"kurobuta" news and stories

The National Pork Board has been touting pork as "the other white meat" for decades, providing low fat pork to the American public. In the last fifteen years the average pork chop has about the same amount of fat as skinless chicken breast. The only problem is that while being low fat, it is also low taste, just like that pasty white, mushy chicken breast. In many cases the pork has no taste at all. You try to fry up a chop and you end up having to add lots of fats or oils to brown it, and if you aren't careful you end up with a tough, dry, and flavorless hunk of inedible pseudo-pig on your plate.

Pork isn't supposed to be white, or even light pink. It should be a light red meat, but commercial pork producers have been breeding lower and lower fat hogs for decades, and it hit it's apex a few years ago. The fat and flavor ratios are so low in today's commercial pork that my local A&P / Food Emporium doesn't carry much in the way of untreated raw pork, only pre-brined, chemical laden and flavored raw pork. Brining is soaking raw meat for several hours to days or even weeks in a mix of water, salt, phosphates, and other chemicals and flavorings. It is used to add moisture and flavor to meat that has had all the fat, and so all flavor, bred right out of it. You also end up with the pork absorbing up to 10% water, a cheap way for pork producers to charge more for less meat per pound.

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The other day I was talking about the latest Buzz on Beef, and mentioned "American style Kobe beef." Today I ran across Snake River Farms Gourmet Deli Line of products. Three of the four are called American Kobe Beef and I disagree with their labeling that it is "American Kobe" since there is no such thing. If it is called Kobe then it has to be from Japan, this is American Wagyu/Angus crossbreed.

The same goes for their using the term "Kurobuta" which is a Japanese term for pork descended from Berkshire hogs that hundreds of years ago were cross bred with Asian hogs, to produce a local strain of very marbled pork. If it isn't from Japan then you should call it Berkshire Pork which describes the breed. You may think I am nit picking but I believe in truth in advertising and that the consumer should know exactly what they are getting, and paying a fortune for.

That said, I have liked all the Snake River Farms products I have tried in the past, and I am eagerly looking forward to trying these products. The meat is highly marbled, incredibly tender, exquisitely delicious, and naturally produced without growth promoting hormones. They have four types of meats in their deli line as well as cured hams, pork ribs, pork loins, and raw meats available.