Eric
Posts : 9738 Join date : 2012-07-30 Age : 73 Location : Pensacola
| Subject: Green meat. Ever eat it? I have. Sat Mar 02, 2013 11:18 am | |
| I have often wondered "What the shit is this in my beef?" Have you? From an article in The Atlantic http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2013/02/what-causes-beef-rainbows/273534/ - Quote :
- Beef rainbows aren't a sign of spoiled, tainted, or (sorry) magical beef. There's enough speculation over the integrity of rainbow beef that the USDA's website has a section on "Iridescent Color of Roast Beef" near similar topics like "What does 'natural?' mean" and "what is beef?" According to the USDA, "When light hits a slice of meat, it splits into colors like a rainbow." This is something called a "diffraction grating," essentially what happens when light waves bend or spread around a surface and create a pattern. It's the same thing that happens to make rainbows on the surface of a DVD. It's understandable that folks mistake diffracted light as a sign of spoilage, especially since the main color created by meat diffraction gratings is green. There is a reason why in Dr. Seuss's Green Eggs and Ham, the central conflict of the protagonist is his strong apprehension against eating green meat.
Speaking of ham, beef is not the only meat known to have rainbows. However, when cooked beef is sharply sliced against the grain of the muscle fiber, this, coupled with the moisture in the beef, creates an excellent surface for producing rainbows. "In my opinion," Dr. Thomas Powell, Executive Director of the American Meat Science Association, told me, "The reason it shows up in roast beef is because the cuts of meat that are used in most roast beef are more prone to iridescence, particularly in the round," hence the reason why the USDA singles out roast beef as being especially colorful. | |
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Joanimaroni
Posts : 1157 Join date : 2012-07-31
| Subject: Re: Green meat. Ever eat it? I have. Sat Mar 02, 2013 11:28 am | |
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Guest Guest
| Subject: Re: Green meat. Ever eat it? I have. Sat Mar 02, 2013 1:57 pm | |
| The first time we moved to Japan, much of the beef at the commissary was green. Not just rainbows of green like in the photo above, but green all over. I didn't buy it. |
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| Subject: Re: Green meat. Ever eat it? I have. | |
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