Epic snow journey to pick shop’s prime Christmas beef
Thursday 16th December 2010, 2:29PM GMT.
Butcher Jason Hamon, left, and Forest Stores owner Keith Bienvenu travelled 1,900 miles thanks to disruption caused by snow to pick prime Orkney beef to sell at Christmas. (Picture by Adrian Miller, 1067846)
SNOW in Scotland meant that Forest Stores literally had to go the extra mile to bring home the beef from Orkney this Christmas.
Delays, missed connections, closed airports and abandoned landings saw butcher Jason Hamon and store owner Keith Bienvenu clock up more than 1,900 miles on their round trip to the Scottish isle to buy meat at the Orkney Meat Christmas Beef Competition.
And while the pair are seasoned air travellers, Arctic conditions saw this year’s complicated beef quest taking much longer than they could have ever imagined.
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What is wrong with Guernsey Beef. So many farmers have beef cattle to sell, but guernsey shops will not buy it, but willing to bring it in from Scotland. You should look closer to home and support local. poor farmers
I am very unhappy with Forest Stores :-(
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Buy beef from Guernsey. there are so many local farmers trying to sell local beef. Why go all the way, when Guernsey is the best.
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Agreed Jane
Bad publicity when people are genuinely worried about the planet
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Where are the enviro warriors and their food miles? Oh sorry I forgot, they all shop there.
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Jane
Maybe there is nothing wrong with Guernsey beef but the stuff he has brought in is much better.
And why shouldn`t people have the right to choose what beef they want to buy?.
Should we stop the export of flowers as i`m sure the countries they send have their own supply, how about we stop the crabbers from exporting their fish while were at it?.
I`m very happy with the Forest Stores and their friendly service :)
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the sandwiches at forest stores are well good.
Jane why dont you buy all the guernsey meat and sell it on or paint it or something
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Ray – I hope anyone who criticises the Forest Stores on environmental grounds never eats bananas.
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Jane, you’d hate M&S. None of their food other than the milk is from Guernsey. Even potatoes come from weird and wonderful places.
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Paul
The difference is that we don’t grow bananas but we do produce local meat with approximately 2 food miles involved,especially if you cycle
Jeepers,I’m starting to sound like Rosie
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Ray
You’re right of course, sir but I would argue that we actually don’t NEED to eat bananas at all. We choose to import them from lands afar because we like them – despite there being other fruits available much closer to home.
Don’t misunderstand me – I don’t have a problem with importing and eating bananas, or meat for that matter. My point was that anyone complaining about the Forest Stores importing meat from Scotland on environmental grounds should first make sure they are practicing what they preach.
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OK Paul
Perhaps the rather triumphal headline is the main cause of any ill feeling towards the shop.I realise that the two gents would rather not have had such disruption on their annual journey
Perhaps they can plant a compensatory tree in their car park after obtaining IDC permission on what sort of tree would be permitted !
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We don’t grow bananas here in Guernsey that much, PaulLeP, but we DO grow tonnes of perfectly good BEEF that goes up in smoke every year, benefiting no one – then import it from elsewhere.
THAT is what is so scandalous.
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Paul Le Page,
You need to read the book ‘How Bad Are Bananas?’
Food miles do have a carbon footprint, but it’s usually a fraction of that produced by trying to force longer fruiting seasons closer to home. According to the book, a single red rose grown out of season in a heated greenhouse is as bad as importing 4.5 kilos of bananas.
Food miles are here to stay, unless you want to spend the next four months eating sprouts, kale and turnips!
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Actually to those who criticize Forest Stores should remember the whole truth.
Certain staff at the store raise and slaughter animals to produce local meat . this is very widely publicised within the store. This is something that very few of the other chains do so Forest Stores are probably the most “mileage efficent” in the island.
My family and myself have shopped at Forest Stores for over 45 years now and are on first name terms with all of the staff and directors, the service is superb as is the range of meats.
I’m with Paul Le Page on this, scottish beef is nothing compared to what the average consumer buys over the period of a year.
The truth of it is they are responding to YOUR demand , do you slag them off for selling New Zealand Lamb ? or do you campaign the Co-op because they sell Danish bacon ? and how much imported beers do you drink when we have local brewerys here ….
If we had only Guernsey products the moan then would be the lack of choice …
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ChrisJ – I am not against importing food!
I am against those that pontificate about importing certain food types (such as Scottish beef) on environmental grounds whilst eating food from much further afield that they do not need – such as bananas. If someone was spending the next four months eating sprouts, kale and turnips and then decided to make a point I might be more inclined to listen!
Scarlett’s point is slightly different and is a valid concern. My argument would be that retailers such as Forest Stores only import beef because their customers want to buy it. The easiest way to ensure only local beef is in our butchers is to refuse en masse to buy anything else.
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Paul,
The GHG emissions of rearing the cattle in the first place probably outweigh the emissions of getting it from Scotland to Guernsey 100 times over.
So on that basis, better to have bananas for Christmas lunch!
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i say congrats – yet another year bringing us, the public, some of the finist meats for this the finest times of year!! i wish you all a merry christmas and highly reccomend the beef. any naysayers to forest stores can sit and eat your equivelent of spam from checkers. either way enjoy yourselves.
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please correct me if im wrong, but i was under the impression that due to the state of our Slaughterhouse, that we can’t process our own beef here- and as Scralett says- it all goes up in smoke at the incinerator.
I think the only exception i can think off is the Watts’ /Meadow Court rose veal ( delicious and ethically sound)- so perhaps it is to do with the Under 30 months rule?
Ultimately, i don’t think FS should be taking the ire here- at the moment,it appears Guernsey just doesn’t have the infrastructure for beef cattle
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@Guernsey Fred
perfectly put my freind , but they wont all be going to checkers , most will be going to M&S for their beef , which of course is Aberdeen Angus ….
A la Perchoine
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ChrisJ – although stranger things have happened, I just can’t see that menu catching on!
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Unlike most people posting here I suspect, I have actually lived on a diet of purely Bailiwick food (for 46 days in Lent, as a kind of interesting trial and to support local producers).
It’s do-able, but a little patchy (e.g. no wheat or flour; little fruit except Mr Meyer’s organic lemons). As regards beef, there is Guernsey beef available from time to time, but of course our local cows are dairy cows, not beef cows. The reason Jason went up to Orkney was to get super high quality meat from beef cows. Quite a different product than local Guernsey-breed beef.
Guernsey dairy make cheese, but that’s no reason why islanders should be banned from buying non-Guernsey cheese. Unless you think we should only be able to eat cheddar and brie.
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If you want to buy local meat from a supermarket in Guernsey, the one to visit is Forest Stores… they are always on the look out for it. The butcher grows some of the pork he sells and he will sell guernsey beef if he can get some of it….. they get through well over 30 animals per year. I have been asking for local meat from them ever since we returned to Guernsey 7 years ago, and the market for it has now grown (at last) and they do their best to fulfil that demand.
I don’t know what Jane’s original post is about. Where are all these farmers she describes?
As far as the beef carcasses that are incinerated every year…… it certainly is a scandal. But it is because the animals are of an age that means they must have their spinal columns tested (in England) before the meat can be released for human consumption. Our present slaughter house does not have the ‘cool room’ necessary to store the carcass while that process is undertaken.
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I’d second Rosie’s statement about buying local. I popped in the Checkers to get some groceries. “Ooh, I thought, island produced veg!”, looking at their display signs, “good opportunity to buy local stuff”.
It turns out the island in question is Jersey.
The only Guernsey veg there was some mushrooms and herbs.
I noted they’d taken down their previous even more misleading sign that said “if it was any more local we’d have to grow it in-store”…
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Dont try and compare checkers to Forest Stores. There is no comparison.
Jason at Forest Stores is an outstanding example of what every butcher should aspire to be. He does already sell Guernsey beef, and very tasty it is too. Not as tasty as the Orkney beef though, which is just the ticket for a Christmas treat.
As somebpdy else said – go buy your spam from Checkers if you like, but dont complain about those of us who enjoy our food.
Jo
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ChrisJ.
As you suggest, it is just as important to buy food in season as it is to buy locally sourced food, and it is unrealistic to expect everyone to restrict themselves to those criteria (in season & local) 100% of the time. It is a matter of degree though. Provided we try to source the majority of foods that way, and support local producers wherever possible, then we are doing what we can.
I highly recommend the book The Carbon Fields’ by Graham Harvey. Very interesting and illuminating about the whole food system and how many of the worlds food problems could be sorted if we grew more of our meat on properly managed pasture land, using the natural energy from the sun in place of artificial fertilisers, pesticides etc etc.
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I must revisit Forest Stores
I’ve only ever been in there twice and the second time was to double check that I hadn’t strayed into Dibley
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Ray
You don’t know what you are missing – the best supermarket in the island by a country mile. Not as cheap, but you get what you pay for. Impossible to compare the quality of goods and service with any of the large supermarkets. A throwback in time, perhaps, but well worth the journey.
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Rosie,
I think your promotion of ‘green consumerism’ is laudable because it raises awareness of the urgent need to reduce global GHG emissions, and how our daily lives are going to have to change to achieve that. But I have to admit it presses my cynicism button.
I’ve not read ‘The Carbon Fields’ (I haven’t recovered from Monbiot’s ‘Heat’ yet…) But if everyone has to have read various books on the subject, wade through mountains of corporate greenwash and have a decent enough grasp of chemistry and maths to juggle multiple competing factors in order to work out whether it’s more ethical to buy a banana or an apple when they go shopping, and then in all probability pay a fairly hefty premium for the privilege of making the right choice, then our chances of achieving real change through this means are zilch.
It does not surprise me at all that big companies like Tesco are so big on green consumerism – because it gets them off the hook on the supply side. The customer just bounces like a pinball between the fair trade stand, the organic stand, the local produce stand and the stand with the stuff you can actually afford (all in open fridges along heated aisles with 10 squillion watts of lighting…). And Tesco can just go on producing whatever they want and doing as much damage as they like – because ‘it’s what the customer wants’, therefore the damage is the customer’s fault.
You said ‘If we try to source the majority of foods that way, and support local producers wherever possible, then we are doing what we can’. Yes, but of course we need to go further than that and campaign for effective action at the highest level possible. I know you for one are doing that which I heartily applaud, but we must be careful not to mislead people that they can discharge their individual responsibility just by buying a bag of Mr Le Mesurier’s potatoes.
None of this is a criticism of Forest Stores by the way – they are just trying to make a living and do what they do well, and there is plenty enough good in that!
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Ray – I didn’t realise Dawn French was the new vicar of Forest Parish Church!
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Being vegetarian, I am rather looking forward to my sprouts, kale and turnips ;0)
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ChrisJ.
I agree with what you say, but nor are you going to make changes by hitting people with too brutal a truth between the eyes. It simply makes people recoil. When someone actively makes the choice to exchange their usual buy of imported potatoes for some local ones, they have made a start and the next step is to think about everything else in their basket. It’s a journey. I still find that new things occur to me that I can improve on without really making any effort, but it is a continual process and we all have to start somewhere. A journey of a thousand miles begins with one small step.
I still think that you should read the Carbon Fields because it explains how we don’t need any fancy high tech solution… and in fact looking for the high tech solutions will simply compound our problems, many of which are created by our need for economic growth. (i.e create a problem and you can create a wealth of businesses that grow up to overcome that problem, which then themselves create more problems that need more businesses etc etc….)
Its an easy book to read…. give it a go. It will though, make you despair at the thought of these giant industrial farms that are due to start up in england soon, to feed the insatiable cheap dairy food market. I have a copy if you want to borrow it.
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Personally I prefer Argentinian beef – the Scottish stuff isn’t anywhere near as good.
Which is why I and a few friends bought a cow from an Argentinian farmer, had it butchered and vacuum packed over there, then shipped to Guernsey via courier.
It was a lot cheaper than going to the Forest Stores……….
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Janet
I suspect that you have four legs and you’re best pals with Buttercup and Daisy
Super typing skills though :)
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Maybe if our abbattoir could process cattle that are over a certain age then there would be a lot more guernsey beef on the counters.
Instead the farmers have no choice but to send them to the incinerater.
(i do believe that there are plans for a new abattoir at the longue houge where this will be possible).
Lets just hope everyone supports it when that happens!
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