preference if not in quantity (The same transformation can be traced in the French word viande.) One sign of this preference is Charles Carter’s 1732 Compleat City and Country Cook, which devotes 50 pages to meat dishes, 25 to poultry, and 40 to fish, but only 25 to vegetables and a handful to breads and pastries Abundant Meat in North America From the beginning, Americans have enjoyed an abundance of meat made possible by the size and richness of the continent In the 19th century, as the country became urbanized and more people lived away from the farm, meats were barreled in salt to preserve them in transit and in the shops; salt pork was as much a staple food as bread (hence such phrases as “scraping the bottom of the barrel” and “porkbarrel politics”) In the 1870s a wider distribution of fresh meat, especially beef, was made possible by several advances, including the growth of the cattle industry in the West, the introduction of cattle cars on the railroads, and the development of the refrigerated railroad car by Gustavus Swift and Philip Armour Today, with one fifteenth of the world’s population, the United States eats one third of the world’s meat Meat consumption on this scale is possible only in wealthy societies like our own, because animal flesh remains a much less efficient source of nourishment than plant protein It takes much less grain to feed a person than it does to feed a steer or chicken in order to feed a person Even today, with advanced methods of production, it takes 2 pounds of grain to get 1 pound of chicken meat, and the ratios are 4 to 1 for pork, 8 to 1 for beef We can afford to depend on animals as a major source of food only because we have a surplus of seed proteins Why Do People Love Meat? .. .the West, the introduction of cattle cars on the railroads, and the development of the refrigerated railroad car by Gustavus Swift and Philip Armour Today, with one fifteenth of the world’s... Today, with one fifteenth of the world’s population, the United States eats one third of the world’s meat Meat consumption on this scale is possible only in wealthy societies like our own, because animal flesh remains a... 2 pounds of grain to get 1 pound of chicken meat, and the ratios are 4 to 1 for pork, 8 to 1 for beef We can afford to depend on animals as a major source of food only because we have a surplus of seed proteins