Source: Lisa M. Keefe, MEATINGPLACE, 5/12/15

In his just-published book, “Pig Tales: An Omnivore’s Quest for Sustainable Meat,” James Beard Award-winning writer Barry Estabrook puts the pork supply chain under a microscope, yielding what is being promoted as “an eye-opening investigation of the commercial pork industry and an inspiring alternative to the way pigs are raised and consumed in America,” according to a news release about the volume.

The book draws on Estabrook’s own experiences raising pigs, as well as research into both conventional hog operations (he visited Smithfield and Tyson) and small farms that raise free-range heritage pigs raised on antibiotic-free diets.

Estabrook asserts that hogs are “too often subjected to lives of suffering in confinement and squalor, sustained on a drug-laced diet just long enough to reach slaughter weight, then killed on a mechanized disassembly lines,” according to promotional materials distributed to promote the book.

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