The " Food " Conundrum !

When we order Crayfish in a restaurant - or Lobster as other nationalities call them - the cooking and preparation of the meal is mercifully performed out of sight in the kitchen, but the traditional way involves dropping this live creature into a vat of boiling water.

That is coming to an end in Switzerland.  The government has decreed that this practice is barbaric and it is now outlawed, but the law is vague about what alternative should be used, and this has created a new controversy.  A commercial device has been invented that zaps the lobster with electricity and some chefs are simply making a brain incision with a sharp knife do the job.  The unsolved question is whether Lobsters have the ability to feel pain.

Scientific opinion is divided.  Lobsters lack the brain geography that handles pain in the human brain but when under attack they are capable of sacrificing a claw to gain an escape.  They continue to twitch when their arms have been ripped off, but it is unclear whether this is because of unpleasant sensations or a programmed reflex.

We are fast heading into a more merciful attitude to the death of those animals that form the human food chain, but a visit to any abattoir is enough to turn most stomachs.  Death - as part of the way animals make their way to the butcher shops and supermarkets - is neither fast or pleasant.

We only need to observe pens of sheep or cattle waiting their turn to be herded onto the killing floor to see the distress.  What they see and what they can smell brings an awareness of what is to come. Hunters claim this is why hunted animals have more tender meat.  They have no idea a bullet is heading their way and their bodies are not tensed with fear.  That sounds a very reasonable contention.

There is widespread revulsion of the use of battery hens in egg production and this production method is being fazed out, but the conditions that apply to " free range " are usually a lot less than customers imagine.  We have images of chooks wandering grassy paddocks but this is not commercially rewarding.  Usually, the only thing missing is the wire cages and the poultry are herded together in great numbers - and expected to lay an egg a day - or be sentenced to become chicken meat in a fast food restaurant.

It has been proven that land use to raise animals for human consumption is less efficient than pure agriculture and with our growing numbers that will have to change.  Science is well on the way to " growing "  a substance that has all the properties of " meat " and this is fast evolving into commercial practice.   The boffins are cleverly getting the texture and delivery of mineral content right - but still have a way to go to replicate that elusive element we call " taste ".

Perhaps the day is fast coming when we will all be vegetarian - not by choice - but simply because that is the what is offered at the food stores and it is a mysterious combination of commercial laboratories blending together all the nutriments our bodies need with the protein derived from the insect world, supplemented by the bulk of vegetable matter the world's farms struggle to grow to sustain the world population.

Perhaps that is the day when a cow or sheep are a rareity to be viwed on an excursion to a model " farm " that reminds people how we lived back in the dark ages.  Perhaps by then the " blandness " of what we eat will have become an acquired taste !