What's that, Kobe Beef?...yeah right.

[salf]

Interesting article about Kobe Beef, and some other things:

Think you’ve tasted the famous Japanese Kobe beef?

Think again.

(...)

That’s right. You heard me. I did not misspeak. I am not confused like most of the American food media.

I will state this as clearly as possible:

You cannot buy Japanese Kobe beef in this country. Not in stores, not by mail, and certainly not in restaurants. No matter how much you have spent, how fancy a steakhouse you went to, or which of the many celebrity chefs who regularly feature “Kobe beef” on their menus you believed, you were duped. I’m really sorry to have to be the one telling you this, but no matter how much you would like to believe you have tasted it, if it wasn’t in Asia you almost certainly have never had Japan’s famous Kobe beef.

Food's Biggest Scam: The Great Kobe Beef Lie - Forbes

All this time I've been recommending to everybody the best Carpaccio I've ever had, a Kobe Beef Carpaccio at Morimoto (well still's the best I've had, just not really Kobe)

You would think that Morimoto being not only a top chef, but also Japanese (and all that crap about japanese honor and pride) wouldn't trick you into buying "Kobe" beef at his place, but I guess I was wrong.

[loveisnoise]

This is the biggest kept secret since it was found out that Liberace was gay. Same recycled news story that has been done for years.

[phillyaggie]

Interesting info that I didn't know about. I wonder why Japanese food industry does not protest this illegal use of their teroir term.

CHOPS on Washington Square has happy hour specials for $6 only for 10 oz "Kobe beef" burgers.

[phillyaggie]

Reading all the related articles in the series, it reminded me of the "American" basmati rice fiasco, when the Indian government tried to fight off a private Texan company that started selling long-grain Texas rice as basmati... I think that got stopped and the company started selling it as "texmati" but I'm not sure now. That's the thing: we can never be sure in America about what we're buying due to shoddy labeling laws meant to protect American food industry profits.

[BarryG]

Interesting info that I didn't know about. I wonder why Japanese food industry does not protest this illegal use of their teroir term.

CHOPS on Washington Square has happy hour specials for $6 only for 10 oz "Kobe beef" burgers.

The Kobe hot dogs making the rounds are really hilarious. At least Vetri and Garces have the decency to call their overpriced hot dogs mortadella instead of some meaningless breed of cow that doesn't exist.