All things grass-fed beef, from grazing practices to farm stories to news.
Grass Finished Means Really, Truly Grass Fed Grass finished beef is beef from cows that have only ever eaten grass. The finishing period of a cow’s life is the final stage, at which point it may still be growing its frame a bit but is mostly gaining muscle and fat. For conventionally raised beef cows,...
Look for the Grass Fed Label Whole Foods carefully cultivates an impression that it is a responsible company, with an interest in the environment, treating its employees well, and providing healthy food. It would make sense to assume that the beef it sells is grass fed. But the truth is not so simple. While Whole...
Website Epicurious recently announced that it will no longer be publishing recipes featuring beef. The statement itself is so milquetoast that, despite my best efforts, I have not been able to summon much in the way of righteous indignation. But I am concerned about the ignorance it represents. The exclusive justification for the move is environmental. In...
The Basics of Grass Fed Steak There’s an idea floating around that grass fed beef is fundamentally different from grain fed. And it’s true that well raised grass-fed beef does taste better and is more nutritious. But it is still beef, and there doesn’t need to be any mystery about how to cook it. Prime...
By Garth Brown An early but strong contender for the craziest ag story of the year comes from Washington state, where Easterday ranch has been accused of inventing 200,000 cows out of thin air and billing Mega-packer Tyson for them. It’s now in the process of coming apart, with bankruptcy, shady land sales, and a...
By Garth Brown Over the past couple years the company Beyond Meat, maker of fake burgers and sausage, has managed to attract the sort of breathless, credulous coverage that’s usually reserved for tech startups and royal marriages. The spin is always that if enough people simply decide to replace meat with a combination of ground...
By Garth Brown As a child I loved looking at pictures of Rube Goldberg machines. In case you’re unfamiliar with the concept, these are fanciful mechanisms that accomplish a simple task in a ridiculously complicated manner. So in a typical instance an alarm clock vibrates a ball off a table, which spins a wheel, which knocks over a...
By Garth Brown Can you guess what Panorama Grass-Fed Meats, Niman Ranch, Coleman Natural, Sonoma Red and now Pasturebird have in common? Given their names it would be natural to assume they’re all plucky upstarts trying to provide an alternative to industrial agriculture, and some of them were precisely this at one point. But what...
By Edmund Brown Two weeks ago I mentioned rotational grazing. I thought this week perhaps it would be interesting to show all the hardware I use to keep the cows on fresh grass every day. First, a quick summary of the manifold reasons that rotational grazing is a worthwhile practice. Grasses and ruminants co-evolved to...
By Garth Brown An excellent article in The Counter examines the conflict over whether grazing cattle could decrease fires on western rangelands. Proponents say cows could help by removing excess cheatgrass, which is a significant fuel for the fires. Opponents counter that this may be true in the short term, but that in the long run the impact...