Naked Science Forum
General Discussion & Feedback => Just Chat! => Topic started by: Andrew K Fletcher on 22/09/2008 17:24:15
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The Incredible Shrinking Tasteless Bacon Trick
A Short Film about Sainsbury's
Supermarket Chain Selling Butchers Choice 8 Thick Cut Unsmoked Bacon Rashers supposed to be half price was £3.49 now £1.74
Ingredients pork (87%). Water, Salt, Preservatives: Potassium Nitrate, Sodium Nitrite; Antioxidant: Sodium Ascorbate.
Flavour Nil!
Complaint Line 0800 636262
Complaint Line 0800 636262
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I have read that cooked people taste like cooked pork and also that pigs are used in some experiments because they behave like people.
I believe that people are mainly water, estimates vary but something like 55 to 60% seems about right. I think it's fair to assume that pigs are similar.
When you cook bacon you drive a lot of the water out of it. That sizzling noise is made by escaping steam.
How incredible is it that when you remove up to 60% of something, it shrinks?
I grant that the stuff may be bland, overpriced and full of spelling mistakes -Oops! sorry, additives, but why the shock that it shrinks when you cook it?
At least they are expected to label the stuff so you know that only 6/7ths of it is food and the rest is salty water.
Feel free to buy something else.
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BC aged 52 I may have become aware of how bacon should behave in the frying pan. This bacon was drenched in water in the packet, the water that ran from it did not fry but burned brown on the frying pan.
I might have known you would have something to say about the video :)
While I am free to buy something else. I feel justified in advising others, who like myself have to watch every penny, from making the same mistake as we did and ending up with a product that is inferior in quality to normal bacon, contains far too much water, tastes of fried fresh air and snowballs and cowers in the corner of the pan rather than streaking forward onto the spatula.
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I agree with you, Andrew. I too found the video to be bland. I then popped the video on to several cd-r's and proceeded to fry them in my frying pan, my will to live shrunk by 50% and i began to pass water! Back in the olden days someone who butchered a youtube video would have had their hands cut off!!! Shame on you!
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Paul
Glad you have found some amusement from such a bland video, although I suspect you may be selling Porky’s with your saucy reply.
Personally, I am sick and tired of people trying to rip me off, each time these shysters get their hands in my pocket I want to get them by the throat and squeeze until their eyes bulge out. Yet they are faceless invisible people who mess around with our most basic needs in life for their own financial gain.
I say put them in the stocks and let them simmer while people pelt them with their own dodgy fruit,
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Andrew, did you actually call their customer complaint line?
It's just that it seems to me that buying mass produced food from a supermarket then complaining that it's not very good is like buying beer and complaining that it makes you drunk. What did you expect?
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BC I have contacted the office of fair trading about this product, I feel we have been duped by the information on the packet. Yes I did report it to the number and have been given a refund for the two packets of bacon.
The only reason I'm complaining about this is so that other people don't make the same mistake.
What I expected was to have bacon that resembled the discription on the package.
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Andrew,
...Thick Cut Unsmoked Bacon Rashers supposed to be half price was £3.49 now £1.74
1. So they were half price (baring half a penny, so they were actually cheaper than half price), what's your gripe with that?
2. You are moaning that they shrunk by 50%, yet I never noticed any kind of measuring device...was this just guess work? Also, seeing as you get 16 rashers for less that the price of 8, should they have shrunk by 50% you have not lost any money.
3. Define "the old days". My dad lived in the old days, are these the old days you are on about? If so, who was the last butcher to have his hands chopped off for selling poor quality bacon in your town? And just what year was that?
4. You notice that the packaging states "Butchers Choice", well how do you know that the butcher did not choose to sell meat that shrunk by a (guess)timate of 50%?
5. What did you do with the bacon? You "knew" it was tastless and still cooked it, so what was the final fate of the bacon?
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Remaining packet in fridge to take back to the store. I can send it to you if you would like to try it.
My gripe is being sold mostly water! I was paying attention when this injection machinery was introduce, allegedly to tenderise meat when really it was to sell customers water
The measuring device was a brain and an eye coupled with a frying pan that was once covered with bacon and ended up being covered less than fifty percent. Take a snap shot from the film and measure the bacon free area against the bacon-covered area if you want to be pedantic.
The old days referred to history lessons from school, where we were taught this.
The butcher who chose the bacon mentioned on the label must be pretty damned busy considering there are hundreds of thousands of these packaged products in every Sainsbury’s Store. Maybe he missed the two packets as they ran through quality control?
Hope you find these answers as useful as your questions.
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Andrew - they told you that there was only 87% pork in your bacon - so why the gripe?
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"My gripe is being sold mostly water! "
Like you and me, most meat is mostly water. Many vegetables and fruit are even "wetter". What do you propose to eat?
Incidentally "Butcher's choice" doesn't have any legally enforceable meaning but "87% meat" has.
My money is that no trained butcher really paid a lot of attention to the stuff, but it will have been made from 87% pork.
"The measuring device was a brain and an eye coupled with a frying pan that was once covered with bacon and ended up being covered less than fifty percent. Take a snap shot from the film and measure the bacon free area against the bacon-covered area if you want to be pedantic."
Imagine my disgust when I folded my pancake over and found that half of it had disapeared.
Ok, that's an extreme case, but how did you allow for the fact that cooked bacon isn't flat anmore?
Also, my money is on there being less adulteration of food now than there used to be in "the old days" for any sensible definition of that phrase.
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Hope you find these answers as useful as your questions.
I have no idea what this is supposed to mean.
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One gets to know what a bacon butty should look and taste like over the years. When I feel I have been ripped off, I will not take it lightly and in this case this is exactly what my wife and I felt after watching the meal shrivel up and seeing the water coming out of the bacon that was obviously injected into it. We can go to Farm Foods in Torquay buy bacon that is frozen and it tastes good, does not shrivel up to nothing and is excellent value for money.
Why on earth you guys are defending a product you have no experience with bewilders me?
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I don't think that calling a product "bland, overpriced and full of spelling mistakes -Oops! sorry, additives" counts as defending it.
What I was commenting on was that you chose to attack it for being essentially what it said it was, and exactly what (I think) you ought to have expected it to be.
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I buy my pork from the farm up the road. I don't go so far as choosing my own pig from the field but I can see how the little chaps have been cared for. It is only slightly more expensive than your supermarket stuff but well worth it.
People should take more interest in what they are stuffing in their gobs.
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That makes so much sense and we normally buy eggs free range from a farm, they taste divine and soooooo fresh. We have some local farmers selling meat in the farm shops but generally far too expensive for us. Perhaps we should start shopping at the farm shops.
I buy my pork from the farm up the road. I don't go so far as choosing my own pig from the field but I can see how the little chaps have been cared for. It is only slightly more expensive than your supermarket stuff but well worth it.
People should take more interest in what they are stuffing in their gobs.
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Farmers markets are all the rage at the moment. Just markets in general are pretty damned good though. Lots of cheap veg too.
PS. if you want to save the planet...go veggie. I'm not a veggie as it doesn't suit me.
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We can go to Farm Foods in Torquay ...
Torquay...you don't know a bloke called Fawlty, do you? Runs a hotel there.
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I have to agree with Andrew. We are being ripped off left right & center. It's all very well to have the ingredients printed on the package so you know what you're buying, but let's face it who has the time to study every packet they pick up from the supermarket? What's more who can read some of the print? It's so small you need to carry a magnifying glass to read it.
This sort of product should have a large red warning label on it.
WARNING~~~~~~~~THIS PRODUCT CONTAINS A HIGH LEVEL OF WATER & WILL
SHRINK TO LESS THAN HALF IT'S UNCOOKED SIZE DURING THE COOKING PROCESS
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I have to agree with Andrew.
your first mistake
We are being ripped off left right & center. It's all very well to have the ingredients printed on the package so you know what you're buying, but let's face it who has the time to study every packet they pick up from the supermarket? What's more who can read some of the print? It's so small you need to carry a magnifying glass to read it.
This sort of product should have a large red warning label on it.
WARNING~~~~~~~~THIS PRODUCT CONTAINS A HIGH LEVEL OF WATER & WILL
SHRINK TO LESS THAN HALF IT'S UNCOOKED SIZE DURING THE COOKING PROCESS
Is anyone stupid enough to think bacon will not shrink? do you really need a warning to tell you that?
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I don't tolerate meat shrinking myself. You need to whip these people into shape!
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We had a fiver sent to us from head office to say sorry, the Supermarket gave us 2 packs of Taste The Difference Bacon.
We purchased their dry-cured bacon instead and low and behold it did not shrink to nothing, tasted lovely on our BLT and we now feel vindicated.
Yes this particular pack of bacon really does need that red lable on it!
Thank you Don
For all those who would rather thrown bad products away and not complain, you are making the situation worse by not complaining!
I have purchased chips from a chippy, opened the bag found them to be soggy or refried and burned, or just plain old dinner times chips sold in the evening and taken them back and insisted on a refund in front of other shocked customers.
Put your hand in my pocket and I will bite it off!
In Sainsbury's case it cost them £10.00 to sell me two packs of bacon, one of which we ate the other returned.
Now if everyone adopted this method of standing up for our rights as customers and consumers of products. Stores will most definately think twice about ripping us off!
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Well my breakfast either consists of 2 mugs of tea or toast & tea.
But if I ate a huge cooked breakfast, I'd be sick.
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you need to eat a good breakfast in the morning. It doesn't have to be when you first get up as your digestive system may still be asleep. Wait until mid morning and have a big meal then. You are less likely to gain weight if you eat big meals earlier in the day.
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That's the advice I used to hear years ago when the wisdom was you should "breakfast like a King, lunch like a Prince and have supper like a pauper" for a healthy digestion. I've never been able to do it though.
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I have to agree with Andrew.
your first mistake
We are being ripped off left right & center. It's all very well to have the ingredients printed on the package so you know what you're buying, but let's face it who has the time to study every packet they pick up from the supermarket? What's more who can read some of the print? It's so small you need to carry a magnifying glass to read it.
This sort of product should have a large red warning label on it.
WARNING~~~~~~~~THIS PRODUCT CONTAINS A HIGH LEVEL OF WATER & WILL
SHRINK TO LESS THAN HALF IT'S UNCOOKED SIZE DURING THE COOKING PROCESS
Is anyone stupid enough to think bacon will not shrink? do you really need a warning to tell you that?
Of course I expect meat to shrink when cooked, but I don't expect to pay for a package of water, when I was expecting bacon.
The food industry does inject water into some products (bacon & chicken for example) to give it the appearance of being more than is actually there.
This practice should be stopped. It's nothing short of fraud.
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It's not fraud when they tell you that they do it, and you buy the product anyway.
Fraud involves dishonesty and they are perfectly clear about selling a questionable product.
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Of course I expect meat to shrink when cooked, but I don't expect to pay for a package of water, when I was expecting bacon.
The food industry does inject water into some products (bacon & chicken for example) to give it the appearance of being more than is actually there.
This practice should be stopped. It's nothing short of fraud.
I think BC has already answered this. I would only add, that since you know all of that, why do you still complain?
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OK, fraud is a bit OTT, and I wouldn't buy the stuff anyway. It's usually the 'budget' brands that come up like this to give the appearance of being better value.
There have been a number of campaigns by consumer groups to outlaw this practice, because it is seen as taking advantage of the vulnerable. For some reason none of these campaigns ever seem to get anywhere.
I wonder why? (sarcastically)
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It is fraud when they put water on the packet without a percentage and tell everyone it is to make the product tenderised, when it is simply to sell people water. RIP OFF BRITAIN!
Paul adds why do you complain? Answer, because it pisses me off being ripped off with tasteless products that vanish before our eyes in the frying pan!
I complain also to warn others not to make the same mistake as we have done and if they do to send in their complaint to Sainsbury's complaints department and get a refund and replacement bacon. This is a victory for the shopper!
If a hundred people did the same, they would sit up and listen. If ten thousand did the same they would be very careful about what they try to sell their customers in future.
Paul and BC. You are both very loyal towards the supermarket for some reason?
The name Butcher's choice is not just plucked out of the blue. It is carefully contrived to lul people into thinking this bacon might actually taste and behave like the bacon our butchers used to sell us. Not quite fraud but certainly misleading
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What I am loyal to is not the supermarket (did you not see how I described their product?) I am loyal to the idea that adults should make their own decisions in the light of the available information and if they make a mistake they should accept responsibility for it.
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The mistake was Sainsbury's selling me inferior products. They paid for their mistake too. Following your adice in quote below, I should have accepted my mistake and lost my money and meal?
What I am loyal to is not the supermarket (did you not see how I described their product?) I am loyal to the idea that adults should make their own decisions in the light of the available information and if they make a mistake they should accept responsibility for it.
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Blushes
I don't tolerate meat shrinking myself. You need to whip these people into shape!