Amazon, pork bellies

[thistlechaser]

It's very very rare to have your customer service experience exceed even your hopes. I have a growing number of issues with Amazon, but their customer service is not one of them.

I bought a new cooling pad/fan setup for my laptop through them, same one as my previous now-dying one. By happy chance, there was a $10 rebate on it... but only on the version with "fustration-free" packaging, not traditional packaging. Odd, but I like fustration-free packaging better anyway, so that was fine. I suspected that might become a problem when it came to the rebate, and it turned out I was right.

The rebate required the UPC code from the packaging. Fustration-free packaging = no packaging.

Last thing before bed last night, I emailed Amazon asking them if they could send me a replacement code. I suspected they wouldn't/couldn't do that and I'd have to ask firmly for a $10 refund on the price instead.

This morning I woke up to an email saying they issued me a $10 refund and apologized for the trouble. I know $10 is nothing to Amazon, but a lot of companies would dig in their heels and at least make me jump through hoops/demand the refund. It was a nice surprise that they just gave it to me.

--

Pork bellies, on the other hand, are NOT a nice surprise. I was in Trader Joe the other day, looking for food I could make during the week. Wandering the meat section, I saw a box of pork belly. The only thing I knew about it previously was that it's something they talk about on those morning farm reports in the midwest -- I was kind of surprised that it was not only a real thing, but that I was encountering it here in California.

The box made it look just like loin of pork -- mostly white (cooked) pork meat with just a tiny layer of golden fat at the top. Precooked, all you needed to do was "brown and eat". Seemed perfect, so I bought it.

When I got it home, I opened the box. Any appetite I had vanished. It was covered in a thick layer of... goo. I have no idea what it was. The more detailed version of the instructions said you had to wash that goo off. Whatever the hell it was, it stuck to my hands like nothing else. Greasy, slimy, seriously gross.

The meat under the goo looked no better. I know pictures on boxes lie, but this was like putting a picture of a roasted turkey on it when the box really contains a rock. The meat was more than 90% fat. Not just fat, it had a really gross texture? to look at. Just so disgusting.

However, it had been semi-expensive (what at Trader Joe's isn't?) so I figured I should at least try it. I cut off the least fatty part I could find (still more than 50% fat) and fried it up.

Fat is flavor, and bacon is wonderful, so how in the world did this stuff have no flavor? Gross, gross, gross. I threw most of it out, but what little I ate made me feel sick for the rest of the day.

So the lesson for today: Unless you're trading in them, avoid pork bellies.

Comments

[hamsterwoman]

Amazon's customer service has always been amazing in my experience, too. They've replaced damaged items with a minimum of fuss, offered credit without having to be asked when an order had to be canceled because something they claimed was in stock and had shipped actually wasn't and hadn't, and when we got items by accident (they sent us 4 UPS's instead of the single one we ordered), just told us to keep them. I know they have some pretty unsavory practices, and that they can afford to be so magnanimous because they're raking in money, but from a customer standpoint, it is very nice.

Pork bellies -- yeah, it's basically fried lard. Which can be tasty, actually! but not just to eat by itself, and not if you weren't expecting the fat (the texture does take getting used to; my point of reference was Ukrainian salo, which is hard, and so the weird squishiness was a turn-off at first).

It would appear I like pork belly only if it's accompanied by something savory. If you see The Chairman Truck around (they do steamed buns), they have a pretty good pork belly bun.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I had the same experiences with refunds and extra items. They sent me three smoke/fire alarms instead of one, then told me to keep the extras (I gave them away at work). Refunds were effortless, too.

I wish the box had been more honest about what it was! I found an image of it:



I'll keep my eye out for the truck! They sound good.

[voidmagus.livejournal.com]

Pork belly == bacon, essentially. There's a bit more complexity than that, but for your purposes, yes you tried to cook a huge lump of bacon after trimming the fat. Normally to cook pork belly, you wash it, dry it, and cook it however you cook bacon (not microwave). The resulting meat should be crisp on the outside, flavorful, and fatty as all hell.

I'm not a big fan of pork belly, for that reason. Lately it is kind of a hipster food thing, don't really understand why.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

But bacon has flavor and this stuff tasted like nothing. I did cook it that way (washed, dried, sliced, browned in a pan), but even the brownest, crispest parts weren't any good.

*joins you in not being a fan*

[pure-trance.livejournal.com]

Well bacon is cured, so it tastes different in that way. Maybe you should have brined the pork belly or something? Eaten it with sauce?

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Or at least have salted it. The instructions said "brown and eat" though, didn't mention seasoning it, so I had thought it would be table-ready. Even the longer instructions didn't mention that! Though how something is both "ready to eat" and yet still needs goo washed off it... maybe I should have questioned the instructions more!

[loup_noir]

Amazon's customer service has always -- Always -- been amazing. I've been a happy customer since the late 90's, back when they publicized a phone number for questions.

Never had pork belly. I don't eat much pork to begin with, and somehow the idea of pork belly is just not appetizing. Maybe it's also because of all the financial references i.e. investing in pork bellies.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

They still do! When you click the help link, it gives you the option to call, email, or live chat. Quite impressive. I had to call in once when I bought an ebook by mistake and it was painless (I like emailing better, but I didn't want any delay so they wouldn't think I had read the book).

I can't recommend that you give it a try, not based on my experience.

[postingwhore.livejournal.com]

As someone who works for a company that sells on Amazon...yeah, they favour customers a lot.

huh, I've never heard of pork bellies when referring to financial stuff. What are the expressions?

I had pork belly at a restaurant in the UK, and it was really good. It's still a pretty common food there. idk, maybe it's worth trying it in another country if you get the chance.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Pork belly is just something that farmers, um, trade in? You hear things like "Pork bellies are up" or down. Same as corn, wheat, and whatever else.

If I ever get a chance, I will!

[voidmagus.livejournal.com]

Pork Bellies

Definition of 'Pork Bellies'

A cut of pork that comes from the belly of a pig. Pork bellies were traded in the futures market, as they are important components of meat products, such as bacon. Trading in pork bellies futures began in 1961 on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME), and allowed meat packers to hedge the volatile pig market.

Investopedia explains 'Pork Bellies'

Pork bellies became the iconic commodity for the futures market's representation in popular culture, and has been mentioned in a variety of films relating to investing, such as "Trading Places". While they were a major future traded for decades, their waning popularity in trading led to the CME to halting trading in 2011.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Interesting, thanks!

Pork bellies became the iconic commodity for the futures market's representation in popular culture

Ha! Explains why I knew about it.

Edit: investopedia, just as dangerous as wiki. Click on one link, leads to three interesting new ones, each leads to more and more...

[postingwhore.livejournal.com]

I have never heard that wrt farmers! But okay :P

Glad to hear it! And if you do, I hope you'll write an entry about it!

eta: I really don't get the big deal about bacon....

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

For sure I will. :)

I love bacon because it's salty and rich!

[postingwhore.livejournal.com]

Calling bacon rich seems so strange to me, since it's just a tiny strip and there's barely anything to eat. Rich chocolate, I can understand. A rich pudding (in the BrEng sense), I can understand. But using rich to describe bacon is so weird to me, haha.

And it tastes just as salty as anything else I've ever eaten XD

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Hmm, maybe we have different kinds of bacon? I do agree that the strips are small! I'd like much, much bigger slices. :D

[postingwhore.livejournal.com]

Well, I've had bacon in both the US and UK and wasn't impressed with either. What type(s) have you had?

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Just the US/crunchy, well-cooked kind, not the UK/floppy kind.

[postingwhore.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I'm totes not a fan of crunchy bacon, haha. Although there are USAmericans who don't make their bacon crunchy, and I actually prefer this. :P I'm not a fan of British bacon, either.

[tersa.livejournal.com]

A cut of pork that comes from the belly of a pig.

^^^ This.

All pork belly is the primal that bacon comes from. As someone else said, bacon is cured, so, yeah, pork belly is not going to taste anything like bacon without some additional treatment. :) It's also not really going to taste like much because, well, pork usually doesn't taste like much. I think, deriving from the photo, the idea is that the flavor is going to come from browning the outer layer and fat contrasted with the mild meat.

But, like bacon, it is going to be very fatty. I'm not quite sure, without having a close-up look at it, how that photo could match to the contents of the box.

I got my hands on a small chunk of it a few months ago at Whole Foods and made an Asian-inspired jook out of it. Like bacon, it is very fatty, so you kind of have to know what to do with it.

As a point of interest: the colloquialism living high on the hog came from the fact that the lower parts of the pig--including the belly (pork belly)--was considered to be cheap/less desirable. It's also why you'll see so much bacon, salt pork, and/or pork belly in Southern soul food--it was the cheap cuts that poor people, especially African-Americans, could afford.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Interesting information, thanks!

I was wondering about the quality, too. The one I got wasn't just fatty (like bacon is), it was nearly all fat. I suspect getting it from a butcher instead would have been a good idea (if this hadn't been a spur of the moment thing).

Next time I'll just stick with a pork chop, I like those just fine.

[ashmedai.livejournal.com]

Amazon in Germany has excellent customer service too, I have to say. I've always been happy with it on the rare occasion there was a problem.

Ugh, sorry you had such a bad experience with meat. I've never tried pork belly, and now I'll know not to.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Same. It's rare to have a problem to begin with, but when there is one, they handle it so well. Nice to hear they're just as good in other countries!

[ani-mama.livejournal.com]

Pork belly is really popular in Korea, but I never cared much for it. Koreans usually grill it, so some of the fat is drained out. But it is still very fatty, and all the flavor comes from the dipping sauce served alongside. My sister makes a wicked kimchee stew with pork belly slices, but that stuff would probably kill you. :P

It is basically unseasoned bacon, and the best part of the bacon is the seasoning!

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

I think grilling it would be best -- smokey flavor would improve it.

Now that I think of it, it did taste just like uncured bacon I tried. Boring, like "nothing".

This whole conversation is making me want bacon. :P

[bacchuslives.livejournal.com]

I don't think I've met a pork product I didn't like, but I think you've described it...

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Yeah. I love bacon and pork, but this was just no good at all. Less than no good!

[amanuensis1.livejournal.com]

Ooh, go to a Chinese BBQ shop--not a restaurant, but one of those little deli storefronts with whole cooked ducks and a side of roasted pig hanging from the hooks and trays of pig intestine and other intimidating stuff and ask for a pound of the roast pig. They'll cut a pound piece off the pig, hack it up into pieces, and give it to you in a box with a tub of sweet sauce, and then you get to try what proper crispy-skin-on-the-meat roast pig tastes like: white, juicy, rich, and with the most astonishing crispy pork fat clinging to each piece. Way easier than cooking it yourself.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Yes! I've seen pictures of that and I'd love to try it. I must google, with our ultra-high Asian population around here, we must have a BBQ shop.

[spike7451.livejournal.com]

Glad you had a win with Amazon but sorry the pork was far from a win.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Thanks! :)