The other day when I was trying to figure out if alligator counted as red meat or not (curiosity, I don’t eat it in significant enough quantity to bother worrying about) it suddenly occurred to me–is what we call “red meat” from a health perspective simply meat from mammals?
Red meat: Cow, Pig, Buffalo, Rabbit, Goat, etc.?
Not Red Meat: Seafood, Chicken, Turkey, Reptiles, etc. ?
It’s not terribly well-defined outside of lists, which still don’t get to the heart of the matter.
The American Meat Science Association defines “meat” as “skeletal muscle and associated tissues derived from animals of all types (mammals and others) for human consumption. Red meat is defined as all forms of beef, pork, lamb, veal, goat, and non-bird game (e.g. venison, bison, elk).
I would assume there’s some characteristic fatty acid profile and myoglobin content difference between red and non-red meat, but I can’t find a definition anywhere.