Sunday, August 4, 2019

Do You Know the Life History of Your Chicken Dinner? Now You Can. A Real Story



I'm like most people. I like to know the food I'm eating is safe to be consumed. I suppose this isn't enough for some people. There are now those who want to know the life story of their poultry. I would think this may be a bit too much information concerning something I'm about to have for my dinner. I'm someone who believes what an animal did before it reaches my dinner plate should stay in the past. I'm not going to judge if it had a bad attitude in social situations, wasn't liked by other chickens or like to drink beer and party. I'm really not interested.

Here are some excerpts from the story and my valuable insights are in italics.

It's not as absurd as it sounds, says Robyn Metcalfe, a food historian who teaches at the University of Texas at Austin. A GPS tracker strapped to the leg of a chicken, says Metcalfe, means "that people who potentially will buy that chicken will know every step that that chicken has taken."

I would like to know if being told your chicken dinner was named “Plucky,” and was a lifelong vegan. It had troubled relationships with a variety of roosters and was a bit of a loner. The other chickens made fun of Plucky and if she didn't end up on your dinner plate others around her feared she may have taken her own life.

Would this add or detract from the taste of a meal?

Would it make someone such as myself say, “This chicken dinner is great. It's obvious Plucky was born to be breaded and fried.



ZhongAn Online, a Chinese insurance company, has already outfitted more than 100,000 chickens with trackers. The sensors upload information, such as how much exercise each chicken gets and what it ate. The company says the technology will be on 2,500 farms in China by next year.

I can just imagine future conversations that could take place in restaurants.

“I've checked the sensors on the chicken you served me. It's apparent this chicken was a real slacker when it came to exercise. I'm sorry. I just don't want to consume a chicken that had no respect for its body and didn't take care of it. It doesn't matter to me if the only future for this chicken was to end up on a dinner plate. With that attitude, I want nothing to do with it. Could you make my meal with a chicken who had a better attitude about physical fitness?”

“I'll speak to the chef and see what we can do.”

I'm sure in supermarkets now they'll have sections of chicken for sale divided by those who loved blueberries, those who existed exclusively on corn and those who weren't picky eaters.

Then there will be interesting conversations taking place in people's homes.
“This chicken tastes strange for some reason”
“When I got to the store, they only had chickens parts for sale from chickens who preferred to eat bugs. I know you like the ones that prefer to eat blueberries, but they just didn't have any this time.”
“I hope next time you can get some physically active corn eating chickens.”
“I'll be sure to look for them.”



They are also working on facial-recognition technology so that consumers can one day make sure the organic chicken they saw on the farm is the same one that ends up on their plate.

I can't speak for everyone. Seeing a picture of poultry prior to it ending up on my dinner plate is not something I find necessary. If you are a person who will go to a farm, see a chicken and want to make certain that exact same chicken ends up on your dinner plate, you have issues and lots of time on your hands.

Here is a link to a story about it.



Here is a funny video from It is a Glorious Day.

It's called Million Dollar Potato Picture.








Posted by at

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)