We are told that consumers want to know everything about the food they eat, from the time its was planted or impregnated until the time it reaches their plate. I think we have to be very careful in how we meet the consumer’s wishes or it could backfire on us.
Follow along with me now as we join the Wilson family as they are gathered around the dinner table to enjoy a scrumptious prime rib. Instead of saying grace before dinner Mrs. Wilson scanned a bar code on the beef package so they could put a face to the food they were about to enjoy.
A computer screen came to life and as music faded away there appeared on the screen a black-faced calf that said, “Hi, I’m Blizzard and I was born in North Dakota in the middle of a blizzard. I survived but my mother didn’t.”
The youngest Wilson girl dabbed her eyes with a napkin and said, “Oh, the poor thing. He’s so cute.”
Blizzard continued, “I never knew my father and my mother didn’t either because she got raped repeatedly by several brutish thugs at the time of my conception. I’d have given anything to have known my father, to have him explain the birds and the bees, or show me where to hide when the cowboys came to gather us all up. But like many modern American males these days, he skipped town wanted nothing to do with his offspring.”
Suddenly what was a joyous Wilson family dinner now turned into a soap opera. As they were about to dig into the prime rib one by one the family members put their forks down and sat in rapt attention as Blizzard continued with his autobiography. “Here I am in the bathtub of the family that owned the ranch I was born on. They are pouring hot water on me to warm me up. For the first weeks of my life I lived in close proximity with this kind family of five who bottle fed me at all hours of the night. There I am curled up in front of their fireplace. I lived in the barn until I was turned out with the herd. The rest of the calves called me names like”dogie” and I felt lonely a lot. Occasionally I’d try to sneak a drink off the other cows when they weren’t looking but I grew tired of being kicked in the head. Then the rest of the calves were weaned off their mothers and it was their turn to cry. But I had no mother to cry for and I had long ago lost the urge to suckle.”
Mr. Wilson looked at his prime rib and wondered if this wasn’t a case of TMI… too much information.
“For the most part,” continued Blizzard, “I was treated well except when they gave me shots, branded and castrated me. There’s a photo of me sprawled on the ground as some cowboy took away my manhood. It didn’t hurt as much as you’d think but I did lose all interest in heifers from then on.”
“Here I am being loaded on a truck with the other calves, bound for a feedlot in Nebraska. Life at the feedlot was like living in a commune with a cafeteria that was open 24 hours a day and we could eat all we wanted. Being the runt of the litter I had few friends in my pen, except for the cowboy who rode through the pen on frequent checks to make sure we were all okay. There was lots of gossip about where we were going next, some cattle concentration camp it was rumored, but I didn’t believe them. If you are eating me now I guess the rumors were true.”
As Blizzard’s story came to a close the Wilson’s turned their attention back to the prime rib but they’d lost their appetite for beef so someone in the family called and ordered a take-out pizza. A vegetarian pizza! And the next day someone removed all the packages of Blizzard’s beef from the freezer figuring the poor calf had enough cold weather for one lifetime. From then on whenever Mrs. Wilson bought beef, if she bought it at all, she made sure it was from Uruguay or Australia that she knew absolutely nothing about.
