SHOPPERS buying supermarket gourmet salami may be treating themselves to a taste of horse meat, the Food Standards Agency revealed yesterday.

The agency has ordered a nationwide survey of cold meats, including salami, chorizo and pastrami, after it found horse meat in pre-packed salami sold by Safeway in Durham and by a wholesalers in Leeds.

Safeway’s salami was sold under the label L’Artibon and horse meat was found in two ranges — a 200g pack of Peppered Salami and a 250g pack of Cervelat Salami, both priced at £2.25. Horse was also found in pre-packed Italian wild boar salami under the brand name Bernardi Gastone, distributed by the Leeds branch of the Alivini wholesale firm, which supplies many delicatessens and restaurants across Britain.

Samples of cold meat are now to be collected from supermarkets, delicatessens, catering companies and wholesalers nationwide to find out the scale of the problem.

It is not illegal or unsafe to eat horse or donkey, but they must be identified on the label. Rosemary Hignett, the agency’s head of labelling, said she was concerned that people could be eating them unwittingly. “It is important that people know what they are eating and can make an informed choice about whether or not they want to eat it,” she said.

The agency move has outraged Safeway, whose spokeswoman insisted that while horse was found in initial testing by Durham trading standards, later tests were negative.

She said: “There were no traces of horse in the second tests and the products are still on sale in stores nationwide.”

Steve Bridgeman, a director of Alvini, said: “We are shocked because this is not supposed to be horse and we are fully aware of the attitude of the British people to horses. We have contacted the firm and they were unhappy, too. They think the salami could only have been contaminated by a dirty knife. Horse and donkey meat fetch premium prices and should have not got anywhere near this lower- value product.”

But does it taste any good?

L’Artibon’s Pepper Salami is described on its wrapping as an authentic dry-cured salami sausage made to an “exclusive recipe” containing “not less than 100 per cent meat”. The listed ingredients include pork and three E-numbers, but not horse or donkey, and how something that is “not less than 100 per cent meat” can also contain fat, salt, milk powder, sugar, dextrose, and spices is explained with the note: “100g of product prepared from 125g of meat.”

That does not make for a very high-class salami, but the chief objection is not so much the meat as its dense pepper covering, which tastes of nothing at all and leaves a lingering burn in the mouth.

L’Artibon’s Cervalat Salami is billed as “mildly flavoured” and “ideal for pizza toppings or as a snack”. The ingredient list is identical to that for the Pepper Salami, without the pepper. The sausages look identical in cross-section, too, save for the Pepper Salami’s pebbledash coating. Not as offensive as the peppered version, but people who willingly snack on this must be food manufacturers’ best friends — Robin Young

Explore UK News

• Crime News

• Education News

• Health News

• Science News

• Scotland News

Times Recommends

• An officer and a gentle woman
• Dame Helen Mirren is worthy of the Epidaurus
• Foods that can help to prevent swine flu