After last week’s post I don’t know about you, but I feel invigorated. I have taken in a deep cleansing positive breathe, embraced the circle of life and released all negative thoughts.
 

Well, not exactly. I was doing great by the way until the very next day when I read an article on Yahoo about horses in Ireland and Great Britain. Oh, and it’s a whopper! I truly think that I am going to stop watching and reading the news. Things just get crazier by the minute.
 

Do y’all know about Mister Ed?
 

If not, I think you can still catch reruns on Nick at Nite or somewhere on the internet. It’s an old comedy series, but it came to mind after reading that Yahoo article. Its jingle went like this:
 

“A horse is a horse, of course, of course

And no one can talk to a horse of course

That is, of course, unless the horse is the famous Mister Ed.”
 

You’ve got to admit that’s catchy. 🙂
 

Anyway, the Golden Globe award winning television series was based on a short story written by Walter Brooks in the 1930’s called, “Ed Signs the Pledge.” Now you have to know that “Mister Ed” had an opinion for everything. If Wilber, his owner, got into a pickle about something, he always walked out to the barn and talked to “Ed”. Of course we realize that horses can’t talk, but if they could, I’d hate to think what Mister Ed would say about this.
 

Apparently, Burger King is huge in the U.K. and Ireland. In fact, they love their burgers as much as we do in the U.S., if not more. But it was announced last week that they’ve stopped using one of the firms caught up in a scandal of supplying grocers with beef that contained horse meat!? And not just a little horse meat. The hamburger contained twenty-nine percent horse meat.
 

Okay, does this…

 

Look like this…

 

No? Oh good, because I thought I was losing it for a minute!
 

I recall an incident in U.S. history when the Donner Party resorted to eating horse meat. But they were at the brink of starvation during a blizzard while crossing the Sierra Nevada mountain range in northern California in 1846. Granted, this example may be way over the top since there was a little cannibalism going on. The point is it wasn’t a pretty picture.
 

All we want is a good healthy burger. It that too much to ask? But horse meat?

Really? Are we that desperate?
 

The British food industry was rocked by this revelation—a $2.6 billion dollar scandal that has left them reeling with the aftereffects from the first major shock-waves after its discovery. Food safety experts say the horse meat posed no added health risks to consumers, but the discovery has raised concerns about the supply of our food chain and the ability to trace meat ingredients.
 

Well that’s interesting, because as you may know, the U.S. has had its own ground beef concerns with E. coli and Salmonella. Should we also be looking for horse meat in our ground beef too? Uh, this is not just a bunch of hamburger. This is a real concern, especially if you’re a beef eater, which accounts for most of the kill ‘em and grill ‘em population.
 

You see the vast majority of ground beef we purchase is from a few enormous meat-packing corporations that sell beef through gigantic supermarket chains. These meat-packing plants butcher thousands of cattle every hour. Meat and trimmings from all that cattle are combined, so any random package of commercial ground beef could include particles of meat from hundreds or even thousands of individual cattle. This, as you can imagine, makes it much more difficult to monitor the source of contamination or in this case horse meat.
 

So what can we do?
 

Well, as you know, I am into healthy and natural. Hello Sexy Kale! But, I too like a good juicy hamburger straight off the grill. Mmm, yummy!

Now that’s my kind of whopper!
 

Here’s what is suggested:
 

If you’d like to have it your way, buy food that is free of synthetic pesticides, antibiotics, hormones or other chemicals. Thus, the best approach to buying ground beef is to go directly to its source. Buy meat that is ground at the facility where you purchase the meat. That way you are assured of its quality and that the ground beef you purchase comes from one head of cattle, verses several thousand individual cattle. (And yes, that number is correct.)
 

I can’t tell you how much better organic beef is over non-organic. But this of course is a personal preference, although hubby and I have taken this one step further buying grass fed organic beef.
 

Now grass fed beef is a horse of another color. Please pardon the pun. I just couldn’t help myself. Yet, this is a subject I’d like to explore on a later post.
 

So until then, remember this:
 

“A horse is a horse, of course, of course

And no one can talk to a horse of course

That is, of course, unless the horse is the famous Mister Ed.”
 

If you want a “Whopper”, have it your way!

And that does not include eating a horse!

Of course, of course!
 

Hmm, I still wonder what Mister Ed would have said about this?
 
 

So what do you think? Do you enjoy a nice thick juicy Hamburger straight off the grill? Or do you lean towards vegetarianism? Does the safety of our food concern you? Do you grow some of your own food? What measures to you and your family take in order to eat healthy?
 
 

Thank you so much for dropping by and for all your wonderful comments!
Karen