MeatEater and the Death Behind Every Meal

           

                 Last week we watched Brazilian chef Alex Atala explain how important it was that while he was growing up to eat the entire animal after killing it on the Netflix documentary, Chef’s Table. Atala is an individual who grew up with his eyes wide open to the death and messiness that goes behind every plate that involves meat. In the documentary, Atala states that, “Behind every dish there is death. And people only close their own eyes to it,” which is a very relevant statement for today, especially in America’s industrialized meat industry, comprised of institutions strategically designed to mask the process by which our meat supply is brought to us. Why do they do this? The clear answer to me is the fact that many people don’t generally like to view their meat as part of a once living animal, especially if the process to get them onto our plates is unethical and inhumane. They view it as what’s on their plate, rather than what it was when it was alive and honestly, in the current state of things, why should people be thinking any differently? I don’t blame people for this at all. I’ve been guilty of this too in the past, but thanks to my experience with hunting and fishing for my own food, I can’t say my eyes are completely shut. But on that point, hunters, as well as outdoorsmen, farmers and people who generally respect and have knowledge of the outdoors, do stand against this mindset, and the entertainment catered towards them reflect that mindset as well. Recently I was introduced to a hunting program on the Sportsman Channel called MeatEater, which is hosted by author, avid outdoorsman, and unapologetic meat eater Steven Rinella. MeatEater spares no detail in the process of getting the meat from the wild and to the plate, even more so than other hunting shows and in a way that I believe to be unique even among hunters today. It’s just as much a cooking show as it is a hunting show, and what’s more is that Rinella, similar to Chef Atala, demonstrates throughout the program that you can eat a lot more of the animal than just what is popularized by today’s society.

            But before Rinella can sit down and enjoy his meal he has to hunt it first. This is where the death behind the meal appears, but it’s not sobering or disturbing, rather it’s celebratory and triumphant. The general feel of the show is like this, unless he is somberly recounting some sad story from America's history, such as the Euro-American's wanton hunting of Buffalo to near extinction. Additionally what makes this show so unique among other hunting shows is the emphasis he puts on the process of getting his meat from the wild to the plate, often cooking the meat at his campsite. In one episode, after a day of hunting wild turkey, Rinella immediately proceeded to gut the animal and extract the edible organs, including the gizzard, heart, and liver to boil and eat with his hunting buddy right there on the spot. But back to the process of the death before the meal: it’s never easy. In this series, Rinella’s hunts are often cut into two to three episodes due to the difficulty of finding game. This is never filmed in a quiet or meditative way though, as it was in Alex Atala’s Chef’s Table episode. Whereas the killing of a chicken early in the Chef’s Table episode was quiet and somber, an up-beat soundtrack often accompanies the process of the hunting and field dressing of game in MeatEater. I believe this can be attributed to the audiences that each program is catering to. To the audience of MeatEater the killing of game to process into meat is commonplace and something to be celebrated, so the soundtrack reflects this feeling to almost a cheesy degree, while to the audience of Chef’s Table the action of killing a chicken may be more of a sobering, almost spiritual experience. Playing an up-beat soundtrack over the killing of the chicken in Chef’s Table would have been off-putting and against the tone of the general documentary.

         

 The feast for Rinella begins after the game has been hunted and properly divvied up. Similar to Atala’s desire to introduce new, interesting, and perhaps even discomforting tastes to his customers, Rinella challenges those watching and especially those who hunt too to eat more than just the desirable part of the animal. Rinella eats everything; tongues, testicles, livers, gizzards, hearts, bone marrow, you name it, and he does so in a way that makes the food appear appetizing. After he prepared a deer heart for some tacos I suddenly found myself craving for some of it even though I’ve never tried deer heart before. He even managed to make deer testicles appear appetizing. In addition to straight-up eating certain stigmatized parts of the animal, Rinella also utilizes parts of the animal such as the fatty membranes (caul fat) surrounding the guts to aid in his cooking. Of course these methods are only really useful if the person harvests and butchers their own meat. As I stated in my previous blog and as I stated earlier in this blog, not many people hunt anymore and even less people hunt regularly, but I can only wonder what non-hunters or non-outdoorsman would feel about the way Rinella prepares his food. I also couldn’t help to draw comparisons between this and Alex Atala’s use of tucupi in Chef’s Table.

            Both the Chef’s Table showcase of Alex Atala and MeatEater tackle themes of challenging the viewer to face the death behind the meal and to cook the meal in ways that may not be popular; Alex Atala challenges customers at D.O.M. to try unique Brazilian foods made from insects that may not even agree with his customer’s taste buds, and Steven Rinella eats a coyote (commonly killed as a pest rather than to be eaten) and states that if cooked properly it’d be great in a sloppy Joe. But each show tackles its subjects in drastically different ways, with one coming off as almost (in my opinion) painfully pretentious and the other coming off as (in my opinion) good-natured and hokey. Whereas the documentarians behind Chef’s Table seem to reek of avant-garde upper-class filmmaking (not that I don't like the filmmaking of Chef's Table I'm just pointing out my observations), the people behind MeatEater revel in a blue-collar, working class, homemade sort of style that Steven Rinella reflects fully in his persona and dress. I can’t help but wonder if the Chef’s Table’s style of filming serves to 'other' the subject matter more to an audience than the filmmaking style of MeatEater which presents its subject matter in more of a matter-of-fact, anybody-can-do-it kind of way. In my mind MeatEater comes off as a kind of ‘anti-Classist’ show, the kind of show where you feel like you could be on that show regardless of where you are financially. Of course when referring to Chef's Table and its pretentiousness I'm not referring to Alex Atala himself, I'm only referring to the style of the documentary. 

           

But back to the point I made early on in this blog: people do generally close their eyes to the death behind every meal and they do tend to only eat the ‘good’ parts of an animal, but I wonder how these individuals would react if given the chance to view MeatEater. Would they feel like they are missing out or would they view Rinella as a bloodthirsty animal killer? Or is the death in MeatEater acceptable because it’s expected? Would they feel offended at the up-beat soundtrack and hokey presentation of MeatEater? Honestly I do feel that this blog was a bit scattershot and unfocused on my part, but I do wonder if the average American even views hunting as a means for food anymore. Perhaps the average American views hunting as a means to kill animals, or as some means for men to fulfill some kind of male fantasy, rather than as a means to provide energy and nutrients for oneself. This brings to my main question for those reading this blog: When you think of hunting, do you think of food or death? Think of a nice, juicy cheeseburger you just got at a restaurant of your choice, and then think of a hunter kneeling over a freshly-killed buck. What thoughts come into your head and why do you think these thoughts come into your head? I do believe that exposing shows such as MeatEater to non-hunters could potentially sway them to view hunting in a better light, but who knows if that will ever happen. There are currently two seasons (seasons 5 and 6) of MeatEater on Netflix right now, and I’m honestly interested to hear what other people have to say about it if they have time to watch it. It's definitely worth the watch, in my opinion, especially episode 8 of season 5. 

Question: When you think of hunting, do you think of food or death? Think of a nice, juicy cheeseburger you just got at a restaurant of your choice, and then think of a hunter kneeling over a freshly-killed buck. What thoughts come into your head and why do you think these thoughts come into your head? 

My answer: Of course the first thing that comes to my head when I think of hunting is food because the food that deer and other wild game yield when you hunt is really good. Any hunt is potential food in my mind, but I know that may not be the same for many people, including hunters who are more into the trophy parts of hunting. I know what my first thoughts are when I think of a cheeseburger and then think of a freshly-killed buck and both those thoughts are food, although I know where the meat comes from when I think of the freshly-killed buck. I'm probably going to really enjoy that cheeseburger, but I ultimately don't know where the meat came from. I know that perceptions about hunting are varied, so I'm curious to hear what other people think about it, especially with people who have no experience with it whatsoever. 

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