How would you like your Zebu cooked sir?

21/08/2007 09:55

Written by: Tamara Sender of M&C Report

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Several British pubs have been found to be serving poor quality zebu meat, instead of British beef in their steaks.

A programme to be aired on ITV tonight revealed that JD Wetherspoons pubs and Greene King’s Hungry Horse chain were selling steaks with DNA from a zebu, which is a humped oxon-like animal living in Africa and Brazil that is often cross-bred with European cattle.

As part of “Undercover Mum”, a former undercover policewoman visited 15 pubs belonging to the two pub groups, which were randomly selected, and sent samples of the meat she orders for laboratory analysis.

The results revealed that steaks ordered at four out of six JD Wetherspoons pubs and at three out of nine Hungry Horse outlets all contained zebu meat, despite staff saying that the meat was either British or they did not know its origin.

While eating zebu is legal, the meat from the animal and its cross-breeds was removed from a British quality scheme and the meat is described by the English Beef and Lamb Executive as of overall poorer eating quality and variability than meat from British or European breeds.

JD Wetherspoons responded to the accusations saying that “zebu is taxonomically identical to any other breed such as Charolais, Limosin or Hereford”, while Greene King denied the claims.