At 90%+ Lean you have to add moisture back in, I usually do this with Worcestershire & Seasoned breadcrubs, if it's 93% lean an egg usually goes in as a binder. However when I have time to really enjoy a burger I grind my own, usually from cuts not typically used (A mix of Flank, Plate, or London Broil) because they are very tough cuts with a lot of flavor.

I like steak, generally like to cook my own, though its usually such a pain in the ass as a solo dude, much more fun when its a party, you've got a charcoal grill and a bunch of steaks. Adding ale to the steak is pretty good too.

I buy half a side of beef from the farm. There is a world of difference between the hamburger meat the two of us are eating. I cringe at the thought of eating store bought meat.

A note here. I live in Nebraska, so buying a half side of beef is easy here. However, I grew up in southeastern Conn. where the story is very different but equally odd. My brother had a Personal Use Lobster License. His "red beans and rice" (we're broke food) was ramen and lobster. The main reason he doesn't have a lobster license this year is that he's sick of it (and they raised the price of the license to $120). Note that if I drop an economic level locally (go full bore blue collar), I'll find a lot more venison and morel mushrooms on my table. Both are incredible. However, neither are food of the middle class. You either have to go get it yourself or pay heavily for it (or, in my case, have friends in low places).

I think a clearer viewpoint is that the rich and the poor eat differently than the middle class. The rich can afford to buy good food. The poor often grow/hunt good food to make ends meet.

Its the poor folks who live in the city that lose out really - I mean 'round here we have our own little piece of land we grow vegitables on, and I know I'm planning to buy half a cow and a pig next year myself, if I don't just ask my cousins if I can have some of the proceeds of their hunting (yay venison)...but those options aren't really available in the urban sprawl. (Although now I'm thinking about rooftop gardens in old bathtubs and pigeon coops..)

http://verticalfarm.com/

Well, take a look at this then.

Takes the luxury beer madness to a new level...

not sure if thats beer or rocket fuel

love the name for another of their products tho, "tactical nuclear penguin"

seems the guys behind brewdogs have specialized in strong beer.

SF and I do our shopping together. We do not have the chance to buy a 'side of beef' that would be too much for us too. I saw that episode of I Love Lucy. But she does often buy large slabs of vacuum packed beef and happily explains to me how she will butcher it into steaks and roasts and would I like one too?

To go to your very last point I think that is what SF was disputing with the 90% lean hamburger meat. It is more expensive meaning it is supposed to be better and so more special BUT everyone here who seems to understand cooking rejects it, either buying meat that is less lean or adding things to it to up the quality. I buy less lean meat for less money and make better burgers. OK my husband does the burgers. The grill in the back and the TV remote in the bedroom are declared 'man things' and I hope he stops before our two daughters start taking him seriously.

My family got half a frozen cow once.

That... Was not a fun night. We broke two knives, and ended up having to sterilize some hacksaws.

Typically you let the cow thaw before you do that.

I could get a side or a quarter fairly easily, most butchers around here have packs where they'll even cut it to my spec as part of the purchase price, throw in a quarter of a pig and a few chickens in the mix as well. The thing preventing me from doing it right now is freezer space- I have none.

Off-topic Clarification: When one buys half of a cow here, they don't literally get half of a cow. They get about 200 lbs of beef already prepared and vacuum packed. Some roasts, some steaks, a lot of hamburger. You don't need to know how to butcher it, but you do need a decent size chest freezer.

http://www.nebraskafood.org/shop/category_list_full.php

Note that half a pig (raised in a pasture/dirt, no antibiotics) is about 60 pounds of ready-to-cook pork at roughly $3.55 a pound. Half a Angus is about 200 pounds of ready-to-cook beef at $4 a pound. Sure, you could get a pig from a local farm and do-it-yourself (my cousin-in-law did just that for his birthday party, he has a smoker that will handle a whole hog) but it's really a lot easier (and quite possibly cheaper) to let a butcher do it.

--

The point was, the rich aren't the only ones who will eat real food in the future. The wage slaves that grow the fruits and vegetables and meats will likely eat it as well. They may eat lesser cuts, sweetbreads, etc. but the price of organic food at that stage of production, especially if they're growing/hunting their own on the side, makes it the affordable choice.

I got a guy here at work that has a cattle ranch. As long as I'm willing to come help do the carving and have enough space to cart it off, he'll do half a cow.

That reminds me - I need to look into a chest freezer again.

I'm Canadian, and it was in the middle of Winter. You wanted us to wait until Spring?

You don't have space heaters in the Great White North?

No, we just drink Anti-Freeze.

Just kidding, there was a reason we couldn't wait for it to thaw, I just can't remember why right now. I was very young and half-asleep when it was going on.

On the bright side, I learned some new curse words.

Egh. Frozen side, you're better off with a bandsaw.

So, there is this restaurant outside of Denver called the Fort. It's known for being a place that serves a wider variety of meat than most places. If you want elk, rattlesnake, Rocky Mountain oysters... this is the place to go. My family was there a number of years ago and the owner came out to talk to us. He asked us how we liked the bison tongue (yes, the tongue of a buffalo). To this day, it was the best tasting meat I've ever had, and we said as much.

He told us a story: back in the 19th century, when America was destroying the food supply of the Native Americans, much of the destruction was done by trainloads of East Coast tourist "hunters", who would shoot buffalo by the thousands from platforms on the train. The meat was mostly left to rot, but they made a point of taking the tongues back to the East Coast, where they were considered a great delicacy by the idle rich. Knowing this, the restaurant owner checked with his bison suppliers about bison tongues. To his surprise, they were dirt cheap, apparently because there was no real market for them. He thought "cool! I can give my customers this great thing for a low price! That will rule!". So, he started serving it and... it didn't sell. He thought about this. "So," he told us, "I cut the portion in half and tripled the price. They started selling like wildfire."

Not sure if that guy still owns the place, but the "Braised Bison Tongue - A Historian's Treat" is still on the menu, for $9.

(Seriously, though, you can keep your Kobe beef. I'll take the bison tongue. Rocky Mountain oysters, too.)

Eugh. No thank you to the oysters. My old hometown had a fry every year.

And we americans give foreigners grief for the things they eat. Ugh. Eating testicles. At what point does that get fun?

Well, as the old saying goes, "When you got them by the balls..."

That is demented. I love it!

Wordman I think you just gave a ownderful example of what I and Bourdain was saying.
dirty cheap- ew-
high price- hey exotic.

It also depends on where you are. In parts of the Maritimes (The island Provinces of Canada, minus Newfoundland, which was it's own country when the name started), Lobster is the "Poor Man's Meal", despite being a high-price item... Well, everywhere else.

The NAN have access to lots of farm land, so grains are cheaper for them. Prime hunting land, too, so meat can be on the menu too. Unless you're a Pinkskin on a Reserve, that is...

Yeah... I have family in Alaska and they say the same thing... I like me some fish, but I am not sure that I can eat it all the time like they do (hey, its cheap)... I have to have some variety.

Then your SR just isn't dystopean enough.

The poor don't have any place to grow there own food, there are no affordable places to hunt without getting hunted, and the land they work for the corps doesn't let them have any real food. They check the employees when they leave the fields like mine companies check there employees to make sure they are not making off with some gold.

Agreed.

It is a pity considering how good buffalo tastes, but they are making a come back so at least they did not go extinct. On a side note plenty of native americans wasted tons of buffalo meat as well. We all hear how they used every part of the animal, that is not the same as using every animal they killed. The Americans on the trains just did it for totally retarded reasons and in greater numbers.

You mean closet hydroponics doesn't pay for itself? There are no abandoned areas? http://www.livingoffgrid.org/the-basics-of...illa-gardening/ seems almost written for shadowrun.
The land west of Denver is worth defending?There are no more squirrels, rabbits, pigeons, seagulls?

What happens to overripe, sweetbreads, tripe, and other parts that are good eats but don't sell? (Chicken feet leap to mind.)

Maybe my SR isn't dystopean enough, but healthy workers last longer and if giving them chicken feet cuts down on their attempts at trying to pilfer genetically improved eggs to hatch in homemade incubators, then I'd give them the chicken feet.

Besides, with this much ammo running around I don't want any more dystopia.

Mr. Todd: These are desperate times Mrs. Lovett, and desperate measures are called for.
Mrs. Lovett: Here we are hot out of the oven!
Mr. Todd: What is that?
Mrs. Lovett: It's Orc. Have a little Orc
Mr. Todd: Is it really tender?
Mrs. Lovett: Sir, You could it it with a spork. Then again they don't commit sins of the flesh, so it's pretty fresh.
Mr. Todd: Awful lot of fat.
Mrs. Lovett: Only where it sat.
Mr. Todd: Haven't you got Hacker, or something like that?
Mrs. Lovett: No, you see the trouble with Hacker is you can still taste the dorc. Try the Orc. Adept's rather nice.
Mr. Todd: If it's for a price.
Mrs. Lovett: Order something else though to follow since no one should swallow it twice.
Mr. Todd: Anything that's lean?
Mrs. Lovett: Well then if you don't mind the oil, you might enjoy this Rigger I've seen. Anyway it's clean, though of course it tastes a little of machine.
Mr. Todd: Is that Street Sam on the fire?
Mrs. Lovett: No it's basted in honey, it's really Gun Bunny...

And the Corporations that own the land have goon squads that make sure every GRAM of food that can be turned into product is, while still allowing the people to work the fields.

Or, you know... Drones. Drones don't eat.

Where do you get the non-acid rain water, how about power for the lights, and even if something eventually pays for itself you still have to be able to pay for it.



The land west of denver is worth defending even if you could get out there, good luck with that. Squirrels, pigeons etc good luck getting a non diseased version in the polluted tomorrow.



There is always a market somewhere, and waste is common for big evil corps.



Workers can be replacedh, a new worker is cheaper than the food I'd be giving him. And as pointed out Drones would/could be doing this work. Besides soy protean is cheaper and keeps them going fine. Yes it is dystopean but people are not starving to death they just are not eating meat, they eat Soy'Os for breakfast, Soy-burgers for lunch and maybe switch it up and have Krill Steaks for dinner. All of which is fortified so they get all there dietary requirements, mmnn stuffer shack good.

They make wonderful sausages.

Drones and skillwires cost more than that waste you're throwing away. And why pay to haul waste away when workers will take it home for free?

The "poor people are mindless sheep" meme boggles me. Run with it if you want, it's your world, but from what I can see, if the harder life is for a group of people the less they act like mindless sheep. Either the corps need to deliver a lot of bread and circuses to the Sinless or the sinless are going to focus on making or taking their own.

People are mindless sheep,a person may not be, but people are. Also its not "my world" its the Sr setting, people don't eat meat unless they are the rich, corporations treat there employees like crap, corporations will throw stuff away before giving it to there employees, corporations do check every gram of food to make sure employees don't steal a drop of it.

You can say it doesn't make sense because of Y, and maybe you might be right. But hey not everything in SR has to make sense, it just has to make enough sense to play it.