Ethical rose veal at Windmill Hill City Farm

Windmill Hill City Farm are supporting ethical veal farming by selling their own rose veal on site on Tuesday and Wednesday.

There will be live cooking demonstrations and farm manager Tim Child will be on hand to answer any questions.

Rose veal gets its name from the pink colour of the meat, which is thanks to ethical farming practices – meaning calves are bred free-range and on a natural diet.

Tim says: “Rose veal is bred naturally. They’re on milk for three months, then on natural diet. They can go outside and we get them out on the fields as well when they’re old enough. We take them up to just about eight months old – it’s very different than continental veal.”

White veal farming, which remains widespread on the continent, is considered to be a cruel practice by many. Crate–farming was banned in the EU in 2007, however there is still serious concern over white veal farming, which puts calves on a restricted low-iron diet to keep their meat white, causing the calves to suffer from anaemia and leaving them feeling weak and unwell.

Because of this, many people choose to avoid veal altogether despite ethical options like rose veal being available.

Sadly, this has led to a trend of male dairy cows being shot at birth because they have low commercial value. According to Compassion in World Farming (CiWF), around 100,000 male dairy cows are shot every year.

“We’re trying to use the by-product of the dairy industry,” says Tim. “The male bull cows, which there’s not a lot of call for, a lot of them get shot at a couple of days old.”

The farming of rose veal is supported by RSCPA and CiWF, who for the past few years have been pushing efforts to get mainstream supermarkets selling rose veal in their stores.

By encouraging consumers to consider veal as popular meat option again, they hope to reduce the amount of male dairy cows being killed or exported to countries with lower welfare regulations for farm animals.  

Tim adds: “It’s about getting people to understand what rose veal is. It’s basically just young beef. It’s like eating young lamb or pork. There are so many young dairy cows being shot and going to waste. If we can get more of it on the menu out there, we can get more people to understand what it is and get past that first word they hear, which is ‘veal’, and shutting down.”

Among the customers at Windmill Hill City Farm on Tuesday afternoon was local restauranteur Sam Fryer, who part-owns Rosemarino. He tells us that rose veal can be used as a tasty and cruelty-free alternative to traditional veal, and is there to collect some veal shins for classic Milanese dish, osso buco which will be on the menu this week.

Rose veal will be available from Windmill Hill City Farm on Wednesday, January 28 from 10am – 3pm.