So I was shopping the other day……

I often stop at The Healthy Buffalo to pick up venison and buffalo, but I thought I would check out what the local grocery store had for healthy meats. I found a great selection of wild caught seafood at Market Basket. It was there that I found a new label. I was perusing the meat isle trying to find if they had free range beef.

I found a fascinating label instead. It read “Only Vegetarian Fed”.

This label was on a package of beef, and the label proudly proclaimed the benefits of (and charging extra for) making sure this cow was only fed vegetables.

Is this some incredible new development? Are we heralding the dawn of better beef?

Not so much.

This product was what food companies used to (and some still do) call “corn fed beef”, which was supposed to be the best possible beef on the planet. Richly marbled, tender and flavorful.

Here’s the rub – cows don’t eat corn, or at least they weren’t designed to eat corn.

Cows are herbivores – grass eaters, and when you feed them corn, all sorts of nasty things happen. As in – corn makes cows sick.

And that is turning out to be a bit of a PR problem for beef growers, at least in some circles.

Documentaries such as “Food, Inc.”, and books such as Michael Pollans “In Defense of Food” have revealed the costs – to the environment, the farmer, and the consumer – of feeding cattle an unnatural diet.

As vegetarian diets grows in popularity (not with me, but with many), it is only logical that we start seeing labels such as “Only Vegetarian Fed” start popping up.

While it may seem like a small thing to some, there is a big difference between “Only Vegetarian Fed” and “Grass Fed” beef.

Vegetarian fed beef is not the same as grass fed. Corn and Soy are vegetarian feeds, and very common in most beef production. Most organic and natural beef are finished with grain, so it’s important not to confuse these two types with grass fed.

In fact for a product to say grass fed it has to meet specific criteria.

Grass fed beef definition (USDA): grass and/or forage shall be the feed source consumed for the lifetime of the ruminant animal, with the exception of milk consumed prior to weaning. The diet shall be derived solely from forage and animals cannot be fed grain or grain by-products and must have continuous access to pasture during the growing season.

So what’s the big whoop, why is grass fed a better beef?

• Less calories: A 6oz steak from a grass fed cow has almost 100 fewer calories than a 6oz steak from grain fed cattle.
• More healthy EFA’s: Science suggests that people with a diet that has an Omega 6 to Omega 3 ratio of over 4:1 have more health problems. Grain fed beef can have ratios that exceed 20:1, while grass fed is around 3:1.
• More CLA: Conjugated Lineolic Acid is thought to be a potent cancer fighter.
• More Vitamins A & E: Up to 400% more then grain fed.

Pretty powerful reasons to get some grass fed in your diet.

Getting back to the labels, there were three I noticed that day.

• The regular label without any special considerations.
• A label that said no antibiotics or growth hormones – better than the first, but still corn and soy fed, and more expensive.
• Finally the most expensive label said no antibiotics, no growth hormones, and only vegetarian fed.

Here’s my ideal label (which doesn’t exist yet):

No antibiotics, no growth hormones, and grass fed

Maybe someday…

Is grass fed more expensive? No doubt about it, pound for pound off the shelf it is.

But don’t be “all or nothing”. Start by using grass fed for one meal a week, and build from there. Realistically most of us eat too much beef (and too many calories) anyway, so if the cost considerations cause us to cut back a little, that’s probably not a bad thing.

Here’s to reading (and understanding labels) and making better choices everyday!

Coach Nancy