepresented on resto menus, even in places like Aux Zingots + Ribouldingue.  It is this discrepancy between "eating in and eating out" habits that interests me.

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To answer your question, horsemeat, though loved by some, is not acceptable enough to be served at restaurants. Don't be fooled by the word "bistrot" in its modern acception. They are restaurants like others. Places like Aux Zingots and Le Ribouldingue, though they try to maintain the mythology of the French bistrot, are no more "casual" than other places. It would be unthinkable to serve horsemeat there. It would probably have been possible a few decades ago. The traditional bistrot as we used to know it is definitely dead. As a matter of fact, if you showed me one bistrot that serves horse meat, I would conclude that the old days are not definitely over.

As for gypsies and Kazakhs, it is interesting to note the importance of the horse in their cultures. Eating horse would be considered close to anthropophagy. Actually it is exactly in those terms that an Irish friend of mine, upon his very first visit to France, told me in horror: "I can't understand how you people can eat horses! A horse is human, for God's sake!" And though I have never been close to horses and do not worship them more than any other animal, I do share that feeling.

[John Talbott]

Well the darndest piece just appeared in Expatica today, an unsigned article entitled Horse stepping back on the plate? in which the author reveals a good news/bad news type of situation. Whereas the number of horse butchers in Paris is reported to have fallen by a quarter - from "1,300 to under 1,000 between 1999 and 2002 alone" some health professionals, eaters and restuarants - eg Les Crocs, Les Pissenlits Par La Racine, Sardegna a Tavola + Le Taxi Jaune are promoting its consumption.

[John Talbott]

Two updates:

First I had an absolutely great horsemeat ragu on tagliatelle today at Al Cancelletto, via Corsica, 4, 049.8702805 in Camin/Padova - Italy of course.

Second, courtesy of Felice, who hasn't yet posted it, I'll report that the NYT and its baby-version, the IHT, had an Op-Ed piece on the product March 5th and 6th respectively.

[annecros]

Two updates:

First I had an absolutely great horsemeat ragu on tagliatelle today at Al Cancelletto, via Corsica, 4, 049.8702805 in Camin/Padova - Italy of course.

Second, courtesy of Felice, who hasn't yet posted it, I'll report that the NYT and its baby-version, the IHT had an Op-Ed piece on the product March 5th and 6th respectively.

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Wow. I look forward to reading it.

I don't know if I can eat it, but do look forward to reading about it.

What does horsemeat taste like?

Just curious.

[John Talbott]

The taste of a steak is indistinguishable from beef steak (at least in one"blind-tasting" I conducted), the ragu I had was pretty much the same as that made from a "gamey" meat such as boar.

[grace3]

The taste of a steak is indistinguishable from beef steak (at least in one"blind-tasting" I conducted), the ragu I had was pretty much the same as that made from a "gamey" meat such as boar.

Being a horse owner most of my life, I can only say that I find all of this absolutely horrible!!!