just as they reach sexual maturity, when the connective tissue is still relatively soluble and the meat tender Individual cuts of American and European pork generally contain half to a fifth of the fat they did in 1980 Pork is a pale meat because the pig uses its muscles more intermittently than cattle and sheep, and therefore has a lower proportion of red muscle fibers (around 15%) Some small Chinese and European breeds have darker and significantly more flavorful flesh Domestic Meat Birds Chickens Chickens are descendents of the aggressive, pugnacious red jungle fowl of northern India and southern China Gallus gallus is a member of the pheasant family or Phasianidae, a large, originally Eurasian group of birds that tend to colonize open forest or the edge between field and wood Chickens seem to have been domesticated in the vicinity of Thailand before 7500 BCE, and arrived in the Mediterranean around 500 BCE In the West, they were largely unpampered farmyard scavengers until the 19th-century importation of large Chinese birds created a veritable chicken-breeding craze in Europe and North America Mass production began in the 20th century, when much of the genetic diversity in meat chickens evaporated in favor of a fast-growing cross between the broadbreasted Cornish (developed in Britain from Asian fighting stock) and the U.S White Plymouth Rock Chicken Styles The modern chicken is a product of the drive to breed fast-growing animals and raise them as rapidly and on as little feed as possible It’s an impressive feat of agricultural engineering to produce a 4pound bird on 8 pounds of feed in six weeks! Because such a bird grows very fast and lives very little, its meat is fairly bland, and that of .. .the vicinity of Thailand before 7500 BCE, and arrived in the Mediterranean around 500 BCE In the West, they were largely unpampered farmyard scavengers until the 19th-century importation of large Chinese birds created a... of a fast-growing cross between the broadbreasted Cornish (developed in Britain from Asian fighting stock) and the U.S White Plymouth Rock Chicken Styles The modern chicken is a product of the drive to breed fast-growing animals and raise them... veritable chicken-breeding craze in Europe and North America Mass production began in the 20th century, when much of the genetic diversity in meat chickens evaporated in favor of a fast-growing cross between the broadbreasted Cornish (developed in Britain from