Nancy, with so many posts I'm amazed you have never tried mutton!

Ok here's sheep 101

up to one year = lamb
older = mutton

compare:

baby cow = veal
older = beef

Having established that, just imagine that all your life all the cattle you have ever eaten was veal. Then someone gives you an aged steer rib steak. The Earth moves.

Mutton

( a good way to get into mutton is to get a leg roast and cook it very slowly under foil for a few hours )

Posting != eating

I wonder where I could find mutton. The only thing I ever see is lamb.

Maybe a halal butcher?

One caveat before you sally forth on your mutton quest; many west-indians (and likely east-indians) call goat "mutton" as well. You might want to ask; though a worst case outcome you get goat meat, which is still pretty good.

I'm dying to try goat, so either way is good. Although I'd really like to know which I'm eating...

I just got a meat order from one of my local farms - this video makes me feel much, much better about the money I spent. Who the hell is in charge of that place? I just don't get it.

I tried mutton for the first time last summer. It taste very close to lamb. I got it at a market that sells a lot of Hispanic food. I might get some more this weekend now that we're talking about it.

Back in the day, my brother and his family would have goat roasts.

Try goat the Jamaican way. After it is cut up, boiled and spiced to the nth degree, you wouldn't know whether it is lamb, goat or fire-breathing Martian desert rat. :-) Goat fat is not as cloying as mutton fat (you'll know what I mean if you taste them side by side), and overall, to me, is a superior meat. I've eaten a lot of goat, but nothing under a year has enough flavor.

I have been looking for this since this thread originally posted.
http://www.proteinpower.com/drmike/...-beef/#comments

Ugh, you'll need to scroll up to the blog post.

FWIW, the USDA has extended its hold on the products of the company where the mole for the Animal Rights group filmed those atrocities. For one, it makes a mockery of the claim that no unsafe animals make it into the food chain, and especially downer animals that may be carrying BSE. And it irks that these people supplied jails and other federal institutions because the price was right. Sounds like that Robin (Cook? - ex-MD. who writes medical thrillers? Yeah - him!) anticipated this quite a few years ago with one of his books set partly in slaughterhouse shenanigans.

The fact is, by the time the "knife" shows up, the animal is already dead. Typically, cattle that are butchered are killed by being driven into a narrow chute, where a machine at the end of the chute slams a steel bolt into their forehead, killing them instantly. In some cases, they're shot in the head, but this is more expensive and the steel bolt is considered to be more "humane."

But, consider this: regardless of how these animals are treated while living and how they are killed, they are bred for one purpose only: to serve as part of our food supply. If PETA somehow succeeded in releasing these animals into the wild to "live free," they'd be dead in weeks, victims of coyotes, wolves and bears. It's a fact of life on Earth that there is a food chain and we just happen to be lucky enough to control our position in the chain.

Gary

I think Beachbum was referring to halal meat in her quote, so it's not quite the same as standard meat. There are pretty strict requirements for an animal to be considered halal, and the manner of its death is one of them.

We are also supposedly at the top of the intelligence chain as well, but I don't see it. Being at the top of the food chain is no excuse for criminal behavior.

Is it "criminal behavior" to survive, or were you merely commenting on the illegality of mistreating "downer" cattle? The harsh reality is that species eat other species for survival. I've never heard anyone call a great white shark's behavior "criminal" when it devours a human. I'm going to assume you must have meant the behavior in the video is criminal, otherwise, how do you justify eating other animals for sustenance, yet call the very same behavior "criminal?" It's not only illogical to do so, it's also hypocritical - not to mention anti-human.

Gary