Talk:Goat meat

Most consumed red meat

I am removing the first half of this sentence: As of 2010 goat is the most widely consumed red meat,[2][3] eaten by more than 70% of the world's population.[4]

The sources are wrong because their original study was in error. The Washington Post printed a retraction here: http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/food/goat-meat-the-final-frontier/2011/03/28/AF0p2OjC_story.html

It is eaten by the most people, but it is not the most widely eaten red meat (which implies that more goat meat by weight is eaten that any other red meat)

Agreed - (http://www.fao.org/ag/againfo/themes/en/meat/background.html) Arabellavii (talk) 21:24, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

Regarding article name

Northamerica1000, I hope you read article Lamb and Mutton. Why term "Mutton" specifically used in that article title only when term "Mutton" is also used for "Goat meat". Either that article's name should be "Lamb meat" as this article's name is "Goat meat". Or we can change name of this article to "Goat and Mutton" or "Goat Mutton" or anything else relevant containing word "Mutton". What you say? --Human3015 Say Hey!! • 05:08, 26 May 2015 (UTC)

External links modified

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Not mutton in Australia

I was surprised to read this: "In South Asian, Australian, and Jamaican cuisine, mutton commonly refers goat meat, though it originally referred to lamb meat.[1][2][3][4]". (Added to the article on 14 Jan.)

Firstly, goat isn't prominent in Australian cuisine. Secondly, I've never seen it called "mutton" here (except maybe in an Indian restaurant). If fact it would probably breach the law for a butcher to sell goat as mutton. (I don't have a reference for a regulated definition of "mutton", but this article discusses the definition of "lamb" [1].)

Aside: A few years ago, I wanted to make a goat curry. I only found one local butcher who sold goat, and it was necessary to visit the store early on a Tuesday after he received his weekly delivery and before he sold out. The main demand seems to be from the Indian rather than Middle Eastern community, and there isn't a large supply.

My parents' generation ate lamb, hoggett and mutton. But these days all one sees for sale is "lamb". Maybe not mutton dressed as lamb, but it wouldn't surprise me if some of that "lamb" was actually hoggett. They couldn't get away with that at the sale yard, but by the time it gets to a retailer...

Anyway, gettting back on track. For the four ref's given:

1. The Hindustani Times piece is more about restaurants in India passing off goat as "mutton", but maintains the latter should refer to sheep meat.
2. The OED wants my subscription details, so I can't check that. (Time to haul out my old print copy of the Shorter Oxford?) For Australian usage the Macquarie Dictionary would be a better reference, though I don't have one handy.
3. The two print cookbooks aren't avaiable to me. But their titles are about Indian cooking so I'm dubious how much they would say about Australian cuisine.

Pinging Macrakis, could you provide a quote from the print sources?

Pelagic (talk) 03:45, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

Counter-examples

It could be hard to find sources that positively say "in Australia, goat meat is called 'goat'", because that would be stating the obvious. But I can find instances where the words goat and mutton are used in the same context for different things.

• https://sielearning.tafensw.edu.au/toolboxes/KitchenOps/tools/kitchen/clard/i_meat.html from TAFE NSW lists lamb/hoggett/mutton for sheep meat, and kid/capretto/"older goats" for goat meat.
• https://featherandbone.com.au/collections/lamb-goat "lamb, mutton, hoggett and goat".
• https://www.agriculture.gov.au/ag-farm-food/meat-wool-dairy "Mutton and lamb production is often undertaken with wool production. … Goat meat production is growing."
• https://www.agriculture.gov.au/export/controlled-goods/meat/statistics Column headings are: beef/veal, buffalo, mutton, lamb, goat, pork, fancy meats.

Dictionary definitions

• Macquarie ABC Dictionary, 2003. "mutton n. 1. the flesh of the sheep, used as food. 2. the flesh of the well-grown or more mature sheep, as distinguished from lamb, and hogget."
• Longman Dictionary of the English Language, 1984. "mutton n the flesh of a mature sheep used as food".

definitions in support

Okay, I finally found a couple of print dictionaries that do mention Australian use of mutton for goat, but I have caveats.

• Macquarie Dictionary, 7th edition, 2017, Sydney: Pan Macmillan. "Mutton ... 3. Obs. the flesh of goat, used as food. 4. Colloq. the penis."
• The Australian National dictionary: A dictionary of Australianisms on historical principles. Ed. William Stanley Ramson. Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1988. "mutton. [Transf. use of mutton the flesh of sheep, used as food.] 1. The flesh of goat, used as food. Also goat mutton. 1897 J.J. MURIF Fom Ocean to Ocean 57 No sheep beyond Oodnadatta either. . . The goat's flesh is called 'mutton'. 1905 Bulletin (Sydney) 30 Nov. 15/3 There really isn't enough difference to make a fuss about between sheep-mutton and goat-mutton. 1922 'J. BUSHMAN' In Musgrave Ranges 23 This was why the mutton they had eaten . . was so tough; for, because sheep cannot thrive in that part of the country, goats are kept and killed for meat. 1925 M. TERRY Across Unknown Aust. 154 A most excellent dish of mulga mutton—goat. 1927 M. DORNEY Adventurous Honeymoon 30 We had some 'mutton' which was really goat, but was quite nice as mutton. 1930 D. COTTRELL Earth Battle 125 She put . . the damper and cold goat mutton on a newspaper.

So, Macquarie says the usage is obsolete, and of 6 attestations in Oxford, we have: 3 are combinations "goat mutton" or "mulga mutton"; and 2 are goat being passed off as 'mutton'.

Until somebody can find evidence showing current usage of mutton=goat in Australia, I'm taking that assertion out of the article.

Pelagic (talk) 23:44, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

In India

• "Where do lamb and mutton come from?", Times of India, Aug 2019
  • "We know for a fact that they are two different types of meat, but how many of us really know which one comes from where? Well, lamb comes from sheep, while mutton comes from goat, right? Wrong. The truth is that both lamb and mutton are meats obtained from sheep."
  • "However, don’t beat yourself up over being mistaken about the jargon of meat, as things work a little differently in India. Here, the word mutton is used interchangeably between sheep and goat, but since Indians mostly consume goat, it is the widely accepted term for goat meat. Since we hardly eat sheep, you will seldom be given meat from a sheep if you walk into a butcher’s shop and ask for mutton."

Response re. Australian usage

@Pelagic: Sorry for the slow response; I've been off Wikipedia for a few weeks. In response to your question of 03:45, 29 Feb, the source I used is in the cited definition in the OED, which says:

The flesh of goats, used as food. Also goat mutton. Chiefly Australian and South Asian.

The only Australian quote that the OED gives to support this is the same as the one in the Australian national dictionary which you cite (J. J. Murif). (By the way, many libraries, at least in the US, have access to the OED online, so you don't need a personal subscription.) I don't claim any additional knowledge about Australian usage -- I was just following the OED -- and it's perfectly plausible that this is an obsolete, rare, or regional usage, or that Murif or the OED was mistaken. It does seem that the compound term "goat-mutton" was used occasionally. Anyway, thanks for the improvement to the article and the copious documentation above! --Macrakis (talk) 14:55, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Thanks, Macrakis. No worries about the late reply, I too tend to be a late responder, even when I am active (I tend to put off working through my notifications). Thanks for the info; I feel that, in an effort to be comprehensive, OED might be drawing a big inference from small evidence in this case. Or perhaps the term mutton is falling into general disuse here. I was actually surprised to discover that goat=mutton was an old usage and not something newly introduced by the south-asian diaspora.

The documentation might be a bit too copious, I'll admit, but I was learning something in the process! My usual public library used to have a subscription to Oxford (might have been provided by the State Library, which had a budget for state-wide consortium licensing), but for some reason it was discontinued. All the best, Pelagic (talk) 20:30, 5 April 2020 (UTC)

Agree mutton is sheepmeat in Australia. Not sure what it should or does mean in India. That may well vary. There aren't many sheep in India, but lots of goats. Johnbod (talk) 15:41, 9 November 2020 (UTC)