Cats shouldn't hang out in supermarket meat cases
Cats like meat.
Even though we live in central Manhattan (Kansas), there’s a small greenbelt behind the house and we’ve had visitors such as deer, turkeys, and yesterday, a fox.
The raccoons, squirrels, birds and rabbits are everywhere.
My two black cats have had happy hunting since our 2006 arrival, and left me a pair of lucky rabbits feet the other day (the two black ones, as kittens in this pic, from 2003; the other one, named Lucky, wasn’t so lucky).
Because cats like meat, it’s a good idea to keep them out of supermarkets, especially those with a butcher shop, or a meat case with open doors.
A colleague sent along this video of a cat in a meat case in a supermarket, apparently, according to readers’ comments, in St. Petersburgh, Russia. Not good supermarket food safety practices.
Australian state cracks down on backyard butchers
A New South Wales Food Authority crackdown on backyard butchers has caught unlicensed operators producing and selling smallgoods from homes in Sydney.
The NSW has been targeting illicit meat processors and confiscated almost 120 kilograms of homemade nem chua - a Vietnamese-style fermented pork.
The authority made 10 seizures of the product from illegal processors operating out of homes that were then selling the meat to butchers' shops, restaurants and private consumers.
Primary Industries Minister Ian Macdonald said the crackdown, which started in March, would continue.
Staff butchering deer leads to closure of Chinese restaurant
“In general, you can’t have a dead animal in a food services establishment.”
That’s the advice from Erie County Health Commissioner Dr. Anthony J. Billittier IV after a dead deer was discovered being butchered in a restaurant.
The Buffalo News in New York reports the discovery was made after a tipster called the Health Department.
A health inspector was quickly sent to the restaurant, which was immediately closed. A hearing on the matter is expected to be held early next week.
Officials don’t know whether the dead deer at China King, 5999 South Park Ave., had been hunted or if it was road kill.
Wales: E. coli lessons 'were not learned'
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Mark Powell QC (no relation but a fine Welsh name), representing the families, said warnings had not been heeded following an E.coli outbreak in Scotland between 1996 and 1997 which left 21 elderly people dead."It is galling to the families that many of the observations the Sheriff's inquiry, with the substitution of the name of Tudor for that of Barr, the butcher involved in that outbreak, could be written about the 2005 outbreak. Much of what was said then could equally be said now."
The inquiry, chaired by Professor Hugh Pennington, who also chaired an inquiry following the 1996 outbreak in Scotland, is hearing final submissions on Wednesday and Thursday.
It was as if the report following the Scottish outbreak was never written, he told Professor Pennington, adding, "The families are determined that in 10 year's time, the same might not be said of your inquiry."
The inquiry’s findings and any recommendations are not expected to be published until later this year.
Why are UK butchers -- and inspectors -- apparently so lousy?
The Yorkshire Post reports today that a butcher's shop at the centre of one of Yorkshire's most serious food poisoning outbreaks was found to be "filthy" by inspectors two years before it was shut down.
About 60 people were struck down by E-coli O157 during an outbreak in Leeds in 2006 that led to an investigation into Todd's Pork and Beef Butchers in Armley and its stall at Kirkgate Market.Papers released under the Freedom of Information Act reveal that Todd's was warned several times about poor hygiene standards and practices.
Hilary Cobley, whose late husband Neil was struck down by poisoning as he was due to undergo chemotherapy, was quoted as saying the outbreak was "no accident", adding,
"I don't think this happened overnight. When they shut the shop you could see the muck on the floor. It is a shame that they can't make them pay the fine."
Summer sausage is tasty, maggots and all
I grew up in a deer hunting family, and although my own deer hunting career started and ended when I was 13, I was so used to eating venison that beef tasted weird. I still remember one deer my family butchered at home, and my brother chased me around the house with an eyeball. We packaged and marked the cuts, but they stayed in our family freezer. Perhaps we had some guests over for dinner or gave some to a friend at church, but if anyone got sick, it was us. In Omaha, apparently, things are run differently. Deer processor and poacher extraordinaire Jack McClanahan was finally put out of the summer sausage business.
According to the Omaha World-Herald McClanahan processed and sold tons of tainted summer sausage, much of it from poached deer. McClanahan told federal undercover agents that he sometimes shot deer at night with a rifle from the bathroom window of his home in Omaha's Ponca Hills and then would retrieve the carcasses in the morning. He baited the deer with corn, used a spotlight to blind them, and then shot.
McClanahan is a retired butcher who sold summer sausage in 5-pound casings at $3.50 a pound. He also made salami, jerky and snack sticks, and authorities estimated annual production at about 10,000 pounds.
Mark Webb, a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service special agent, said mouse droppings, maggots, deer carcasses, dried blood, deer hair and other contaminants littered the commercial-grade meat processing equipment that filled McClanahan's three-car garage. There was no running water for cleaning. When wildlife agents seized the equipment and cleaned it with hot water and soap at a carwash, they discovered two lead bullets the size of a man's thumb lodged in the grinder. The blade had been shaving lead into the meat.
The butcher-poacher was fined $10,000 and sentenced to three years of probation Wednesday in U.S. District Court.
My family and most deer hunters I have known have a strong conservationist ethic. I was raised to respect wildlife and have a deep appreciation for nature. McClanahan, and other poachers, are appalling, but making humans sick and putting their lives at risk with filthy processing conditions is even more disgusting.
The Butcher of Wales Pt. 2
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The Butcher of Wales Pt. 2
Click here to download the infosheet.
