The other night, while we were watching France go through to the final 16 of the world cup, my wife cooked a rosbif de cheval. This is of course horse meat. Most of our British friends baulk at the thought of eating horse meat but some are adventurous enough to try it.
Even though most British people will turn their nose up at the thought of eating a horse, many of them will have eaten it and enjoyed it without knowing. The horse meat scandal of 2013 saw horse meat entering into the European food chain but dressed up as beef.
Some supermarket hamburgers were often made from horse meat and the public enjoyed them without knowing that they were not beef. Horse meat also ended up in pies and lasagne etc. It also ended up in some supermarket pâté and sausages. Some unscrupulous butchers and meat suppliers had passed off cheaper horse meat as beef. The supermarket buyers were unable to tell the difference even if they saw or tasted the meat or meat products.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-21765737
http://www.iga.net/fr/recettes_inspirantes/burger_a_la_viande_chevaline_et_au_fromage_fe/
We cooked the genuine horse meat joint in the same way as we would cook a joint of beef. It was rare and roasted with a generous knob of butter and an onion with some white wine to produce a sauce which was seasoned with salt and pepper. It is just was delicious as beef bit but it tasted a little sweeter.
We washed down the rosbif de cheval with a bottle of Gérard Bertrand Syrah/Carignan, Minervois red wine from the Languedoc in the South of France. It went perfectly with the meat and the generous tannin refreshed the palate. It was superb wine at a price of £9.99 a bottle and Waitrose had discounted it by 20% so it was even better value for money. This is one of my favourite wines and my team and I enjoyed it in one of our favourite restaurants in Hamburg; it was always on the menu even if horse meat was not.
Gérard Bertrand is a former French international rugby player so this wine is one up for the players and supporters of the real football. I wonder why rugby players do not writhe on the ground from much harder tackles than that they would would receive in a "soccer" game. Perhaps a good bottle of a full bodied red gives them strength. Rugby players are instructed by their coaches to get up immediately after a tackle and not act like babies.
We have tried to find butchers in England which sell horse meat without any luck and after the scandal it is now impossible to buy it in a British supermarket. I suspect, however, that it still enters the food chain if only by accident. Supermarkets in France sell it and there are specialised butchers too. Many other European countries serve horse meat and most people have no qualms about eating it. Luckily, it is easy to find a good bottle of Minervois red in Britain.
You can buy horse meat here, however:
http://www.exoticmeats.co.uk/horse-meat.html
http://www.waitrose.com/shop/ProductView-10317-10001-94592-G%C3%A9rard+Bertrand+Syrah/Carignan,+Minervois+South+of+France
http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2013/jan/17/how-to-cook-horsemeat-three-thrifty-recipes
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2409371/ALEX-RENTON-The-real-horsemeat-scandal-greedy-ruthless-supermarkets-got-scot-free.html
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