You are what you eat

This sounds appetizing: meat glue

Meat glue: it's what's for dinner!

It may well be, as meat glue--transglutaminase--is used to make fake steak, sausage and hot dogs, imitation crab, fish balls, and, I suspect (but don't know for sure) chicken nuggets.

What is transglutaminase?

TG is an enzyme that catalyzes covalent bonds between free amine groups in a protein, like lysine, and gamma-caroxminid groups, like glutamine. These bonds are pretty durable and resist degradation once the food has been formed.

In other words, it's a very strong glue. The enzyme comes from pig or cow blood, but if it's in your food, you probably won't know it, as there is no labeling requirement. If it's on the label at all, it will be as "composite meat product," so you might want to read those labels.

Watch the video to get an idea of how it works. For a "steak," say, you sprinkle the meat glue over chunks of meat, roll them up tightly in plastic wrap, and refrigerate overnight. In the morning, you've got a roll of meat that can be sliced into filet mignon-type "steaks." Notice, in the video, that the butcher and the reporter wear masks as the TG is sprinkled onto the meat. That's because they don't want to risk thrombosis.

Meat glue has recently been approved by the EU. Plenty of consumers are outraged by the decision, which reverses the EU's previous stance.

Many people, however, not only have no problem with TG, but wholeheartedly embrace it. Nils Noren and Dave Arnold, who author the high-tech food blog Cooking Issues, are enthusiastic about it. Innovative, avant-garde chefs experiment with it, producing such things as pasta made almost entirely out of shrimp. With meat glue, you can take different types of fish and meld them together for a new kind of fillet, or different kinds of meat for a "mixed grill."

Over at BoingBoing, Maggie Koerth-Baker and her commenters wax enthusiastic about the stuff. Commenters have used it to make turkey confit and to glue bacon and scallops together. Also coming in for praise on the blog is the idea of not wasting any meat--making what was previously un-sellable attractive and sellable.

After all, humans have long used meat scraps and the less aesthetically appealing parts of the animal in head cheese, blood sausage (black pudding), and the like. Someone on BoingBoing mentioned how native Americans used every part of the buffalo.

I can see the point, but unless I have a guarantee that the meat comes from grass-fed beef without antibiotics or hormones, I myself would rather not eat certain scraps. Organ meats in CAFO animals are notorious for their concentrated toxins.

Also, there is a much higher risk of food poisoning with "steaks" made with meat glue. As microbiologist Glenn Pener points out in the video linked above, “The amount of bacteria on a steak that’s been put together with meat glue is hundreds of time higher.” Why? Because scraps of meat put together feature bits that were on the outside--where bacteria can gather--but now have surfaces on the inside, where it's hard to get rid of them through cooking. Think about grilling a real steak. Bacteria on the outside will be killed by cooking, but if you're eating your steak somewhat on the rare side, that inner meat doesn't cook as much. Which is fine, because (especially after dry-aging) the inside of the meat is a lot safer. But a patched-together "steak" has lots of exterior (think beef stew meat) that becomes interior. Those previously exterior pieces are hard to cook thoroughly. For this reason, restructured steak should, according to the Wiki entry, always be cooked well-done. I doubt that it always is, though.

And finally, consumers should feel insulted by the deception going on. Inferior meats can be sold as if they were premium cuts: good for profits. Along with such things as surimi and restructured steak, one of the uses for meat glue listed in the Wiki entry is

Improving the texture of low-grade meat such as so-called "PSE meat" (pale, soft, and exudative meat, whose characteristics are attributed to stress and a rapid postmortem pH decline).

(Before leaving the uses for transglutaminase, I should point out that "meat glue" is something of a misnomer, as TG is also sometimes used in noodles and in milk and yogurt.)

I really resent the deception employed by the meat industry. There's no end to it: gas-injected packaging to keep meat red; water injection to make it plumper, heavier (pay by the pound, remember?), and better looking; pink slime in ground beef; and now I learn about meat glue.

I also tend toward plain cooking (Mark Bittman is my hero) with natural ingredients, and meat glue doesn't fit into my food philosophy at all. But hey, if meat glue sounds like something you'd like to try in your own kitchen, you can buy some through Amazon!

Meatballs a la Julia Child, plus how to use leftovers

I make these for parties, doubling or tripling the recipe depending on the size of the gathering. I've made just a couple of changes in the original recipe, which comes from Julia Child & Company.

The meatballs are so flavorful, and the sauce is a little different from the usual gravy-like sauce one often sees.

Recently, for a party, I made more of these than was necessary, so a recipe using the leftover meatballs follows.

Meatballs a la Julia Child

1/4 lb. mild Italian sausage
1 lb. lean ground beef
1 egg
2/3 C. fresh nonsweet white bread crumbs
5 T. dry vermouth
2 cloves garlic, very finely minced
8 or more drops of Tabasco
2 tsp. soy sauce
1/2 tsp. oregano or thyme
1/2 to 3/4 tsp. salt
freshly ground black pepper
flour

2 T. Dijon mustard
1/2 cup dry vermouth
1 C. beef stock
1 tsp. soy sauce
salt, pepper, and oregano or thyme
2 T. tomato paste

Preheat the over to 450 degrees. Soak the bread crumbs in the 5 T. of vermouth. Beat meat, egg, crumbs, and seasonings together. I use a food processor for this to get a very smooth texture. Roll the mixture into small balls about an inch in diameter, then roll each in flour and arrange in a single layer in a baking dish. Bake for about 15 minutes, possibly more, turning the meatballs once or twice, just till they're nicely browned and just stiffened. Drain, if necessary, in a sieve or colander. 

Mix the mustard with the vermouth, beating them together well. Mix with the rest of the ingredients in a saucepan and bring to a boil. Boil down the sauce until lightly thickened (it won't thicken very much, but it will thicken some). Add the meatballs to the sauce.

You can make these ahead and refrigerate them. Just reheat before serving, then place in a crockpot.

Meatball stew  

This isn't so much a recipe as general directions. The amount of each ingredient depends on how many meatballs you have left over as well as your personal preferences.

Saute chopped onion in a soup pot. After a few minutes, add sliced celery and carrot in thick half-slices or large dice. (Mushrooms would have been an excellent addition, but I didn't have any.) Pour in some beef stock; I used a couple of cups, plus some water. At this point I added hulled barley, which takes a lot longer to cook than does pearl barley. I let this stock simmer for a while, until the veggies were tender and the barley nearly so.

Add the meatballs and their sauce. I found that the tomato paste in the sauce made it unnecessary to add tomatoes to the stew, but go with what you like. If you need more liquid, add some stock. Add some herbs of your choice; I used basil and oregano. You'll need to adjust the salt and pepper. Simmer until the meatballs are heated through and the liquid thickens a bit. If the liquid doesn't thicken to your liking after a good simmer, use a cornstarch-and-water mixture to thicken it.

Serve the stew over noodles.

Do McDonald's hamburgers decompose?

According to one artist, the answer is no.

Sally Davies has kept a Happy Meal in her home for 6 months, with no noticeable change other than "it's hard as a rock." You can compare the photos yourself at the link.

McDonald's accuses Ms. Davies of fabricating the whole thing. Well, I don't know ... have you seen this video of the Bionic Burger? And the museum of ancient McD "food"?

 

Getting grass-fed beef from Melvin

Yes, it's that time of year. Tonight or tomorrow I'll be e-mailing Melvin to see when my half-a-cow will be ready and to tell him what cuts I want. We meet him at the meat processor's when we pick up the beef so we can give him his check. This year we're sharing the half with our daughter; we've discovered that a side of beef each is just too much. I'm going to beg for the tail, hoping that whoever is taking the other half doesn't want it. It makes incomparable broth. My daughter is letting me have the brisket, too, so I can make my own corned beef.

Melvin's is dry-aged beef, which is hard to find these days, and let me tell you, it produces a flavor and texture far superior to today's wet-aged beef. I think the fact that his beef is dry-aged explains why I haven't noticed the chewier texture everyone ascribes to grass-fed beef. Dry-aging reduces the weight greatly, and price is based not on final weight but on what's called the hanging weight; the weight of the beef we'll eventually get will only be about 60% of the hanging weight, but so what? The quality of the beef makes it worth every penny. The flavor of the beef is concentrated; compared to Melvin's beef, supermarket beef might as well be wet cardboard. The first time my daughter bit into some grass-fed beef, she exclaimed, "It tastes like a whole different animal!" Indeed it is in terms of the differences in omega-3 levels, conjugated linoleic acid concentrations, and other health benefits. It tastes the way beef tasted in my childhood.

A lot of people can't stand the thought of slaughtering an animal, but I guess I'm somewhat immune, having grown up a butcher's daughter who was quite used to seeing sides of cattle hanging in the walk-in cooler. I was raised around people who routinely butchered hogs and killed chickens, too. When I became a vegetarian, it wasn't because of the killing of animals, but because of the cruelty involved in feedlot-raised animals and of certain practices on hog farms and chicken farms. It was also because of the toll CAFOs (confined, sometimes termed concentrated, animal feeding operations) take not only on the animals, but on the environment. The pollution from these operations is horrendous and terribly damaging, with wastewater discharge being probably the biggest problem. When we were out west we passed several feedlots and they were awful to see--and to smell. So many animals in a confined area that they couldn't even really move, standing in their own excrement, eating an unnatural diet.

And if you think grass-feeding beef ravages the environment, particularly grassland, I hope you'll read this article that explains how grass-feeding can be healthy not just for humans and cattle, but for the environment as well. If done correctly, it could even--surprise!--reduce global warming gases.

Grass-fed beef has a lot going for it, and I like buying it from Melvin. His is a small operation, he loves his work and his cattle, and he continually improves his herd by careful breeding. He's "local," if you consider local within about a hundred miles, so that's good, too.

Do consider grass-fed beef. Your body--and your tastebuds--will thank you.

Corn your own beef

Having purchased half a cow, we have lots of beef in our freezer. I suppose it's only natural that we'd eventually think of corning our own beef, especially with St. Patrick's Day coming up next month.

According to Wikipedia, the term "corned beef" dates from at least 1621, while the "corn" in corned beef "refers to the 'corn' or grains of coarse salts used to cure it." Salting meat is, of course, a very old way to preserve it, although today most of us are familiar only with corned beef as an example of this formerly widespread technique.

Why corn your own beef? Well, why not? It's easy to do, and by doing it yourself you won't get any of those nitrites we'd all rather avoid. You can also vary the herbs and spices you use.

I turned up some recipes on the web that called for brine, and others that used a dry rub. We went with the latter for our experiment.

The brisket is the most commonly used cut of meat for corned beef, but roasts can also be used. We chose a round roast weighing about 5 pounds.

After two weeks of brining the meat (it does release its own juices to make a liquid brine), yesterday we soaked the meat in several changes of ice water (otherwise the salt would make the meat inedible!) over a period of a few hours and cooked it our favorite way--in the pressure cooker. The result? Delicious! We had been on tenterhooks about the result of our first attempt. I can hardly wait for the reubens we're having for dinner tonight. Not to mention the corned beef hash to come.

You need to know that homemade corned beef will not be red like that you buy. That's because there are no nitrites. So expect it to be the color of any other cooked meat.

I'll list the steps of the technique, then offer a recipe for the rub.

• mix together the rub
• spear the meat about 20 times per side with a meat fork
• rub each side of the meat evenly with the salt-herb-spice mixture
• place the meat in a 2-gallon plastic zipper bag, forcing out as much air as possible
• place the meat in a pan large enough to hold it (we used a 9" x 13" x 2" baking/roasting pan)
• place a similarly sized pan over the bagged meat
• weight the top pan down with bricks or heavy cans (about 10 pounds' worth)
• refrigerate for about two weeks, turning the bag once a day (we also "massaged" it through the bag)
• before cooking, soak the meat in cold water for a few hours, changing the water several times and making sure the water stays ice cold

Aye, here's the rub:

3/4 cup kosher salt
1 generous tablespoon peppercorns, cracked
2 tsp. whole allspice berries, cracked
1 T. dried thyme
1/2 T. paprika
1 tsp. crumbled sage
4 bay leaves, crumbled or torn into small pieces

I have a second coffee grinder that I use exclusively for grinding spices, so we put the whole peppercorns and then the whole allspice berries in for a few whirls of the blade to produce the cracked versions of these spices. Then mix all the spices and the salt together well and proceed as above.

When you're ready to cook your home-corned beef, you could do worse than follow this recipe:

Corned beef dinner

soaked corned beef, 4 or 5 lbs.
4 cups water
2 large bay leaves
4 or 5 potatoes, scrubbed
1 small green cabbage, quartered

Pour water into 6-quart (or larger) pressure cooker. Add the bay leaf and the meat. Arrange the potatoes on top. Lock the lid in place. Over high heat, bring the contents to high pressure. Reduce heat just to maintain high pressure and cook for 60 minutes (for 4 pounds) or 70 minutes (for 5 pounds). Turn off the heat and allow pressure to come down naturally. Remove lid, tilting it away from you to allow steam to escape.

Transfer the potatoes to a plate or platter and tent with foil to keep warm. Test the meat for doneness; it should measure around 150 degrees on an instant-read thermometer, and the meat on the ends should shred easily. If the meat is not done, return it to high pressure and cook another 5 or 10 minutes. When the beef is done, transfer to a cutting board and let it sit for 10 minutes before carving.

If there's less than a cup of liquid in the pressure cooker, add enough water to equal a cup. Set over high heat as you add the cabbage to the liquid. Lock the lid in place and bring to high pressure; reduce heat just to maintain high pressure for 3 minutes. Quick-release the pressure (by running a stream of cold water over the cooker in the sink). Remove the cabbage from the cooker (be careful to avoid the escaping steam) and drain.

Slice the corned beef against the grain. I like to serve corned beef with a mixture of sour cream and horseradish, sometimes with a bit of Dijon mustard added.

Dust off that slow cooker

Many, if not most, of us who do a lot of cooking have a slow cooker, or crockpot (in my case, two) languishing in the cupboard, to see the light of day only at the occasional party or buffet. But summer really should bring out those slow cookers.

Here on the homestead, spring, summer, and early fall are busy seasons, what with the planting, transplanting, weeding, watering, de-bugging, harvesting, and veggie-preserving. Those of you without huge gardens still spend a lot of time outdoors, whether doing yard work, caring for flowers, sunning, enjoying the summer breezes, or going to the beach or to a park. At the end of a long, lovely (or labor-intensive) day outside, who wants--or has the energy--to cook?

Barbecuing, of course, is a popular way to extend that time outdoors and requires little advance prep, even if you have to marinate the meat. Main-dish pasta salads prepared early in the day also solve the problem. The slow cooker is another option, one that's underused, perhaps because we just don't think of it. It's time to get your money's worth out of that handy appliance.

Last weekend, anticipating a long day of hard outdoor work, I got out my 5-quart slow cooker, knowing I'd be pretty worn out by dinner time. Nothing like having your dinner waiting for you when you come in, dirty and exhausted, at the end of the day. (And let's face it, the only way I'm ever going to come home to have dinner waiting is if I make it myself ahead of time.) In the morning I put together a beef stew. (If you need to, you can put it together the night before and keep it in the fridge until morning.) All day, whenever we'd come back to the house, the aroma made us salivate. At seven o'clock that night, we popped a wine cork, sliced some good sourdough bread, took salad-in-a-box out of the fridge, and sat down to a much-anticipated, much-needed hearty meal that sent us to bed happy.

The recipe follows. A few notes:

• I used fresh thyme and oregano, as my herb garden is lush and abundant right now. You can substitute dried.
• The last of last year's shallots simply must be used now, so I used a large shallot in the stew. You can omit and replace with a little more onion.
• If you omit some of the veggies--say the pearl onions and/or mushrooms--you may not need as much liquid, so use your judgment.
• I usually use a better cut of meat than is ordinarily used for stew beef, but this time around I had only a humble chuck roast. It came out incredibly tender. The long, slow cooking in liquid makes for really tender beef, so don't hesitate to buy the cheaper cuts for the slow cooker.

Slow cooker beef stew

2 lbs. beef stew meat, cut into 1-inch cubes
1/4 cup flour
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. freshly ground black pepper
olive oil
1/2 cup dry red wine
1 large bay leaf
1 T. Worcestershire sauce
several fresh sprigs thyme, leaves stripped off into the stew,
       OR 1/2 tsp. dried thyme
1 T. minced fresh oregano, OR 1 tsp. dried
3 cloves minced garlic
1 large shallot, chopped (opt.)
1 onion, chopped
2 medium-to-large potatoes, diced
3 medium carrots, sliced
2 stalks celery, sliced
8 oz. mushrooms, halved or quartered, depending on size
1 jar pearl onions, drained
1 small can plus 1 cup beef broth
1-2 T. red wine vinegar
2 heaping T. cornstarch dissolved in 3-4 T. water (a little more if necessary)

Mix flour, salt and pepper. Dredge beef cubes in the mixture, coating all sides well. Heat olive oil in a large pan, and when it's hot, brown the beef cubes, a few at a time, taking care not to crowd. Remove browned pieces to the slow cooker as they're done. After the meat has been browned, deglaze the pan with the wine, scraping up the bits off the bottom until the bottom of the pan is clean. (I actually deglazed twice, once with the wine after a little more than half the beef was browned, and once at the end with a little beef broth.) Pour the liquid into the cooker.

Add the herbs, Worcestershire, and vegetables. Stir in the beef broth. Cover and cook for about 10 hours on low, or 4 to 6 hours on high. When the meat and vegetables are tender, add 1 to 2 tablespoons red wine vinegar. Dissolve the cornstarch in water; stir into the stew. Cooker should be set on high at this point. Leave the cover off and let cook for another 15-20 minutes or so while you slice the bread and uncork the wine. The stew should thicken nicely.

Enjoy!

Beef braised in stout

This would make a delicious alternative to corned beef for St. Patrick's Day. I first made it for a friend who had visited Ireland and was coming, with another friend, to show me her photos (and were they gorgeous!). We had a lunch of this stew, salad, and Irish soda bread, with a Guinness cake for dessert.

You'll find that the beef fairly melts in your mouth, particularly if you choose a good cut of beef and slice it yourself. A top round roast is an excellent choice, as is a sirloin tip or bottom round. The stout--I used Guinness--tenderizes the beef miraculously.

Serve this in a bowl or soup plate with buttery mashed potatoes to the side of the beef in the same bowl.

2 lbs. beef, cut into thin strips or slices
2 T. olive oil
1 onion, chopped
2 leeks (opt.; use more onion if you don't have leeks), 2 carrots, and 2 celery sticks, chopped
2 cloves garlic, peeled
1 cup beef stock
1/2 cup stout
salt and pepper
1/4 lb. bacon, diced
4 T. butter
1/4 lb. mushrooms, sliced
small onion (about 2 oz.), peeled
cornstarch

Heat the oil in a Dutch oven and brown the meat well, a few strips/slices at a time, removing each batch with a slotted spoon (place all the meat in a bowl). Next saute the onion, leeks (if using), carrots, and celery. Add the meat and any collected juices to the pot, plus the cloves of garlic. Pour in the stock and stout; season with salt and pepper. Simmer gently for about one and a half hours. Remove the meat from the pot. Strain the liquid, saving it in another pot. Discard the vegetables.

Place the meat into the pot containing the strained liquid. In a skillet, saute the bacon. Remove with a slotted spoon. Add butter. When the foaming of the butter has begun to subside, add the sliced mushrooms. Do not crowd the pan! Do the mushroom slices in batches, removing them to a bowl as they begin to brown. Add the mushrooms and bacon to the meat and liquid.

Stir 2 T. cornstarch into a small amount of cold water; whisk so it's well dissolved. Add to the sauce, stirring and heating until the sauce thickens. Taste for seasoning. If the stew is still too thin, add more dissolved cornstarch; if too thick, add a little warm water or some beef broth.