This book explains how America became a meat-eating nation - from the colonial period to the present. It examines the relationships between consumer preference and meat processing - looking closely at the production of beef, pork, chicken, and hot dogs. The author argues that a series of new technologies have transformed American meat. He draws on detailed consumption surveys that shed new light on America's eating preferences - especially differences associated with income, rural versus urban areas, and race and ethnicity.

How did meat become such a popular food among Americans? And why did the popularity of some types of meat increase or decrease? Putting Meat on the American Table explains how America became a meat-eating nation - from the colonial period to the present. It examines the relationships between consumer preference and meat processing - looking closely at the production of beef, pork, chicken, and hot dogs. Roger Horowitz argues that a series of new technologies have transformed American meat - sometimes for the worse, sometimes for the better. He draws on detailed consumption surveys that shed new light on America's eating preferences - especially differences associated with income, rural versus urban areas, and race and ethnicity. Engagingly written, richly illustrated, and abundant with first-hand accounts and quotes from period sources, Putting Meat on the American Table will captivate general readers and interest all students of the history of food, technology, business, and American culture.

Every day, millions of people around the world sit down to a meal that includes meat. This book explores several questions as it examines the use of animals as food: How did the domestication and production of livestock animals emerge and why? How did current modes of raising and slaughtering animals for human consumption develop, and what are their consequences? What can be done to mitigate and even reverse the impacts of animal production? With insight into the historical, cultural, political, legal, and economic processes that shape our use of animals as food, Fitzgerald provides a holistic picture and explicates the connections in the supply chain that are obscured in the current mode of food production. Bridging the distance in animal agriculture between production, processing, consumption, and their associated impacts, this analysis envisions ways of redressing the negative effects of the use of animals as food. It details how consumption levels and practices have changed as the relationship between production, processing, and consumption has shifted. Due to the wide-ranging questions addressed in this book, the author draws on many fields of inquiry, including sociology, (critical) animal studies, history, economics, law, political science, anthropology, criminology, environmental science, geography, philosophy, and animal science.

"By the late nineteenth century, Americans rich and poor had come to expect high-quality fresh beef with almost every meal. Beef production in the United States had gone from small-scale, localized operations to a highly centralized industry spanning the country, with cattle bred on ranches in the rural West, slaughtered in Chicago, and consumed in the nation's rapidly growing cities. Red Meat Republic tells the remarkable story of the violent conflict over who would reap the benefits of this new industry and who would bear its heavy costs"--

A former agribusiness reporter critically assesses the corporate meat industry as demonstrated by the practices of Tyson Foods, documenting the meat supply's takeover by a few powerful companies who are raising prices and outmaneuvering reforms.

Johnson's lively recreation of the genius of American cooks served as the foundation of a great new school of American cooking. In The American Table he reveals a heretofore unimagined treasure trove of American dishes. Line drawings.

This collection of essays explores some of the complex relations between meat and health in the twentieth century. It highlights a complicated array of contradictory attitudes towards meat and human health. They show how meat came to be regarded as a central part of a modern healthy diet and trace critiques of meat-eating and the meat industry.