Amid the worst economic environment in the country's history, Venezuelans in one city are knowingly buying spoiled meat because there's not enough electricity to keep their refrigerators working.

At bargain prices, residents of Maracaibo are risking their lives for the protein they need. The nine months of rolling blackouts the country has experienced have only grown worse.

“It smells a little foul, but you rinse it with a little vinegar and lemon,” Yeudis Luna, a father of three young boys, told the Associated Press on Thursday.

He added: “I was afraid that they would get sick because they are small. But only the little one got diarrhea and threw up.”

The power problem has left refrigerators of little use and forced at least four butcher shops to start selling spoiled meat in the city’s central market, Las Pulgas. Some buy the meat to feed to their dogs -- while others feed it to their families.

“Of course they eat the meat -- thanks to [President Nikolas] Maduro,” butcher Johel Prieto said. “The food of the poor is rotten food.”

Luna took about two pounds of spoiled meat home, even though he knew it was bad. He told the Associated Press his wife already left him and their three sons for Colombia because she couldn’t stand the hunger.

Luna said he rinsed the rotten meat in water and let it soak overnight in vinegar before squeezing lemons on it, cooking it with tomatoes and an onion and serving it to his children.

Maracaibo was once called the Saudi Arabia of Venezuela. The sprawling port city lays on the banks of a vast lake that once served as a hub of Venezuela’s oil production. The city was clean and bustling with international restaurants.

Now, the businesses that once made Maracaibo a shining city have fallen into ruin.

The blackouts have plagued residents for nearly the entire year and things turned dire in early August when a fire destroyed a power line supplying electricity to the city of 1.5 million people.

Relief has yet to come despite assurances from Omar Prieto, the governor of Zulia state where Maracaibo is located, the line was being repaired.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.