Purchase
An Omnivore's Quest for Sustainable Meat
W.W. Norton
May 2015
On Sale: May 5, 2015
284 pages ISBN: 039324024X EAN: 9780393240245 Kindle: B00OD8Z4RE Hardcover / e-Book
Add to Wish List
Non-Fiction
An eye-opening investigation of the commercial pork industry
and an inspiring alternative to the way pigs are raised and
consumed in America. Barry Estabrook, author of the New York Times
bestseller Tomatoland and a writer of “great skill
and compassion” (Eric Schlosser), now explores the dark side
of the American pork industry. Drawing on his personal
experiences raising pigs as well as his sharp investigative
instincts, Estabrook covers the range of the human-porcine
experience. He embarks on nocturnal feral pig hunts in
Texas. He visits farmers who raise animals in vast
confinement barns for Smithfield and Tyson, two of the
country’s biggest pork producers. And he describes the
threat of infectious disease and the possible contamination
of our food supply. Through these stories shines Estabrook’s
abiding love for these remarkable creatures. Pigs are
social, self-aware, and playful, not to mention smart enough
to master the typical house dog commands of “sit, stay,
come” twice as fast as your average pooch. With the
cognitive abilities of at least three-year-olds, they can
even learn to operate a modified computer. Unfortunately for
the pigs, they’re also delicious to eat. Estabrook shows how these creatures are all too often
subjected to lives of suffering in confinement and squalor,
sustained on a drug-laced diet just long enough to reach
slaughter weight, then killed on mechanized disassembly
lines. But it doesn’t have to be this way. Pig
Tales presents a lively portrait of those farmers who
are taking an alternative approach, like one Danish producer
that has a far more eco-friendly and humane system of pork
production, and new, small family farms with free-range
heritage pigs raised on antibiotic-free diets. It is
possible to raise pigs responsibly and respectfully in a way
that is good for producers, consumers, and some of the top
chefs in America. Provocative, witty, and deeply informed, Pig Tales
is bound to spark conversation at dinner tables across America.
Comments
No comments posted.
Registered users may leave comments.
Log in or register now!
|