Your own beef-how'd it taste? UPDATE post 139

[HighFlyinBey1]

[QUOTE=PhoenixFarm;7704476]
I don’t like fatty meats. Sorry. I prefer chicken breasts to thighs, grass fed to grain fed beef, and usually don’t eat pork or lamb, cuz it’s too fatty.

I leave all fat possible on my plate, and prefer my meat as lean as possible.[/QUOTE]
I couldn’t agree more! From the time I could hold an implement in my hand, I’ve been dissecting fatty and gristly bits from my meat. I don’t eat sausage because I can see the horrible bits of connective tissue and other vomitous, nasty, chewy fat, gristle, or bone. And I DO mean vomitous :disgust:

OP, good luck with your beef!

[Bluey]

[QUOTE=PaintPony;7704520]
It happens EVERY time without fail. I have seen this argument on the boards more times then I can count! Still beating the proverbial dead cow…[/QUOTE]

You know, if I need to know what to do with my new, say, pet snake and start a thread, I would be thanking those that know about snakes for whatever they have to say, not disagree with them all over and call them names.

There is no argument to be had, beef is what it is.
You can google it and read it yourself, or you can ask and then be glad some do tell you what they know about it.

If that doesn’t agree with what you thought you knew, at least now you know there is more to all that than you knew and can take out of it what you need.

Getting offended because it doesn’t fit with your idea of owning and caring for that snake?
That is not the fault of the one that has had snakes for years and is telling you how you may go about caring for them.

[TBROCKS]

[QUOTE=Bluey;7702699]
What do you mean by that comment?

Anyone may raise any animal cruelly, if grass or grain finished.
Most producers don’t, because if they do, not only is that very wrong, the animals don’t do well for them, of course.

You may want to explain that comment a bit?
It is a little insulting to all those of us that try so hard to do the best for our animals, no matter what species they may be.[/QUOTE]

My thank you to you, Bluey, earned me this. Post #44 if you need to refresh your memory. Hardly a warm way to acknowledge someone’s gratitude.

[CrazyGuineaPigLady]

[QUOTE=TBROCKS;7704536]
All I wanted to know was if home grown grass-fed beef tastes good [/QUOTE]

I vote yes but notice a bigger difference with poultry. :lol:

[QUOTE=Bluey;7704618]You know, if I need to know what to do with my new, say, pet snake and start a thread, I would be thanking those that know about snakes for whatever they have to say, not disagree with them all over and call them names.

There is no argument to be had, beef is what it is.
You can google it and read it yourself, or you can ask and then be glad some do tell you what they know about it.

If that doesn’t agree with what you thought you knew, at least now you know there is more to all that than you knew and can take out of it what you need.

Getting offended because it doesn’t fit with your idea of owning and caring for that snake?
That is not the fault of the one that has had snakes for years and is telling you how you may go about caring for them.[/QUOTE]

The problem is you don’t know (or care) about the principles behind naturally fed, naturally raised meat and how it can be done in the best interest of the animals AND humans.

For some of us, this goes beyond beef is beef and a chicken is just a chicken so who cares what happens before it lands on our plate. Maybe if you showed a little respect to those that have a different set of beliefs or life experience, people would be more willing to hear what you have to say. Just a thought!

Also, the majority of the population will tell you that Guinea Pigs (or snakes or hamsters or turtles) only need this, this and this to survive. I know better and wish better for them so I don’t always believe the internet person beating their chest the loudest to distract everyone from the original question. Something else for you to ponder.

[Bluey]

[QUOTE=CrazyGuineaPigLady;7704713]
I vote yes but notice a bigger difference with poultry. :lol:

The problem is you don’t know (or care) about the principles behind naturally fed, naturally raised meat and how it can be done in the best interest of the animals AND humans.

For some of us, this goes beyond beef is beef and a chicken is just a chicken so who cares what happens before it lands on our plate. Maybe if you showed a little respect to those that have a different set of beliefs or life experience, people would be more willing to hear what you have to say. Just a thought!

Also, the majority of the population will tell you that Guinea Pigs (or snakes or hamsters or turtles) only need this, this and this to survive. I know better and wish better for them so I don’t always believe the internet person beating their chest the loudest to distract everyone from the original question. Something else for you to ponder.[/QUOTE]

That is offensive, when you automatically are assuming that I bolded.
You could not be further from the truth there.

Slaughtering directly off grass gives the consumer a different product that is not as good eating quality for what most people like.
Many taste tests have proven that, human palate being what it is.
You have to cook grass fed beef differently and even then some just will never be very good, when we are talking about the better cuts of meat.
Now, for those that we cook to death or ground, yes, most any will be fine, just spice and add to it to make it so.

You also run into a larger carbon foot print, when you miss all those extra weeks of tremendous gains on a grain ration in those individuals slaughtered directly off grass, some studies average that to a 1/3 difference.
That means you have to raise and kill up to 1/3 more animals for the same amount of meat.
Where is that so good and caring for the animals?
I think it is better to be more efficient, if we have to raise and kill for our needs, to do so with the least numbers we can do so with and with beef, that is raising them on grass as we do now and then the suitable ones being finished on grain or other such rations.

Now, there are some situations where slaughtering off grass makes sense, like with grain supplementation, as the OP is going to do.
Yes, that will be very expensive, she probably could have bought considerably more meat she will get from the animals she raises and feeds, if kept a record of all that went into getting them in the freezer.
That is why not many try to do it that way, why we have CAFOs, that are the most efficient way to handle fattening the cattle those last few months.

Another place grass fed works is if you have some other, like acorns in the fall, or corn residue in some harvested fields, etc.

Now, to say that doesn’t mean I dismiss other methods, not at all, I am explaining all the different ways and whys and what is myths, like saying cattle are abused if not grass fed only, etc.

Since this goes against what some believe, they take offense, not that I am explaining this, but that they still want to keep believing their myths.
I understand that and hope that eventually, some will come around and see that there is more to all we do in life than following trends with little information, or misleading information, as is happening in agriculture.

It is going to take all that want to raise food, soon we will have too many people chasing after finite reserves of all kinds, food included.
If some like to raise a few steers at home, why not?
But understand all what is involved and do it for the right reasons.
No need to bash those that are raising beef commercially, to feel better about our choices, especially when we use myths to do so, following certain agenda’s propaganda.

[Bluey]

I wanted to add, all this may be moot question in some more decades, as we are getting very close to be able to manipulate matter at the molecular level.

That means our resources will be so much more flexible, we can have a steak already cook the way we want, if that is what we desire, just by programming that into a magic box, that with most anything for input will give us just that.

Of course, food for sustenance will then maybe not even need to look like anything.
A brown blob for most days quick pick-me-up, made to complement what our body needs exactly, that may be all we care to eat.
Unless for special occasions, where the meal itself may be center stage.

We are all evolving still, no telling where we will be in the future, but as of today, we have our current best mousetrap, to have enough for all, in the systems we have and are continuously tweaking.
In those, grass fed fits fine, for those that want to try it or happen to prefer it, but it is not what can give us the volume we need to fill current needs for that kind of high quality protein.

Read the already posted links explaining all that better than I can, the Copper report power point is a simple, clear way that is laid out.

[Bluey]

[QUOTE=TBROCKS;7704707]
My thank you to you, Bluey, earned me this. Post #44 if you need to refresh your memory. Hardly a warm way to acknowledge someone’s gratitude.[/QUOTE]

Hold your horses, I was responding to this, saying that others raise cattle cruelly and stressed:

—"Originally Posted by TBROCKS

Thank you for saying this and thanks for the link. I have gotten away from wanting to eat meat from animals forced to live in cruelty and stressed.

We’ve decided to go with corn and molasses to flavor the meat. No arguments from the cows, they seem to love it. C & M is what the meat processor suggested and his company is very well-respected. He said there’s lots of different formulations to finish beef, none of them are wrong, but the corn and molasses was the simplest thing for us to do, since we know pretty much nil about it.

I’m glad our cows will not need to go and be stressed out in a feed lot somewhere. They’ll stay on our farm until he comes out to slaughter them on the property. Hopefully it will be pretty peaceful for them. I haven’t decided if I want to be there or not."—

Not exactly a thank you post that, I would say.
But if you say that is what you meant, you are welcome.

[TBROCKS]

UGH, please stop. I’m begging you.

[Bluey]

[QUOTE=TBROCKS;7704822]
UGH, please stop. I’m begging you.[/QUOTE]

Ok.

Just think, if you are, say, a doctor and someone in a forum ask about something you are doing and has some misconceptions and you explain why you do what you do.
Then everyone jumps in to tell you you are wrong and why, not that they know at all what they are talking about, well, you too would try to keep explaining, I think.

[CrazyGuineaPigLady]

@Bluey;7704754

Slaughtering directly off grass gives the consumer a different product that is not as good eating quality for what most people like.

Apparently you missed that most people on this thread prefer it and an even larger number have concerns about eating feedlot cattle. Not sure where your info is coming from.

TBROCKS, I’m not in a position to raise my own anything but would love to hear more about these cows and how they end up tasting. Do they have names? :lol:

[LauraKY]

[QUOTE=Bluey;7704823]
Ok.

Just think, if you are, say, a doctor and someone in a forum ask about something you are doing and has some misconceptions and you explain why you do what you do.
Then everyone jumps in to tell you you are wrong and why, not that they know at all what they are talking about, well, you too would try to keep explaining, I think.[/QUOTE]

But you’re not comparable to a doctor, unless you have a PhD in agricultural science. You’re more like a horse/barn owner compared to a vet. You have first hand experience and a limited point of view. I might take your advice, but certainly not over that of a vet or an equine nutritionist.

CGPL, Louise from next door was delicious. Black Angus, grass fed.

[TBROCKS]

CGPL I initially SWORE I would not name them, but for purposes of differentiating, I had to start calling them something, so their names are Brownie and Blackie.
I will definitely post an update after the meat is home!

[Simkie]

Bluey thinks we’re all stupid idiots and we think she’s willfully ignorant. We will certainly have to agree to disagree, but this is TOTALLY what’s wrong with the meat industry in this country. Excellent example of the problem. Cattlemen don’t even believe sub-theraputic antibiotics kill microbes. How on earth can you reason with that?

TBROCKS, I am looking forward to hearing about your beef

[LauraKY]

@Simkie;7705134

Bluey thinks we’re all stupid idiots and we think she’s willfully ignorant. We will certainly have to agree to disagree, but this is TOTALLY what’s wrong with the meat industry in this country. Excellent example of the problem. Cattlemen don’t even believe sub-theraputic antibiotics kill microbes. How on earth can you reason with that?

They don’t kill them all…which is the problem. That which doesn’t kill them only makes them stronger, so to speak.

[cnvh]

having not read all 6 pages of this thread, all I can say with regards to the grass-fed issue is this: my folks have a small herd of beef cattle (Dexter cross, mostly). Their cows eat nothing but grass in their field and hay baled on-site; I don’t think any of them have ever eaten so much as a handful of grain. We slaughter and process them on-site as well, and every one gets quartered and hung in our walk-in cooler to dry age for about 2 weeks before steaks are cut. (Burger gets ground much sooner.)

If you’re not going to age grass-fed beef before you process it, I can see where it might not taste as good as grain-finished, but our (dry-aged) beef is always plenty marbled and very, VERY flavorful.

[rustbreeches]

We slaughter all our own meat, and every bovine gets the dry cow ration. The few times I’ve had grass fed/finished beef, I was not super impressed. And breed makes a huge difference to the finished product. We occasionally eat a free martin Holstein heifer, but we try and keep a couple Brown Swiss or Ayrshire bull calves every year to steer and fatten. Holstein meat needs to be handled delicately, it gets tough if you mess with it too much, shaping patties etc. The best we’ve ever eaten was Brown Swiss, his name was Lou Cocoa, but the Ayrshire, Red, this year hasn’t been too shabby.

If you like grass finished, great, if not, switch to grain next time. Seems simple to me. We lack the luxury of available irrigated pasture here on our place. Of course, I will argue until I am blue in the face that hogs finished on milk and corn are the best things on earth!

[poltroon]

Back to OP.

I’ve done grass finished beef from a couple of local producers. I’ve never been unhappy, but they all come out tasting a little different. My favorite source is:

http://avedanosmeat.blogspot.com/2013/08/meet-magruder-ranch.html

To say that they have to be finished on grain to taste good is I think an outdated way of thinking. However, I think also that there is an art to really great grass-finished beef, to really take advantage of the grass, and also to get it to a quality processor and get it properly aged. Having great grass is good too.

The grass finished beef is going to have a different flavor, and you’ll want to cook it a little less. It also has a better nutritional profile, because fresh grass is full of Omega-3 fatty acids, while grain rations are not.

The aging is a big part of it and if your processor cannot do it, you can do some wet aging in your refrigerator as you go.

Good luck with your beef!

[BITSA]

I prefer a corn or grain finished steer, I also ask that the steer be but he’d at its home so it doesn’t know what’s coming, like at the feedlot, less tension means better meat IMHO.

[Bluey]

[QUOTE=LauraKY;7704914]
But you’re not comparable to a doctor, unless you have a PhD in agricultural science. You’re more like a horse/barn owner compared to a vet. You have first hand experience and a limited point of view. I might take your advice, but certainly not over that of a vet or an equine nutritionist.

CGPL, Louise from next door was delicious. Black Angus, grass fed.[/QUOTE]

Really, doctors are the ones that know the most in the health fields of their specialties, but even they will defer to those of other fields, doctors or not, that are working in those, because they realize that is not where they are sufficiently conversant.

Yes, someone with a degree in feedlot management, a veterinary or nutritionist degree will know much more than I do.
That doesn’t mean that, after 40+ years working with those people and their protocols, taking multiple courses and seminars over many years in this field and others, conducting studies they design and being the one hands on taking care, feeding, treating when sick, necropsying and sending samples to the lab, that doesn’t mean that what I know is not sufficient to have somewhat of an educated opinion in this one field.

[QUOTE=Simkie;7705134]Bluey thinks we’re all stupid idiots and we think she’s willfully ignorant. We will certainly have to agree to disagree, but this is TOTALLY what’s wrong with the meat industry in this country. Excellent example of the problem. Cattlemen don’t even believe sub-theraputic antibiotics kill microbes. How on earth can you reason with that?

TBROCKS, I am looking forward to hearing about your beef :)[/QUOTE]

I think that the general public doesn’t realize that there is more to taking care of cattle than looking at them out the window of a pickup in the pastures or while driving down the bunk line in a feedlot, or whatever they think taking care of cattle is day in day out.

There are many colleges offering ranch and feedlot management courses, there are continuous education courses, there are seminars in different areas of the country regularly, geared to different sections of the cattle industry, from hands on to management and there are industry programs of all kinds helping cover all kinds of topics.

This email is one of those many that show up regularly in my inbox, a seminar geared for feedlot employees, the ones directly taking care of the cattle, the cowboys:

https://www.regonline.com/builder/site/tab1.aspx?EventID=1544956

Those are well attended, ranches and feedlots keep sending their employees to those seminars, is how everyone learns what is new and what is changing, like the BQA, Beef Quality Assurance program, started in 1985, that has certified premises and individuals, from ranches to cowboys to truckers, with seminars and on line courses.

Yes, there is much that can be improved in anything we do, some because we are learning how to better, some with newer technologies and some of that has always been the problem of antibiotic resistance, that is by far not new.

BUT, antibiotic resistance needs to be put into perspective, all have those to use and they have saved many lives, human and animal and yes, eventually there is resistance to some of them, it is the nature of the beast.
What we need to keep tweaking is HOW we use the antibiotics so as to minimize the reality that there will eventually be more resistant bacteria to them.

THAT debate, that we all already make prudent use of antibiotics and what is that, where to draw lines, which products are the ones that are important to the general health of humans and animals, which ones we can use more freely, that is an ongoing discussion.

The more is learned, the better everyone is at making those decisions.
Everyone that uses antibiotics is aware of this, regulators are regulating with this in mind, the nature of bacteria is that this will always be a battle between antibiotics and them, is what we have to work with and we do.

I was asked to quit posting, but I hope the OP excuses that I did answer this one more time.

For those that don’t like links, the seminar content:

TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 9

8:00 – 10:00 Registration
10:00 –12:00

Management of newly received cattle - Dr. Dan Thomson
Pre-shipment factors that affect calf morbidity
Receiving new cattle
Processing protocols for new cattle
Metphylaxis programs for new cattle
Update on castration and dehorning techniques
Other topics associated with the first 48 hours at the feedyard
12:00 - 1:00 Lunch
1:00 –3:00

Low-stress cattle handling - Dr. Tom Noffsinger
How does stress affect cattle performance, health and quality?
What low stress practices are available and how does implementing these into your operation raise cattle quality, employee performance and overall profitability?
Understanding cattle behavior and facility design
3:00 –3:30 Break in booth area
3:30 –5:00

Managing high risk calves the first 45 days on feed - Dr. Dan Thomson and Dr. Tom Noffsinger
Pen riding techniques
Managing bred heifers
Pen size and bunk space decisions
Receiving calf nutrition and health programs
5:30 –7:00 Network Reception

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 10

7:00 – 7:30 Continental breakfast
7:30 – 9:30

Antibiotic and therapy decisions for sick cattle - Dr. Mike Apley
Developing clinical definitions for the feedyard
Understanding antibiotics used in beef cattle operations
Developing therapy programs for feeder cattle
How do you measure treatment success?
9:30 – 10:00 Break in booth area
10:00 – 12:00

Management of recovering cattle - Dr. Dan Thomson
Hospital pen management
Humane Euthanasia
Necropsy techniques and findings
Submitting samples to the diagnostic laboratory

12:00 – 1:00 Lunch
1:00 –3:00

Discussion of contemporary issues in feedyards and future implications - Dr. Dan Thomson and Dr. Mike Apley
Current issues in animal welfare
Current issues in food safety
Current issues in antibiotic usage
Current issues with feed grade antibiotics
Current issues with growth promoting agents
3:00 Adjourn

[LauraKY]

@Bluey;7705483

Really, doctors are the ones that know the most in the health fields of their specialties, but even they will defer to those of other fields, doctors or not, that are working in those, because they realize that is not where they are sufficiently conversant.

Sure they take advice from those outside the fields of their specialty, but they don’t take it from a hospital tech/nursing assitant who reads industry magazines in their spare time. That’s the appropriate analogy in this situation.