Food Origins

I’ve known for a while about how some people don’t know where their food comes from – but even so, this particular story is pretty shocking.

Basically, in a poll of 2000 people by LEAF “Linking Environment and Farming” – although I can’t currently find mention of this poll on their site –  33% of young adults aged between 16 and 23 were unaware of where eggs come from – and 11% answered that eggs are produced from wheat or maize.

Additionally, 36% of the same age group failed to answer that bacon comes from pigs, while 40% did not know that cows produce milk.

Now it might be that one third of the sample were thick as mince, but all the same, it’s pretty scary.

Mind you, I’ve also known of people who

• when asked where chicken/beef/pork come from, answer “Tesco”
• didn’t know that chicken (the meat) comes from chicken (the bird) – I’ve seen that one myself

So I’m not too surprised, but all the same, it’s pretty depressing. My parents always taught my brother and I where food came from – to the extent that my brother used to refer to animals by the condiments that went with them :  Cows = Horseradish. Lamb = Mint Sauce. Pigs = Apple Sauce.

Mind you, still no-one really knows what meat goes into kebabs, or just where on a chicken creates McNuggets…