Great story on the cooking of pork, and as a confirmed barbecuer, I've smoked my share.

Here in Iowa, though, the #1 problem is CAFOs, Confined Animal Feeding Operations, or as they're popularly known, hog lots.

These operations confine, as their name suggests, several hundred animals at a time. Apart from the appalling treatment of the animals, who are barely able to move for their entire lives, the pollution runoff is about what you'd imagine.

One of these CAFOs can kill an entire community. Neighboring houses become unlivable, first because of the stench and flies, then because of the water and soil pollution. There are no statistics on declining property values because statistics are based on sales figures, and houses become unsaleable. So your home goes, almost overnight, from being a nice little place in the country to something you can't live in and can't get rid of. Who would you sell it to? If you're lucky, the hog lot operator, for expansion, at bottom dollar. Otherwise, it's simply abandoned, the investment lost, often by those who can least afford it.

CAFOs are sprouting everywhere in this state, next to urban bedroom communities, vacation destinations and tourist attractions (there actually are a few). The lack of a local control option, which would allow citizens in a county to vote new CAFOs up or down, means that the only defense is publicity and community action that, understandably, can sometimes border on vigilantism.

After a long hard campaign, Democrats won control of both houses of the Legislature and the Governor's office in the last election, largely due to this issue. Because of the strength of the agricultural lobby, a bill to institute local control never made it out of committee.

That's where your pork is coming from, and why it's so cheap. During the long gone "other white meat" era, the animals were exercised to keep them lean. CAFOs took over when it was realized that the meat from a too-lean pig was dry and tasteless, and a pig that never moved was cheaper to manage, making the meat cheaper to produce. The effect on the land, air and water is never figured in, making this a particularly vicious form of slash and burn agriculture.

If you have to eat pork (and I confess, I love it), opt for cuts that come from the "Neiman Ranch" type of production -- free range animals raised in clean, nonpolluting operations. It's more expensive, but healthier meat, and far better for the land.

Neiman Ranch's unofficial slogan is "These animals have only one bad day in their lives."

After that, have I got a sauce recipe for you.

There isn't anything else to say. You laid out the problem beautifully, with calm and reason.

It is important to acknowledge that intensive farming is a very sad plight for any animal.

I live in Australia, and a small sign of hope is that over the past year at least one of the major franchise supermarkets has begun to stock free range pork smallgoods, including bacon and ham, as well as other free range packaged pig parts in the meat department

Now if they would just continue this trend and stop selling eggs produced by caged hens..... That means shoppers must make an effort to support industries which supply goods according to principles recognised as promoting the ethical treatment of animals raised for human consumption.

but all I can say is Blech!! Blechh!! Blechhh!! Even before the "Ghostbuster" ectoplasm part. Intestines, ears...snouts...feet....ick!

Glad I'm a veggie. Sorry, guys...

Thank you all for reminding me how fortunate I am to have a local farmer who raises grass fed animals and then sends them to a great butcher. For those who have difficulty finding local sources (http://www.localharvest.org/), I would mention two other 'mail order' sources besides Niman Ranch: Prairie Pride Farm in Minnesota and Flying Pigs Farm here in New York state.

Maybe Fergus Henderson's 'Beans and Bacon' tonight...

Don't you folks at Salon know any other superlatives? This isn't porn, nor is it sexy. What's next? War porn? Sexy politics? Do you really want people to mentally associate your cooking articles with ass-to-mouth and group rape?

On a darker note, Linda Tibbles' recent short story, "Going Whole Hog," explores the tragic dynamic of hog-byproduct foodstuffs.

http://electricstorytime.blogspot.com/2006/05/going-whole-hog.html

Sounds like a great meal, Sarah.

That cookbook is beautiful indeed, the illustrations are amazing.