Veggie burgers are booming.

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https://www.vox.com/recode/2020/5/8/21248618/coronavirus-meat-shortage-food-supply-chain-grocery-stores

Our massive and super efficient supply chain for pork, poultry and beef is in deep trouble. Recovery may take years, if at all. Certainly new norms can be expected.

A detailed explanation of our food supply system when it come to meats and how it’s disruption causes massive issues.

Meatpacking plants are still closing despite Trump’s orders. Worker safety is at risk not seen since Sinclair’s “The Jungle” exposé book a century ago. Never mind the conditions for the animals sitting in pens and boxcars.

And the scale is staggering.

An interesting read, if not disconcerting.

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Published by lenrothman

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27 thoughts on “Veggie burgers are booming.”

    1. Now, Don. At your age you should consider cutting back on the red meat. Actually, that is probably true for all of us, regardless of age.

      But now that you mention it, a nice piece of venison, properly prepared sounds pretty good right about now.

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          2. Loosening mercury standards could change all that so long as the freshwater sources are east of the power plants that still burn coal.

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          4. Used to love fishing in Lakes Smith & Wright. You should take the kiddies to Waller Mill in Wllmsbrg. Great Lake and park. It’s a reservoir…super clean. Same with the Chcck-a-how-many (nobody can spell it)

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    2. Sounds like a plan.

      THE MR. and I may have to do the same, which will require chasing down a few annoying bird-seed-stealing squirrels and slapping ’em on the barbie. Rather appropriate, actually, since I haven’t had my hair trimmed in two months and I appear to be toting a squirrel around on my head. But, that’s another story.

      On a bit of a side trip, here: how come it is that I look shaggy and more than a little unkempt, while THE MR. and his ever growing locks are are working fabulously for him? His barber being shut down is only making him look more and more like a movie ‘bad boy’. I LIKE IT! But, then that’s another story too. . .

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  3. If we don’t grill a rib eye on Sunday evening my new week starts off totally lacking. The baked potato, salad and Pinot Noir just won’t get it.

    Re: the meatpacking plant workers have been on my mind a lot these days. In all seriousness, if those numbers start dropping drastically – if they haven’t already – I will lay off even looking for meat. I appreciate it when I see young people and children wearing masks and being aware of social distancing and I’d like do my part too, for the meat-packing workers. My mother was a meat-wrapper who took care of the fresh cut meats for years at Overtons on 35th & Colley, and later at Farm Fresh. That’s a hard way to make a living. I did it for a couple months one summer while on summer break. I learned a lot that summer: mainly how hard my mother worked, followed by how much I didn’t have to do that job.

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    1. A correction. I should have said . . .

      . . . “In all seriousness, if those numbers start RISING drastically – if they haven’t already – I will lay off even looking for meat. Actually, they HAVE started rising dramatically. Yep, I don’t need to part of the problem, do I?

      Luckily, I still have one solitary lone rib eye in the freezer. I bought 3 a couple weeks ago when Harris-Teeter had the angus on sale for 8.99 lb. Don’t hold it against me – but, I will be enjoying the heck this coming Sunday out of what could be the last one for a while.

      Perish the thought . . .

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    2. I feel so fortunate to have had the career I did. I photographed lots of different working men and women. Those on assembly lines or in a factory with a single mind numbing task repeated hundreds of times a day got my respect for what they endured. And the pay was often paltry.

      Meatpacking is that times 10.

      And now we learn how essential they are. We are facing what’s it’s like to be without food workers. We are not missing hedge fund managers, corporate lawyers, software engineers, advertising executives, photographers. We don’t really care about them at all right now.

      What we want is for the Somali refugee working for low wages and few benefits to get back on the kill floor at Smithfield Foods. Suddenly he is worth a whole lot more, but the pay isn’t commensurate with the risk.

      We can try to force them back. Or we can let the market do it’s magic. Keep raising wages until the employment office is flooded with applications to get $100,000 job with benefits cutting up cows.

      Heck meat is already expensive now and slated to get more so. At least with highly paid workers, we can still get it once in a while.

      Just sayin’.

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  4. Veggie burgers suck big time and, like all vegan crap, make your body and breath smell like a sewer. Where’s the beef…

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  5. If meat shortages and/or higher prices become contentious?

    I’m going to build a rabbit hutch and raise them for food. Dang near every morning there’re 5 or 6 of them in the backyard and 2 or 3 in the front.

    Plus, there’s always the excessive number Canadian geese and ducks as well.

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    1. We had a pair of Canada Geese nest on the riverbank in our backyard. 4 chicks hatched and within a day or so they were paddling around the creeks with the parents.

      Our dog keeps them off the lawn, but in the wooded areathey poke around with the family.

      Fun to watch, but they can be a mess.

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      1. Same here, also saw two red foxes down by the river playing chase as well.

        Very peaceful and entertaining.

        I’d only start killin critters again if I needed to eat.

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        1. We’re watching a mink going from shore to shore off the Lafayette in our inlet. I think he lives in our low cedar bushes along the bank.

          I was surprised to read that they are reasonably common along the Elizabeth and it tributaries. Thought it was our muskrat at first. But way faster and his body turns and twists.

          Watching the wildlife in our backyard is our sports network. Our old dog watches the squirrel channel. He surfs between that and the rabbit channel the duck channel…

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    3. Minor correction on my part…sorry for the bad info.

      As of May 9, 2020 at 0438?

      There were 7 rabbits in the backyard, 4 in front and 2 little ones nestling up against the side door (must’ve been trying to stay warm).

      Come to think of it? Back in the 60’s and 70’s my parents (Aunts and Uncles) would often pay a farmer/rancher per cow/hog to save $ as compared to the store prices.

      They never came home with a live animal…but the larger the animal the more friends/neighbors bought into that.

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  6. CostCo frozen fully-cooked pork sausage patties. Bought 2 bags. 66 patties. I’m set for two years, or the first 2-day power outage.

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