More South Australians opting for kangaroo meat over more traditional meats
THE reluctance to eat our national emblem is on the wane as more South Australians opt for kangaroo meat over more traditional cuts.
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THE reluctance to eat our national emblem is on the wane as more South Australians opt for kangaroo meat over more traditional cuts.
And the global demand for game meats, including goat, has prompted a surge in prices.
Butchers say the popularity of kangaroo and goat has been enhanced by marketing the product to new countries in the same way as beef and wine are spruiked.
The value of kangaroo increased by 90 per cent, and goat by 146 per cent, in the three years to 2015-16 — higher than any other meat values — new farm gate figures have revealed.
Macro Meats founder Ray Borda, whose company controls the largest retail distribution of wild game kangaroo in the world, said the meat was now sold as a premium product.
“It has mainly gone up in value overseas, not so much in Australia,” Mr Borda told the Sunday Mail.
“We used to previously sell kangaroo. It didn’t matter if it was a red, an eastern grey, a western grey or a euro. For whatever reason we sold it all as one.
“But it is like saying all wine is the same.”
Mr Borda said his company had a “light bulb” moment about five years ago and spent millions of dollars developing techniques to grade the meat.
The grading means kangaroo meat is sold as a premium product with specific flavours including:
PAROO (red kangaroos) — mild in flavour not unlike yearling beef.
MALLEEROO (western grey kangaroos) — a more robust, stronger game-like flavour.
MULGAROO (eastern grey kangaroos) — a flavour in the middle of the other two varieties.
“I have been doing this for 30 years and only five years ago saw the light,” Mr Borda said.
“We have the roo family, you don’t go and eat cattle, you eat beef.”
Mr Borda said Japan, Hong Kong, Scandinavia, Vietnam, Singapore and increasingly Canada had been strong consumers of Australian beef.
“We made sure every country got the flavour profile they want,” he said.
Goat meat is not being marketed so specifically but has grown immensely in popularity, according to Something Wild store manager Alice Frazer.
The butcher, in the Adelaide Central Markets, specialises in indigenous food and open range game meats including buffalo, kangaroo, camel and goat.
Ms Frazer said goat, which is best cooked slowly with low heat, is growing in popularity.
“It’s one of our very bestsellers for sure,” Ms Frazer told the Sunday Mail.
“We have quite a few restaurants come in but then a lot of every day people are substituting it for lamb and beef.”
She said goat meat had been a big export to countries including India and Pakistan.
“It’s beautiful in curries. Because it is leaner than lamb. It’s a sweet meat with a gamy flavour, like a gamy milk feed lamb,” she said.
Strathmore Hotel head chef Randall Culliver said locals and tourists loved the Aussie Fare stone grill of kangaroo, NT crocodile and Spencer Gulf prawns on his menu.
“Kangaroo meat is extremely lean, fresh and flavoursome,” he said.
“It’s best served medium rare and must be given three to four minutes to rest after being cooked.”
YOU CAN’T BEEF ABOUT THESE PRICES
VETERAN butcher Tony O’Connell has seen plenty of meat trends come and go.
But he says South Australian families can currently get the best deals on meat he has seen in his 45 years as a butcher.
“Over the past 12 to 18 months, the price of beef has gone up quite a bit and it gets to a stage of buyer resistance,” said Mr O’Connell, owner of O’Connell’s Meats, in the Adelaide Central Market.
“People will not pay over and above a certain price. But what happens is that they keep killing the beasts and they get a backlog of them.”
Mr O’Connell said the backlog has led to a reduction in costs that can then be passed on to consumers.
“We’re now getting some really good buys in beef,” he said.
Mr O’Connell said people were used to paying cheap prices for pork and chicken but beef prices were now among the lowest he could remember.
One-hundred day aged beef, for example, is currently selling for less than $20kg — down from what would normally be $60kg to $70kg.
“We would never sell that normally but (at that price) it is walking out the door,” he said.
Mr O’Connell’s comments are supported by latest farm gate figures for South Australia.
The figures show that, in the three years to 2015-16, the value of beef went up by 60 per cent.
During the same period, pig meat rose by 30 per cent, chicken by just 3.5 per cent and lamb by 2.76 per cent.
- Matt smith