Cheerio Cheerio?

enry, aged two, and his mother visited Wellington’s Gipps Street Butchery recently. They left with half a kilo of rump steak and five sausages, as well as something they hadn’t paid for: a cheerio. The bright red cocktail sausage was the butcher’s gift to Henry, part of an old New Zealand tradition. His parents were surprised. Both in their mid-30s, they remembered the free cheerios of their own reported that “It’s cheerio to the free sav”, after Canterbury Medical Officer of Health Ramon Pink warned that over-the-counter cheerios could be the cause of a stomach bug and advised that they be warmed through first. But here it was, held tightly in Henry’s little hand. The cheerio had survived, or had it? decided to investigate, and spoke to a handful of butchers around the country about their policy on the free cheerio.