Epicurious to stop posting beef recipes, citing climate change

[Victor_Hong]

I applaud the decision!

I was sad to learn recently that lamb is even worse in terms of emissions. I wonder if they’ll slowly phase that out too.

As food or recreation?

[Josh_Grossman]

Think of all the possible carbon emissions eliminated by eating veal. Better yet, I have a modest proposal (if we really want to reduce carbon)…

Ruminants can turn much of the non-arable land into food. Ungulates are an important part of the prairie ecosystem, and a healthy prairie stores much more carbon than a grain field. I suppose they are also going to stop publishing anything with cheese. There are responsible ways of animal husbandry and wrong ways. I’m left with Aldo Leopold’s land ethic, “A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise.” I support banning CAFOs–but am sure Ted Turner’s bison ranches are reducing greenhouse gasses.

Saul Griffith: Why Being a Meat Eater Isn't As Horrible for the Environment As You Thought

[Josh_Grossman]

We don’t need no stinkin’ recipes

I use Franklin’s secret blend of spices on pretty much all my beef recipes:

BBQ with Franklin: The Brisket

(I guess sometimes I add wine, onions, stock, or a mother sauce or two)

[C_Mc_Cart]

Just saying Epicurious is fine with “cruel” food like foie gras, and they are down with endangered foods like tuna and sea bass.

They post plenty of pork recipes, too…way cruel.

Plenty of people are ethically concerned about eating sentient life like octopus, but Epicurious don’t care.

Selective virtue signalling seems a little cynical, to me.

On the plus side, they don’t tell us how to prepare shark fin.

Oh, OK. I got it. You have nothing except the magic words “virtue signalling”, which is like your trump card to use against anything you don’t particularly like. Cynically calling out others for their alleged cynicism seems pretty ironic to me.

Plenty of things I don’t particularly like. Merely curious about where they pretend to be ‘woke’ and where they don’t.

It could be worse, imagine if they started playing the “cultural appropriation” card with different cuisines!

Sister publication & site Bon Appetit did that last year.

Conde Nast clearly added management to focus on exactly this sort of thing along with trying to write recipes & articles that aren’t completely appropriated. I wish I could applaud that but their motive was always suspect as it happened across platforms after Rapaport was outed with his blackface on socials. I was receiving Bon Appetit monthly and used Epicurious semi-regularly and while they had already moved into the “sheet-pan everything” & constant grain bowl riffs, it all changed quite quickly. I stopped using Bon Appetit & Epicurious pretty much at the same time. That they will not publish new beef recipes is not surprising, but expected. I assume they will go fully vegetarian or vegan. To be clear - I’m not anti vegetarian (we enjoy veg/ vegan meals often), I’m anti Conde Nast.

[mmarcellus]

The interesting thing here is they announced they actually cut out beef recipes a year ago. They are just now making a formal announcement.

Maybe because nobody noticed? How inessential do they feel now?

I think the fact that no one noticed was a factor driving the business decision to take this a step further.

Look, for all I know this may turn out to be a stupid business decision. If so it’s not the first, and it won’t be the last. Either way they are responding to what they perceive to be the preferences of their customers, which is how I thought capitalism is supposed to work. Also, given that their website is an historical accumulation of recipes, the entirety of which their users can refer to, the site is probably more weighted towards beef in particular, and meat in general than is in sync with current consumer trends. Since they are on the record as saying that they are not eliminating any previous content, the end result of this change will probably result in a totality of offerings that better reflects what their customers are looking for. Or not, in which case they will pay the price.

[Jason_T]

We don’t need no stinkin’ recipes

I use Franklin’s secret blend of spices on pretty much all my beef recipes:
BBQ with Franklin: The Brisket - YouTube

(I guess sometimes I add wine, onions, stock, or a mother sauce or two)

Super-top secret. Classified.

[David_K_o_l_i_n]

We don’t need no stinkin’ recipes

I use Franklin’s secret blend of spices on pretty much all my beef recipes:
BBQ with Franklin: The Brisket - YouTube

(I guess sometimes I add wine, onions, stock, or a mother sauce or two)

Same

[Cameron_Hughes]

The interesting thing here is they announced they actually cut out beef recipes a year ago. They are just now making a formal announcement.

Maybe because nobody noticed? How inessential do they feel now?

I think the fact that no one noticed was a factor driving the business decision to take this a step further.

Look, for all I know this may turn out to be a stupid business decision. If so it’s not the first, and it won’t be the last. Either way they are responding to what they perceive to be the preferences of their customers, which is how I thought capitalism is supposed to work. Also, given that their website is an historical accumulation of recipes, the entirety of which their users can refer to, the site is probably more weighted towards beef in particular, and meat in general than is in sync with current consumer trends. Since they are on the record as saying that they are not eliminating any previous content, the end result of this change will probably result in a totality of offerings that better reflects what their customers are looking for. Or not, in which case they will pay the price.

This is purely a business decision. Beef producers don’t advertise and beef brands are few and far between in a commoditized category…Morningstar/Beyond/Impossible and all the other startups have massive marketing budgets and are going to fight for market share. I dont know if they actually believe the environmental part (if they do they are easily mislead and shouldn’t be publishers) but its likely just cover.

[Cameron_Hughes]

Think of all the possible carbon emissions eliminated by eating veal. Better yet, I have a modest proposal (if we really want to reduce carbon)…

Ruminants can turn much of the non-arable land into food. Ungulates are an important part of the prairie ecosystem, and a healthy prairie stores much more carbon than a grain field. I suppose they are also going to stop publishing anything with cheese. There are responsible ways of animal husbandry and wrong ways. I’m left with Aldo Leopold’s land ethic, “A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise.” I support banning CAFOs–but am sure Ted Turner’s bison ranches are reducing greenhouse gasses.
Saul Griffith: Why Being a Meat Eater Isn't As Horrible for the Environment As You Thought - YouTube

this is very important…ruminants have been part of these ecosystems for millions of years, they have evolved together. The problem is us and our digging up of fossil fuels and burning them. Very simple.

[Linda_Baehr]

yawn
If you have access to the internet and have trouble finding beef recipes, I would say you are doing it wrong.

[Alex_N]

Just saying Epicurious is fine with “cruel” food like foie gras, and they are down with endangered foods like tuna and sea bass.

Pan-Fried Sea Bass with Miso, Lemon, and Thyme-Glazed Roasties

“Sea bass” is a very broad word to identify one of so many species. That’s not chilean seabass, black seabass or anything endangered, that’s for sure. Looks like a barely legal striper or rockfish like a johnny bass, or calico.

[Jay_Miller]

Think of all the possible carbon emissions eliminated by eating veal. Better yet, I have a modest proposal (if we really want to reduce carbon)…

Ruminants can turn much of the non-arable land into food. Ungulates are an important part of the prairie ecosystem, and a healthy prairie stores much more carbon than a grain field. I suppose they are also going to stop publishing anything with cheese. There are responsible ways of animal husbandry and wrong ways. I’m left with Aldo Leopold’s land ethic, “A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise.” I support banning CAFOs–but am sure Ted Turner’s bison ranches are reducing greenhouse gasses.

LOL, I read that as “I support banning CFOs” and was starting to think about some where I could understand where you were coming from when I saw my mistake.

Anyway, I find the decision silly but meaningless.

[Jay_Miller]

.

[alan_weinberg]

I’m going to order some Flannery after reading this thread.