GREAT BRITAIN: Tamed to the Palate

“Wot’s it matter wevver they knows or not?” queried a blood-stained London butcher. “If yer finds yer ‘usband squeamish, don’t tell ‘im, that’s all.”

“How revolting,” said a fastidious diner at a West End hotel. “I simply couldn’t stomach horseflesh.” And with that she went on spreading her toast with the savory pâté maison which only the trade called by its proper name: processed horse.

Like the “veal” on another menu, the “Hungarian goulash” around the corner, the prime roasts and shepherd’s pies at still other restaurants, the lady’s pate had been, a few days earlier, a long-legged foal romping after a chestnut mother not long retired from a dairy cart. Last week it was still illegal in Britain to kill horses under seven years old for food or serve it in restaurants if other meat was available.

Nevertheless, in black markets all over the kingdom, butchers, farmers and restaurateurs were buying & selling horse meat of all ages for the table. “Tyke a big dray, naow,” said a cockney slaughterer, “at 900 pahnd in skin and shoes, ‘e’d only bring 40 pahnd when ‘e was boned, but on the black market ‘e brings near four bob a pahnd.” Customers, aware and unaware, were eating heartily. “A nice bit o’ minced ‘orse, with plenty of carrots and onions,” said a Doncaster housewife, “and I defy anyone to turn up ‘is nose at it.”

Horse lovers mobilized to halt the slaughter. “But it will be hard,” said one M.P. pressing for Parliament control of the market, “to make Strachey [Minister of Food] do anything to limit this revolting business. After all, a horse steak fills the void.”

Only the most fastidious of hosts were above it all. Asked whether horse was likely soon to replace whale meat or snoek in Britain, one Soho restaurateur replied: “Madame, we never serve these things. None of them can be tamed to the palate.”