Tradition says you have white wine with fish and red wine with beef. But a British Columbia rancher has decided to kick tradition on its head by taking red wine and feeding it to beef before it gets to your plate.
Now here's what the rancher has found. When cows drink red wine they moo a lot more than usual. So do a room full of men. She also found that beef cattle that drank are more relaxed than non-drinking cattle. Ditto with the room full of men. But here is the difference. Beef cattle that drink red wine taste a lot better than cattle that don't drink. Not sure about the room full of men but I doubt any of them would be worth tasting.Our Okanagan cattle rancher got this idea after seeing a TV show where pigs were swilling beer. She thought if pigs are getting "porked" on beer why not get beef "bordeauxed" on red wine.Now the federal government sent two inspectors to see if everything was safe and both said the cows handle the drinking responsibly. Actually one inspector got along so well with one of the wine-tasting cows the rancher had to separate them with a cattle prod.By the way, restaurants that are serving the wine-marinated meat have found customers complimenting the chef and asking whether he serves chickens that drink gin.Our rancher is also experimenting with other combinations. She's thinking of feeding some of her cattle Jack Daniels, which will eliminate people having to use Jack Daniel's barbecue sauce. Other combinations, ducks drinking screwdrivers so that the "duck l'orange" is so moist it barely stays on the plate and sheep drinking ouzo so that instead of throwing classes and yelling 'OPA' you can now just throw the sheep across the room.How about a Thanksgiving turkey that has been on the bottle since spring? The stuffing will consist of bread some herbs and two aspirin for the headache you'll get after eating it.You know if mixing booze with animals actually catches on, maybe we could try other combinations. For example we have an election coming in the fall so maybe we should start slipping truth serum into their food now. By the time they get to city hall they'll be truthful, malleable and maybe even approachable.