"Since you brought up the morality of eating meat, I have a question for you: If eating cows is such an abhorrant thing, why in the world would a compassionate and all-powerful God make steaks taste so damned good and good born-again Christians such as Bush the First hate broccoli so much? "

The taboo on eating cows is a hinduism:
"No Beef Please!
Since the cow is thought to be God's useful gift to mankind, consuming beef or veal is considered sacrilegious for Hindus. Selling beef is banned in many Indian cities, and few Hindus would be ready to even taste cattle meat, for socio-cultural reasons."
...
"Brahmins & Beef
Hinduism and Islam: A Comparative Study, however, says that the cow used to be slaughtered by the ancient Hindus for beef as well as sacrifice. "There are clear evidences in the Rig Veda, the most sacred Hindu scripture, that the cow used to be sacrificed by Hindus for religious purposes." Gandhi in his Hindu Dharma writes about "a sentence in our Sanskrit text-book to the effect that Brahmins of old used to eat beef". "

"Bhishma said:

No sacrifice can be performed without the aid of curds and
ghee (clarified butter). The very character of sacrifice which
sacrifices have, depends upon ghee. Hence ghee (or, the
cow from which it is produced) is regarded as the very root of sacrifice."
http://www.hinduism.co.za/cowsare.htm

I would guess that the prohibition on eating beef was a policy evolved by priest/bureaucrats to keep the peasants from eating all the cows during the various famines- and destroy sacred material needed for rituals. That cows are sacred source of milk/cream but everything about a cow is sacred which includes eating them. Or another way of saying this is cows were so valuable and essential that eating them is like eating your seed stock. But if prosperous in terms of having plenty of food available then eating them would be not only ok, but "blessed":)