AUS butcher life threatened over horse meat (BP News)‏

Sent: July 16, 2010 2:50:52 PM



Big Pond News (Australia)
Butcher threatened over horse meat
Thursday, July 15, 2010 » 10:12pm
http://bigpondnews.com/articles/National/2010/07/15/Butcher_threatened_over_horse_meat_485353.html

A Perth butcher selling horse meat has been bombarded with 'personal
and nasty' emails, including death threats.

But since most of the protests come from animal rights activists,
waking up next to a horse head seems unlikely.

Vince Gareffa of Mondi Di Carne gourmet butchers is believed to be the
only butcher selling horse meat for human consumption in Australia.

After being granted a licence by Western Australia's Agriculture and
Food Minister Terry Redman, Mr Gareffa opened up his Perth shop on
Tuesday with fresh horse meat for sale.

But within two days, he was swamped with emails from around the world
attacking him for offering the specialty meat.

'We've had a couple of thousand emails, some of them nasty and
personal,' Mr Gareffa told AAP on Thursday.

'The majority of them you can tell that they're from animal liberation
groups from all around the world who automatically attack anyone if
someone tells them to.'

Mr Gareffa said he interpreted two as death threats and one, which
referred to Underbelly, he reported to police.

The butcher called for intelligent and 'grown-up' debate instead of
abuse and threats.

'Jewish people don't bash me because I eat pork, Hindus don't bash me
because I eat beef and I don't bash Thai people because they eat dog,'
he said.

'But there's no way in the world that something we're already doing
should be denied to our population.'

According to the federal Department of Agriculture, between 30,000 and
40,000 horses are slaughtered every year and exported for pet food and
human consumption.

Mr Gareffa had planned to supply horse meat at his stall at the
Mundaring Truffle Festival at the end of July, but after thousands of
emails threatening pickets, protests and boycotts, organisers asked
him not to.

'We were concerned that we were getting threats from people trying to
drum up support to boycott the festival and run pickets and protests,'
festival chairwoman Megan Griffiths told AAP.

Since offering horse meat, Mondi Di Carne gourmet butchers has had a
constant stream of customers, which has overwhelmed Mr Gareffa.

After being initially hesitant about eating it, Mr Gareffa tucked in
on Wednesday, saying the medium rare horse steak tasted like 'very
rich beef with a slight sweet overtone on the back of the palate'.

He believes the present outrage will die down in a couple of weeks and
customers will be able to order it quietly.

'We'll be known as the horse whisperers,' he said.

'You just whisper 'Can I have a kilo of horse meat please'.'

Wish I had a bunch of horse meat, that is reported to be one killer coyote bait.

A friend of ours has lived in a number of other places around the globe in Her past. In one city where she took up residency for a while, she said that she ate horsemeat for three months from a butcher shop thinking it was beef. She said it was leaner than beef and tasted as good if not better than choice beef. HP

Horsemeat is delicious. If folks thought of horses as livestock rather than pets horsemeat would be in every grocery store.

Here in southwestern France, horsemeat is fairly common. Not in every butcher shop, and rarely if ever in restaurants, but the Basques raise alot of horses for meat. The Spanish eat alot of it too. I like it, and drive about 45 minutes to buy it at a market.

Pete

I have some spanish neighbors that grill it from time to time but Always offer some to me and it is some of the better meat I have had!

Native Americans seemed to think it was ok to eat them. They were part of the grassland grazing animals around them.
I would try it if I ever have the chance.

I have never eaten it, mainly because I have never had the oppertunity. I would gladly try it if it was offered to me. I have eaten everything from holstien to emu, ostrich, and Llama, all of which were very pallatable. I have actually eaten several llamas but that is beside the point. The only difference between them and a horse is the minset.

The banning of slaughter houses in the US was a terrible injustice to our own economy as well as the animals. The federal law stating it is illegal to export them for slaughter is even worse. Around here everyone with a couple acres has a horse. They never get ridden, they are just expensive pets. Since the economy took a dump all of these horses are getting displaced with nowhere to go. Suddenly the herds of wild horses are growing fast and a high percentage of them are shod, anyone with a backhoe is getting lots of side jobs digging big holes in pastures for mysterious reasons, and dozens of horse shelters have cropped up. It is an ugly situation.

Another problem is that the butchering of a horse is a fairly complex task. It is not like butchering a beef or venison. Horses have a series of tendons that streach from the spine out to major muscle groups. It is these tendons that allow them to sleep standing up. All of these tendons need to be removed in the butchering. To do it right and end up with good cuts of meat takes a fairly skilled person, its not somthing a couple of guys can do on a back porch while drinking budwieser like with a deer.

The closest reservation is talking of opening a slaughter plant. I have issues with the reservation but will applaude them if they succede in opening it. They are one of the few entitys around anymore that are still logging, kudos to them if they can start this next venture, it is needed.