Let's talk about horses. With news of Europe's horse meat scandal grabbing headlines last month, it's hard not to have equine on the mind. In 1875 Scientific American published an article, "Shall We Eat the Horse?" hypothesizing the economic benefits of consuming horse meat in the U.S. At the time hippophagy was practiced in Europe, especially in France where the Siege of Paris (1870-71) left citizens with a food shortage and the need to find nontraditional sources of meat. Whereas no such need was present in America, the magazine wondered what, if any, the impact would be on the economy, and whether or not we might actually be losing money by not serving up plates of "valuable" and "palatable" horse meat.In France horseflesh sold for less than similar cuts of other meats, and the animal itself fetched $10 to $15 from the slaughterhouse. With this information, Scientific American proposed a horse in the U.S. would be worth $10 if sold to be slaughtered, with $3 allotted for alimentary purposes and the leftover $7 for the carcass. The carcass would be stripped into parts--hide, hoofs, hair--and sold for manufacturing. [More]














Source: A Horse Is a Horse, of Course, of (Main) Course