Re: OT Speaking of butchering.....and heart problems

Posted by jackinok on December 07, 2011 at 10:50:26 from (162.58.82.136):

In Reply to: OT Speaking of butchering.....and heart problems posted by oldtanker on December 06, 2011 at 16:56:18:

let me give you sort of a background on the grass vs corn fed deal. Grass fed beef was the norm for many many years, and in fact was what created the industry in the US.And you have to remember the US is the main consumer of beef ,goat or sheep are the primary sources of protein in most of the world even today.Cattle from the west raised on native grass were shipped east by the jillions. These were very often the old longhorned breeds. And were not sold at the railheads so much by the pound as by the head. These were pretty much uniform cattle by size and weight accross the board so this was a good system.
Along about the turn of the century or a little before though.Packing houses in the east (ARMOUR in fact) developed refrigeration to the point where live cattle did not need to be shipped east. Refrigerated rail cars made it possible to slaughter in the west and ship only beef east. This pretty much ended the native cows as king simply because they would dress out about 70% bone hanging weight. English cattle breeds,such as shorthorn,hereford,and angus would typicaly dress out 60% or less hanging weight( its as easy to ship meat as bone) and they became the standard. These cattle were naturally fatter cattle being from their northern climes,and they were easy to fatten on native pasture that very often was higher in protien than even the best improved pasture. They became the norm very quickly and most folks Preffered the extra fat ,and tenderness it gave.
The problems arose with these cattle when it was found that they were not of a consistant taste. A steak from one might be good and tender,and they next have a totally different taste. This of course was found to be because of the rather narrow variety of plants,and grasses of the plains that became available to cattle as the seasons changed. The bundleflower,tick clovers and things would grow very rapidly spring and fall,but then would go dormant with the heat and cold. But while the gamma grasses,buffalo grass and such made up for it as far as feed.they also gave a different taste. This sort of made a different culture emerge. Instead of grass fed or corn fed it was summer beef or winter beef. Consumers would buy lots of beef at one season and then buy pork or something of the nature simply because the quality and taste wasnt there. To make the quality consistant accross the board slaughter houses started running cattle into feedlots,and feeding them for a period of time on a more or less straight diet of corn simply to make the TASTE consistant. Since the vast majority of the folks in the east were immigrants from europe this type of beef and its taste was what they were used to because after years the the cattle there were raised more or less this way,they were put on pastures in spring and brought in during the winter to be fed,where many of them died and were butchered. And this simply became the norm and the standard for cattle raised in the US.
BUT your question leads us back to grass fed beef. And heres the skinny. All these problems still remain as far as consistant quality goes.IF you want to raise grass fed cattle,and eat grass fed beef. You will get a more consistant,better product if you are raising them on a improved type of pasture if your raising the english breeds. If you are raising them on native pasture you probably will be much more satisfied if you stay with the more lean cattle such as longhorn,brahma etc. Or you pull them off native pasture and put them on to an improved pasture for a few weeks. The problem is not in the marbling itself,it adds moisture of course which makes a more tender cut of meat,but the fact that the fat and marbling to a very large extent takes on the flavor of the food the cows being fed.To make it consistant you either have to use a lean cut with few of the different flavorings, or a consistent feed for a period of time to flavor the extra marbling.
As far as fat content goes,grass fed longhorn is very close to venison, and often is leaner than buffalo. Longhorn cattle are very easy to raise,can live about anywhere. The biggest problem with them,and the largest drawback is that they naturally require special handling equipment.And they do much better on a large area,simply because they dont like to be crowded together as much as some.Thirty head of herefords will lay down right next to each other,the same number of longhorns will bed down over two acres. because they dont like their horns touching.
we eat little beef at our home,probably 90% venison because of my wifes heart condition. But if I still had a butcher with on farm slaughter i would turn a few longhorns out in the pasture and never look back.

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