Something weird is happening with beef

a reply to: SeaWorthy

Did you know you can take Potted Meat add a little starch or flour, lard or oil and the off the shelf taco bell packet then voila, taco bell beef.

a reply to: JAGStorm

I don't think it's just you. I spent a year in a remote Alaskan village when I was 12, and there was no commercially processed meat to be had. Wild game, seafood and the occasional can of corned beef has forever changed my taste buds.

I couldn't eat processed meat; it just tasted 'funny' to me. I could eat wild game and fowl, but store bought chicken made me want to gag. The smell of processed meat cooking is most unpleasant to me.

I eventually got to where I could eat store bought hamburger, and that's the only meat I've been able to digest; every other cut sits like a rock in my stomach, unless it's grass fed only.

The last couple of years hamburger not only tastes differently, it smells different. I don't know if it's the antibiotics, growth hormones, GMO feed, all the 'additives', or a combination, but the most recent change in flavor, smell and texture keeps me from eating meat from stores.

I haven't bought store hamburg in years, and I can taste the difference when eating at someone else's home, and it seems to give me a stomachache. Yes, it is more money up front, but buying beef from a farmer that raises cattle is so much better. I've had people try to tell me it is more expensive.

Nope, at 1.85/lb, last time I bought it, plus another 25 cents a pound to process, where are you going to get a steak for that price? A roast?

I save money all year, just to get a half or a full cow. And what you don't use, you can can up, so it will last a lot longer.

Same with pork.

originally posted by: Nyiah
a reply to: JAGStorm

I could have sworn there were articles out years ago during the Pink Slime freak-out (mmmm, ammonia-treated tissue scraps) that mentioned somewhere between 20% & 25% (don't remember the specific #) of ground beef was going to be sourced from PS because waste reduction & food prices.

That probably accounts for the Serving of Weird for you.



I feel like we had a huge debate thread on here about it, too, but can't find it

I had forgotten about pink slime!
"Pink slime (also known as lean finely textured beef or LFTB, finely textured beef, or boneless lean beef trimmings or BLBT) is a meat by-product used as a food additive to ground beef and beef-based processed meats, as a filler, or to reduce the overall fat content of ground beef. Wikipedia"

After a months-long evaluation, the United States Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) determined in December that BPI’s signature product—the offering famously called “pink slime” in an ABC News exposé that got the network in a lot of trouble—can be labeled “ground beef.” Legally speaking, it’s now no different from ordinary hamburger, and could even be sold directly to the public.

[thecounter.org...]

Warning: don't read this article while eating. In particular, don't read while eating a hamburger patty.

"Pink slime" refers to processed lean beef trimmings, and is a cheap filler used to "beef up" many meat products. It is made by salvaging the meat that gets trimmed off cuts of beef along with fat. The trimmings are first simmered at a low temperature to separate muscle and fat, then spun in a centrifuge to complete the separation. Next, the salvaged meat is squeezed through a pipe and sprayed with ammonia to kill bacteria, after which it is dyed pink, packaged into bricks, frozen and shipped to meat packing plants.

Once used only in pet food and cooking oil, pink slime is now found in a large (but unknown) percentage of the ground beef sold in supermarkets and served in fast food restaurants.

[www.livescience.com...]

originally posted by: JinMI
a reply to: SeaWorthy

Did you know you can take Potted Meat add a little starch or flour, lard or oil and the off the shelf taco bell packet then voila, taco bell beef.

Been vegetarian 10 years so nope didn't know, had to look up s "potted meat" mmm

What is potted meat made out of?
Image result for potted meat
Ingredients Mechanically Separated Chicken, Partially Defatted Pork Fatty Tissue (Tocopherol, Natural Flavor and Citric Acid), Water, Salt, Contains 2% or Less of: Mustard, Vinegar, Dextrose, Sodium Erythorbate, Garlic Powder, Natural Flavors, Sodium Nitrite.

a reply to: nugget1

Jokes on us!
"Pink slime (also known as lean finely textured beef or LFTB, finely textured beef..."

originally posted by: chiefsmom
I haven't bought store hamburg in years, and I can taste the difference when eating at someone else's home, and it seems to give me a stomachache. Yes, it is more money up front, but buying beef from a farmer that raises cattle is so much better. I've had people try to tell me it is more expensive.

Nope, at 1.85/lb, last time I bought it, plus another 25 cents a pound to process, where are you going to get a steak for that price? A roast?

I save money all year, just to get a half or a full cow. And what you don't use, you can can up, so it will last a lot longer.

Same with pork.

I wonder about the future relying of freezers, maybe in places with sun get some solar.

a reply to: JAGStorm

Easy answer....grind your own.

And don't buy annonymous meat.

a reply to: JAGStorm

I have noticed that some stores are selling sketchy meat and that they have been for a while. I've always bought some of our meat every March or April from the local farms, but I placed much larger orders the last time. 

Possible combination of growth hormones and fillers?

The whole Covid thing really threw major producers for a loop. Now that demand is back, I wouldn't be at all surprised if there's "hurry it up and stretch it" going on.

Like so many other things today. For example, wood. Drive a nail through the "wood" sold at any big home improvement store, then try diving a nail into a piece of original old-growth. Absolutely zero comparison.

Haven't noticed a difference,Oh wait,maybe because I eat deer,.mostly.And clean it myself.The hamburger nowadays tastes different from one store to the next,local raised is far better than the big stores.

a reply to: JAGStorm

Did you the the Muslim version Halal certified and do a comparison? It is said the cow is supposedly slaughter based on Islamic procedures.

originally posted by: JAGStorm
I’ve been cooking a long time. I’ve cooked from scratch a long time.

I noticed something with ground beef. I think it is being adulterated.
I really wonder if they are putting some of that fake stuff in there, or something else.

I was making tacos and I got my 97/3 beef that I normally get. I noticed right away the way it cooked up was different.
Usually when you cook beef the little “squiggles” round up. Not to be gross but it kinda looks like brains.
Well this beef cooked flat. The beef was fresh and not bad. Not previous frozen or anything. I knew it was odd. You just know these things when you’ve cooked for decades. I immediately wondered what it was mixed with or what is going on with the source, the actual beef cows they are using.

About a year ago I noticed a change in pork, well bacon in particular. Something is off.

I’ve ground my own beef in the past, and I think I’m going to go back to that. Just wondering if anyone else has noticed changes?

There was something off with the last chicken we had. A strange bitter taste. I can eat about anything and I didn't finish. Like if it were going off a little I could still deal but this was a chemical taste.

originally posted by: gb540
Possible combination of growth hormones and fillers?

The whole Covid thing really threw major producers for a loop. Now that demand is back, I wouldn't be at all surprised if there's "hurry it up and stretch it" going on.

Like so many other things today. For example, wood. Drive a nail through the "wood" sold at any big home improvement store, then try diving a nail into a piece of original old-growth. Absolutely zero comparison.

Speaking of this, I used some recently bought deck screws and then changed my mind and undid the project. About a quarter of the screws were broken in half when I backed them out. They hadn't been under much weight or even tension as the 2x4s were economy and pretty soft.

This is crap metal being used and my first thought was what if someone built a deck or stairs with these. People could get hurt or die. At some point it just needs to be "sorry we are out" rather than provide a much inferior and dangerous product.

a reply to: JAGStorm

Recently I cooked taco’s the minced beef 8 percent fat looked good, though when cooked it went really crumbly, no chunky bits like I remember.

I wouldn’t be suprised if they are filling it up with Offaly bits as fillets, hence why it has no adhesion to chunk up.

I have a new technique now, if I cook a beef roast or even a pork shoulder what ever is left over the next day goes intbthe pressure cooker to soften the meat up. I then knead the meat and loose the fibres of the meat and then make tacos as normal.

The family like it alot more as the texture is more real, if that makes sense.

Try it out.

Sure you're getting the same stuff? Reason I ask is at our store ground beef comes in two different varieties (grass fed: $$$$ and grain fed: $$) and in 7%, 10%, 15%, 20% and 25% fat content each, so a total of 10 different varieties plus the specialty stuff (wagyu, etc.) The 7-10% is extremely lean and gives off hardly any fat at all, but perfect for meat ball dishes, tacos, burritos, etc. I usually buy 15% unless I'm BBQing burgers when I'll go to 20%. The 25% is just too greasy. They grind it locally, but I wonder how they measure the %? (I should ask.) Anyway, point is the different varieties cook up way differently.

a reply to: JAGStorm

Hey Jag, former chef here.

The best I can recommend is to get yourself an oldschool manual grinder. You can get an all metal one for ~20 bucks online, I found two for free from a neighbor. This way, you can customize your ground meats by choosing the percentages of fat by weight, quality by cut, etc. And its much, much cheaper. I get my ground beef now for about $2 lb because of using stewing meats with fats trimmed from my different cuts that I cook on other times.

The concerning thing I saw with meats when I was still in the industry, is the instantiation of "fake" cuts from different producers, using scrap meats effectively "glued" together using different blends of amino acids and proteins. They can effectively make a sirloin out of round cuts.

chinchen gives you large breast

originally posted by: SeaWorthy

Pure beef patties
Also called 100 percent beef patties, these are similar to ground beef but can contain partially defatted chopped beef. Regular “beef patties” can also contain defatted beef, and organ meats, water, binders, fillers, and extenders. Those latter ingredients must be listed on the label.

Ground chuck
When you see a cut of beef denoted on the label—such as chuck, round, or sirloin—the meat and meat trimmings come from that part of the animal. No beef components can be added. However, it can still contain meat from multiple animals.

www.consumerreports.org...

Laws vary but most can say beef and have this sort of thing
Taco Bell Sued Over Meat That's Just 35 Percent Beef
www.foxnews.com...

People need to remember (natural flavors) can meen a lot of things even sugar.

The bugs they want us to eat are natural... And supposedly would have a natural (bug) flavor.

a reply to: JAGStorm

Depends on how much "pink slime" your local supermarket adds to ground beef.