Japan's Wagyu Export Ban Has Supplies Dwinding in U.S.

After cows tested positive for foot-and-mouth disease last week in Japan, the country put a halt to exports of Wagyu, the famous cattle breed that's raised according to strict traditions and yields exceptional marbling, delicate texture, and high prices. With no end in sight, chefs are running out of their precious meat. "Everyone that buys from us has called up and said, 'How much do you have left, lock it up for me?' " George Faison, chief operating officer at De-Bragga & Spitler, a meat supplier in the Meatpacking District, tells the Wall Street Journal. "We only have 500 pounds left." Very troubling, Japan! How are Americans supposed to extravagantly blow hundreds of dollars on a steak (or $81 on a burger) now?

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By John Del Signore in Food on April 27, 2010 2:05 PM

Comments [rss]

Kojak

FUCK!

I need my Kobe Steak burger NOW. We'll have to smuggle em through Cuba along with my Cigars

ozik

So these businesses are running to buy meat that might be diseased?

Politburo

Foot and mouth is not BSE (aka "mad cow").

The disease doesn't affect humans.

schadenfreudian mensch

I'd say just because you have money def doesn't mean you're smart. Please let them have all that disease riddle meat. The less time they're on this planet the better.

FelixtheCat & Christine Quinn'

+1

ozik

I want me some riddle meat:

"Hi hamburger!" (in an Adam West voice)

"Hi Ozik, riddle me this: What disease has clowns as a symptom?"

"Oh hamburger, that's a tough one but not too tough for me. The Plague is the answer to your damnable riddle, because it has buboes as a symptom. I must say, riddle hamburger, pairing 'buboes' with 'Bozos' is a stretch. You'd have been better to use hobbits and 'Bilbos'"

"Darn you Ozik, darn you to hell"