Chinese Dogs Rescued En Route to Butcher

These dogs were rescued by Chinese activists before they could be slaughtered for meat. According to this article from the NPR site, such rescues are occuring more regularly as dogs are increasingly becoming pets. A good story from China for once.

Horse Slaughter Could Start Up Again in One Month

Bad news for horses in the US. Of course, right now, they're just being shipped to Canada and Mexico anyway, where health and welfare standards are much, much lower.

Read the complete article at pantagraph.com.....

Horses could soon be butchered in the U.S. for human consumption after Congress quietly lifted a 5-year-old ban on funding horse meat inspections, and activists say slaughterhouses could be up and running in as little as a month.

Slaughter opponents pushed a measure cutting off funding for horse meat inspections through Congress in 2006 after other efforts to pass outright bans on horse slaughter failed in previous years. Congress lifted the ban in a spending bill President Barack Obama signed into law Nov. 18 to keep the government afloat until mid-December.

It did not, however, allocate any new money to pay for horse meat inspections, which opponents claim could cost taxpayers $3 million to $5 million a year. The U.S. Department of Agriculture would have to find the money in its existing budget, which is expected to see more cuts this year as Congress and the White House aim to trim federal spending.

The USDA issued a statement Tuesday saying there are no slaughterhouses in the U.S. that butcher horses for human consumption now, but if one were to open, it would conduct inspections to make sure federal laws were being followed. USDA spokesman Neil Gaffney declined to answer questions beyond what was in the statement.

Phoenix Restaurant Serves Lion Burgers

No, I'm not making this up.

From the Associated Press....

A restaurant owner who put lion burgers on the menu in honor of the World Cup has felt a roar of anger from outraged animal rights activists.

Cameron Selogie, owner of the Il Vinaio restaurant in Mesa, served burgers made with African lion this week as a nod to the tournament in South Africa. Reservations sold out, with a waiting list 100 long.

But the burgers also attracted international attention and the scorn of animal rights activists, who picketed outside the restaurant. Selogie has even received some death threats.

And now Selogie himself is questioning whether the meat was fair game.

"I was led to believe they were not hunted, they were not shot, they were not abused," Selogie said. "I feel I was misled by this."

Serving African lion meat is perfectly legal, said Michael Herndon, a spokesman for the Food and Drug Administration. Game meat such as lion can be sold as long as the species isn't endangered, and the CDC hasn't prohibited importation of African lion, although its Asiatic cousin is on the endangered list.

Bush Meat, Trafficking Decimate Vietnam

Sounds just awful. But the problem is the high demand for these products.

From Vietnam News...

Dr Scott Roberton, head of Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), said that hunting wild animals for meat and trafficking had been happening in many countries, especially developing ones.

In Viet Nam, hunting and trade in wild animals had been alarming, he said.

A WCS study conducted at 200 restaurants in the central region found they consumed nearly 2 million wild animals per year. Among them, stag and wild boar accounted for around 70 per cent of the consumed meat, followed by turtle, snake, fox and porcupine.

The study estimated the demand of wild animal consumption nationwide at nearly 4,500 tonnes per year....

Over the last two years, authorities have discovered 57 cases of trafficking in wild animals involving more than 7,612 individuals including monkeys and Tibetan bears and elephant tusks.

Why Top Chef Makes Me So Mad

I'm just watching the fourth or fifth episode of the latest season of Top Chef. It just irritates the hell out of me.

First of all, it highlights the deficiencies of today's chefs' training. Throughout the entire show, the judges and contestants always refer to their meats as the "protein." It's as though there is no other protein around. That's not true. Vegetarians and vegans know that you get protein from vegetables. Protein is not dependent on meat at all. That is total misinformation. Is that all these people can cook?

I've seen two chefs wear stupid meat-inspired shirts. Last season, one idiot (who actually won the season) wore a stupid shirt saying "Bacon is a vegetable." Another one from this season was wearing a diagram of a cow with all its "cuts" outlined.

Today's vile episode is one featuring French cooking. I have yet to see an episode featuring vegetarian cooking. Vegetarians are far more predominant than people who go to snooty French restaurants. And frankly, I'm not sure these chefs have the training to do anything that doesn't involve a baby animal.

Today, I've seen an elimination challenge involving snails and foie gras. The main challenge involves frog legs, rabbits, live lobsters (still moving) and other animals.

What the eff? I am so unimpressed by this pathetic bunch. And this frigging show. Add cooking schools to the list of animal exploitation promoters, along with medical schools.

UPDATE

On Top Chef Masters Season 1, a show in which famous chefs compete against each other for charity, there was a vegan episode.

Weird Meat Seized in Malaysia

Ewwww....I don't know how I come across these weird stories. In Malaysia, 12 tonnes of exotic animal meat was seized from smugglers. It consisted of bear, iguana and owl meat.

Any kind of meat is gross to me, but owl? That's new to me!