Beat The Meat

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Recommended: Impact of fast food

Meat, everyone loves meat. Well, except for vegetarians. I for one am a meat lover; if you asked me to choose between a healthy salad and an oily heart attack burger, I would go for the burger. I eat fast food once in a while, and I do like the burgers. At times, I would wonder where the meat comes from since it tastes different from burgers that come from actual restaurants. Many people other than me eat fast food daily and have become a habit for them. In addition, due to the rise in costumers, fast food industries opened many more restaurants, which led to a higher demand of meat. Due to this high demand for meat, meat industries are starting to use various ways to produce meat quickly. However, speeding up the processes can cause meat to be contaminated and cause a rise in the risk of E.coli being in the meat.

It all begins with what kind of environment the cow is living in and how it’s being fed, which determines the health of the cattle. In the past when calves are born, they feed off their mother’s milk and later on graze on grass for pretty much the rest of their lives; and in the winter, they would feed on hay. Now in the present, cows are packed into feedlots, get little exercise and practically live in their own manure. Cattle living in this type of situation make them more prone to all sorts of diseases and illnesses. While they are packed in the feedlots, they are fed foods that are high in protein in order to fatten and muscle out the cattle, which causes the cattle to grow and mature at a faster rate. According to Kamb, “In farming communities, a variety of protein sources were readily available, from soybeans or peanuts or cottonseed. Or, from chicken feces, poultry feathers, cow blood or other parts of pigs, hor...

... middle of paper ...

...a happy cow always tastes better.

Works Cited

Schlosser, Eric. "What's In The Meat." Fast Food Nation: the Dark Side of the All-American Meal. New York, NY: Harper Perennial, 2005. 203. Print.

Kamb, Lewis. "Cattle Feed Is Often a Sum of Animal Parts - Seattlepi.com." Seattle News, Sports, Events, Entertainment | Seattlepi.com - Seattlepi.com. 27 Jan. 2004. Web. 12 Apr. 2011. .

Blatt, Harvey. "What Is This Stuff We're Eating?" America's Food: What You Don't Know about What You Eat. Cambridge, MA: MIT, 2008. 202. Print.

Powered By Produce (PBP). "Ground Beef: Cook The Shit Out Of It… Literally." Powered By Produce: A Blog About Food. 24 Feb. 2011. Web. 13 Apr. 2011. .

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