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Valentine's Fare for Green Lovers
Charm your loved one this Valentine's Day with food of love; sweet herbs (lovage, sweet cicely, rosemary), love apples (tomatoes), avocado, asparagus hearts, a bed of rice and delicious chocolate brownies.
"My salad days, When I was green in judgement"*
"Better is a dinner of herbs where love is, than a stalled ox and hatred therewith"**
Menu
Gazpacho
Tomato, Avocado, and Red Onion Salad
‘Beef’ Wellington With Madeira Sauce
Fudgy Brownies
Rose or Raw juice drink
See weekly recipes
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Landowner’s EU Grant Cut
Wildlife crimes punished.
Hard upon our call for urgency in augmenting the powers given in anti-hunting legislation with bans on game-shooting and disquiet that these activities contribute less for the pot than a cruel release of disabled birds unequal for the stresses of wildlife and certainly for the amusement of the shoots on estates and farmers’ diversifications comes confirmation in information released to the Guardian (07/01/08, EU grant cut for landowner whose gamekeeper tried to kill birds of prey and Ministers failing to act on wildlife crime, conservationists say) under Freedom of Information legislation.
In “a landmark punishment” for Scottish farmers that has prompted an Environment Minister to call “for more action” the Scottish executive said it had docked £7,919 from last year’s single farm payment and beef calf scheme payments to James McDougal, “who runs a large cattle- and sheep-farming business near Lauder”, Berwickshire, which is “more than the £5,000 maximum for a wildlife crime offence”. The fine is the first time ministers have used wide-ranging powers under European law to dock a farmer’s subsidies for environmental crimes, “even though the legislation came into force 4 years ago”.
Read full article here. |
This Fish is Not for Coarse Angling
Come June Jimmie and Penny Hepburn expect to sell 2000 carp from the 17 spring-fed ponds at their home in Devon.
They expect to sell a plate-sized fish for £5 and claim an interest from owners of pubs, restaurants, and a chain of popular wine bars in London. However, “the enterprise could be at risk if local predators have their own way” (these being those pesky non-human competitors, of course), “when otters fancy a feed, they head down to the Hepburn’s ponds. There are also fish-eating birds, so the ponds are netted – though the kingfishers scissor a way through”, reports the Guardian 07/01/08).
Jimmie believes that he would earn much more if he used his ponds for angling or to rear ornamental fish. “It seems ridiculous that we put less value on fish reared for food than fish reared for sport. It shows the mess we’ve got ourselves in”, he says. The Hepburns foresee changed attitudes, owing to “environmental problems…
They imagine a time when people will get rid of the goldfish from their ponds and replace them with carp for food. After all, a few years ago many people weren’t into their vegetable patches. Now growing vegetables again is trendy”, says Jimmie. “Remember, 10 or 15 years ago almost nobody ate sushi in the UK. Now it’s everywhere”, he adds
Read full article here. |
Illness from Sainsbury’s Turkeys Sold in London
A Sainsbury’s local store manager offered a customer £20 to “pay for medication” when she complained that turkey sold past its use-by-date had made her feel ill (the Times, 10/01/08, Sainsbury’s fined).
Sainsbury’s was fined £15,000 with £8,000 costs at City of Westminster Magistrates’ Court. The firm admitted 7 counts of breaching food-labelling regulations in 2 of its Central London stores in June last year and December 2006.
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New Angles in Salmon Stocks on the Overfished River Tay
While animal welfarists and environmentalists must appreciate the global aspects of commercial fishing for food and household goods (and this concern embraces sea-mammals such as whales and seals), there are matters closer to home that we must face.
At least, fish are becoming recognised as sentient animals and therefore deserving of more concern than hitherto.
Read full article here. |
VION - A New Name for Veggies as the Meat Industry Diversifies
A significant newcomer into the meat-free veggy market – and possibly dairy-free too – is growing according to claims made by Vion, “the number 2 food processor in Europe", second only to giant Unilever, which it has firmly in its sight, according to the Meat Trades Journal (18 January 2008).
Vion’s Ton Christiaanse says: “Rapid expansion and acquisition outside its traditional fields of operation have seen the company reposition itself as not just a meat processor, but as a food business.” He is Chief Operating Officer of Vion’s convenience division and the person charged with taking the 4-years-old firm into previously uncharted waters.” Convenience now represents about €1.1bn to €1.5bn in turnover (compared with €6.4bn on fresh meat), but it is “a key area of growth going forward” says Ton Christiaanse.
Read full article here. |
Gamesmanship
Huntin’, Shootin’, Fishin’ or Games with Political Aims. The former Tory hard man, Lord Tebbit of Chingford, who was a key figure in Margaret Thatcher’s governments and a Tory party chairman, is writing a book of recipes.
Tebbit, 76, who is a keen shot, is collating recipes for cooking game such as pheasant, partridge and rabbit (Sunday Times and Independent on Sunday, 3 February 2008). This appears to be a salvo as he lays aside his shotgun from the final legal pheasant shoot of this season. “To this day I can think of few things better than shooting a bird, plucking it, cooking it, and then eating it,” he says. For the past few years, with more time on his hands, Tebbit has enjoyed hunting for game and cooking it. “I don’t shoot for the sake of it. That’s pointless. I shoot to cook and eat or to take it to the local butchers,” he says.
Read full article here.
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Bored with Pheasants? Now Let’s Hunt and Shoot Boar
Big-game hunting with gunmen paying £550 a piece to shoot captive “wild” boar on a country estate is a new development in “sports” to vex animal welfarists and environmentalists and challenge the definitions of DEFRA and the Food Standards Agency.
Widening of the applications of hunting for game and angling for both food production and “sport” prompts an urgent overhaul of legislation that needs strengthening before the next General Election.
Read full article here. |
Everything But The Squeal...
But Who’s for Some of the Nasties in the Rasher?
The meat trade often teases veggies with the taste and smell emanating from the fleshpots that fail to disgust the meat-frees long after their conversion. A glimpse of the confirmed meat-eater’s revulsions emerges in a question DA of Bristol poses to Fred A’Court in the Fred’ll Fix It page in the Meat Trades Journal Extra (Feb 2008). Fred was editor of the Meat Trades Journal for more than 15 years. He offers “the opportunity for butchers and retail operators to get practical answers to the kind of issues they are facing every day”.
Read full article here. |
Consultations
Raising Overworked Cows' Work Load?
VEGA comments on a DEFRA consultation on "A proposal for two per cent increase to milk quotas from 2008".
What is Fresh, Pure, Natural Food?
VEGA comments on a Revision of Food Standards Agency Guidance “Criteria For The Use Of The Terms Fresh, Pure, Natural Etc in Food Labelling”.
Routine Mutilations of Animals
VEGA comments on a DEFRA Consultation on the "Draft Mutilations (Permitted Procedures) (England(Amendment) Regulations 2008". |
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Hon.
Research Adviser:
Dr Alan Long
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President:
Dr Conrad Latto
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14 Woodland Rise
Greenford
Middlesex UB6 0RD
Tel / Fax: 020 89020073
Email: info@vegaresearch.org
www.vegaresearch.org
Registered
Charity No. 1045293
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