You’ve heard of Curry Week, Food Safety Fortnight and British Sausage Week. Well this week is the preserve of pork lovers everywhere – it’s Bacon Connoisseurs Week!
There’s an old saying that the only part of a pig that you can’t eat is the grunt and that’s not far from the truth. There’s more to a pig than roasts, pork chops, bacon chops, gammon, sausages and bacon rashers – even the ears, head and trotters can be eaten.
There is much debate at the moment about how much red meat we should eat daily and whether it is harmful or good for our health. Average intakes of red meat in this country are below current Government guidelines of 70g cooked meat per day and as such suggest that, for most people, red meat is safe and consumption does not need to be reduced. Lean pork is high in protein, vitamins and minerals – particularly iron, zinc and vitamin D – and can be as low as 4% fat. It is a very versatile meat and can be made into a variety of nutritious and tasty meals as part of a balanced diet.
Few can resist the smell of a bacon butty, in fact as a nation we purchase 221.6K tonnes of bacon per year at a cost of £1.3 billion. But as consumers, retailers and caterers, we should be striving to eat or supply bacon or pork products which are assured. LovePork.co.uk, the BPEX website behind Bacon Connoisseurs Week, is keen to encourage people to buy pork products bearing the Red Tractor logo. This guarantees meat of a high quality and assures high standards of food safety, animal welfare and environmental protection.
Brits are renowned for being a nation of animal lovers and thankfully in the UK the use of restrictive sow stalls on pig farms is prohibited. That’s why the Red Tractor logo is so important, not just from an ethical point of view, but also from a food safety perspective. Whenever you see the Red Tractor logo on packaging it means that:
- Rigorous standards are observed throughout the supply chain
- At all stages the quality of pig husbandry and animal welfare is high
- Every aspect of the pork meat production process is fully traceable
- Red Tractor pig farms are inspected at least four times a year
- The flag in the Red Tractor pork logo guarantees its country of origin
As Love Pork says, ‘Great Bacon starts with Great Pork’ and that means ethical, hygienic and safe production of a Great British staple.
Details of VWA’s ethical audits and food safety courses