Questions about beef and chicken

Gaer

"Angel whisperer"
Just inquiring,
Chicken:
1. When did chicken breasts get as large as turkey breasts, and why?
2. Why do they take the skins off the chicken breasts? Don't people singe chicken anymore? In soups, it's the skin that gives most of the flavor.
Beef:
1. Remember the USDA shield stickers they used to put on packages of beef? Why don't they do that anymore? I like to know if the beef I buy is choice or select.
2. After my pot roast and my swiss steak ( both cooked low and slow) came out like rubber tires,(completely inedible) a spasm from a very old part of my brain brought 2 revelations. First, The local market buys the cheapest meat they can get and secondly, I'm less than 100 miles from the El paso/Juarez border. I asked the manager. "Is your meat from Mexico?
"Yes, Most of it."
"So it's not inspected or graded?"
"I don't know."
"Do You have any beef from the United States?"
"Yes, Some."
"Is it USDA graded choice?"
"We only buy select."
O.K., Got my answers about the beef. I've looked on line and can't seem to find out about the USDA stickers. Does anyone know?
 

If your beef is tough after cooking Gaer, then it is
probably from an old animal, a hiefer and not a
steer.

Chicken breasts here are pumped full of water with
some kind of gel in it, to meke them look better.

Mike.
 
Chicken:
1. When did chicken breasts get as large as turkey breasts, and why?

99% of chickens raised these days are Cornish hybrids. Cornish grow large and mature fast; this is profitable (they are also the most blandly tasteless breed, unless bred otherwise). With selective genetics, chickens are now MUCH bigger than back in the ‘60’s, ‘70’s, ‘80’s, and ‘90’s.

The majority of chicken and chicken parts are not sold in supermarkets to consumers. They go to the food industry: McDonalds, KFC, Boston Market, Kraft Foods, P&G, etc. As far as those companies are concerned, bigger is ALWAYS better. Less waste, less effort = bigger profits.

2. Why do they take the skins off the chicken breasts? Don't people singe chicken anymore? In soups, it's the skin that gives most of the flavor.

Nobody, and I mean nobody I know (I live in a city of 1 million people, in a major metropolitan area), would even think of singeing chicken skin any longer. I had a teenager decades ago tell me chickens came in plastic bags from the grocery store. She meant that SERIOUSLY. I guess she thought they just popped out fully grown, plucked and cleaned, to get stuffed into a bag with a sticker weight on it!

I am the only person in my family (and we are all excellent cooks) and certainly 1 of only 2 people I know in our wide acquaintance, who even attempts to make soup.

Everybody I know who likes white meat, takes the skin off anyway. So the stores don’t even bother to try selling parts with the skin any longer. And who needs bones if you don’t make soup anyway?

Today they don’t even open a can. Every grocery market around us has a deli with 6 soups, different choices daily. Ramen shops abound (it’s the current biggest craze here). They don’t see any need to bother making a mess at home, when for $3–10 they can buy a huge, satisfying bowl customized with what they want.

Beef:
1. Remember the USDA shield stickers they used to put on packages of beef? Why don't they do that anymore? I like to know if the beef I buy is choice or select.

The USDA grading has been increasingly ‘dumbed down’. What used to be ‘Choice’ can now be labeled ‘Prime’ (but not in my book, LOL). What was once the lowest grade ‘Select’ – think over-the-hill dairy cows on their literal “last legs” – is now ‘Choice’.

Now that most meat comes prepackaged from the processing plants, the sticker is on the bag or carcass, not individual cuts.

2. After my pot roast and my swiss steak ( both cooked low and slow) came out like rubber tires,(completely inedible).....

What distinguishes beef grading is the fat marbling. ‘Choice’ has very little, but ‘Select’ has almost none. As far as I can tell the only use for it remains grinding it into hamburger with added suet or lard to bring up the fat content for the juiciness beef needs for optimum flavor.

Even stewing most Choice cuts can be dicey. No way you should try it with Select. As you noted, it simply gets drier and more leathery.

Although not an official standard of the USDA ratings, some ranchers and certain steakhouses have begun to use a designation of “Prime Plus” or similar phrase, to indicate their beef is at the marbling levels that USED TO BE a minimum for Prime grading. It is not an official standard, unfortunately, but I’ve found it a reliable indicator of quality. Vendors don’t misuse it since marbling is something that is visually immediately obvious.

HTH.
 
o.k., Thanks! Any ideas about the USDA shield sticker? I don't want to buy cutter beef or select beef instead of choice. I've asked "Where is the choice beef" at the meat counter and am told, "In the glass case. If it's priced 26.99 a lb.or over, it's probably "USDA choice."
Ah, I'm probably making too much of this. No one e;se seems to care.
If there are any aliens from another planet out there, I'd like to time travel back to 1959 please!
 
Just inquiring,
Chicken:
1. When did chicken breasts get as large as turkey breasts, and why?
2. Why do they take the skins off the chicken breasts? Don't people singe chicken anymore? In soups, it's the skin that gives most of the flavor.
Beef:
1. Remember the USDA shield stickers they used to put on packages of beef? Why don't they do that anymore? I like to know if the beef I buy is choice or select.
2. After my pot roast and my swiss steak ( both cooked low and slow) came out like rubber tires,(completely inedible) a spasm from a very old part of my brain brought 2 revelations. First, The local market buys the cheapest meat they can get and secondly, I'm less than 100 miles from the El paso/Juarez border. I asked the manager. "Is your meat from Mexico?
"Yes, Most of it."
"So it's not inspected or graded?"
"I don't know."
"Do You have any beef from the United States?"
"Yes, Some."
"Is it USDA graded choice?"
"We only buy select."
O.K., Got my answers about the beef. I've looked on line and can't seem to find out about the USDA stickers. Does anyone know?
I agree with Pinky about the hormone fed animals. And I don't eat the skin cuz A. I think it's gross and B. it makes my tummy feel creepy.
 
And how are boneless chickens raised??
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I haven't seen anyone singe chicken skin since my mom did it to all her fresh killed chickens she bought. I think she told me it was to make sure it took all the fine hairs and feathers off. As for beef and lack of a shield from the FDA, well, that arouses my suspicions now that you mention it. I wonder if we're getting horse meat instead? Actually, I recall the beef itself being stamped by the FDA.
 
Yech. I hate skinless and boneless chicken. It tastes like pencil eraser, seasoned it tastes like seasoned pencil eraser. Can't stomach seasonings so yum, pencil eraser for me.
 


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