Eating beef is a complicated issue.
Apart from environmental concerns regarding the methane burped up by cattle, there are a couple of other considerations to take into account.
First is the issue of growth hormones, and their use in the Australian beef industry. Although my first instinct is to reject these outright, there have been a couple of well-written articles on the topic, including this rational and sensible piece by The Food Sage, and these comments from my food chemist friend, Lee. The general consensus is that they probably aren’t harmful to humans, but I’d like to avoid them if possible.
The second point to consider is whether the cattle have been grain-fed or pasture-fed. As omnivores, we want to ensure that the meat we consume has had the best life it possibly can. We only buy free range chicken, pork and lamb, and would like to be able to do the same with beef. Unfortunately, the ongoing quest for tender meat has led to an increase in grain-fed or grain-finished beef, with the animal fed on prepared rations for the last few months of its life.
In order to do this, the beast is moved to a feedlot, where it has limited room to move, further ensuring the tenderness of the finished meat. A few butchers have told me that a grain-fed steer hasn’t necessarily been kept on a feedlot, but the Australian Beef Industry specifications seem to imply otherwise. (If I’ve misread this, please let me know.)
The issue isn’t completely black and white – Australia is traditionally a very dry country, and in times of drought our cattle need to be given supplementary feeds, or risk dying of starvation. But there is a world of difference between providing extra feed to animals in the pasture and keeping them on a feedlot for months on end.
Apart from these animal welfare concerns, there are environmental issues associated with growing large quantities of grain for use as cattle-feed. Additionally, research has shown grain-fed beef to be a far less healthy option than grass-fed.
Which leads me to my dilemma. I want to make informed choices about the meat I feed to my family, but this can be difficult to do, particularly when buying from retail butchers. Wholesalers will usually have more information about the provenance of the meat they’re selling, but all bets are off when it comes to buying prepared products such as mince.
These concerns have been plaguing me for several months now, and I’ve come to the conclusion that the only way to be completely certain about the beef we’re eating is to buy a clearly labelled bulk portion and process it ourselves.
Having made this decision, I was delighted to discover Greenham Tasmania Natural Beef on sale at the Flemington Market butchers during our last visit. This Tasmanian grown grass-fed and certified hormone-free beef appears to tick all the boxes.
We bought a large rump piece – 5.4 kilos – and put it through our old Kenwood mincer. It was very reasonably priced at just $6.50 per kilo, but by the time I’d trimmed the fat off fairly obsessively, we were left with under four kilos of meat.
It still worked out at an economical $9.20 per kilo for premium rump mince.
Without a doubt, grain-fed beef is tenderer and less gristly, but grass-fed (to our tastes) has a richer flavour and a more pleasing mouthfeel, particularly in a steak. More importantly though, I’m happy to feed it to my sons!
Fig Jam and Lime Cordial 
Thank you for such a well-researched article. It’s something that has been bothering me for a while – I want to know more about ‘grain-fed’. Undeniably it tastes great but I want to know at what cost, both to the environment and the welfare of the animal. The majority of our meat in Dubai comes from Australia.
Sally, thank you, the post took me quite a while to write, as I’ve been ruminating (no pun intended) on it for quite a while… :)
My husband and mother grew up on farms- and when I was a teenager, my father bought several cattle to keep the pasture down and use for meat. I’d like to think the beef we eat has had that kind of care and feeding before it came to my table. Buying a steer and sharing the meat with several families has been the latest of the responsible meat decisions made by members of my family.
It is a lot more work- can be more expensive and takes up a great deal of freezer space, but it is also more satisfying in the end.
Great post, Celia!
Heidi, that certainly is the ideal option, but not one really available to us at the moment. I’m glad you’re able to make it work! :)
Plus the terror of eating beef that has been fed Genetically Modified corn.. this is why I grow my own grass fed beef and lamb, corn free animals and yes i am lucky to be able to do that! your beef looked pretty good too.. c
Cecilia, fabulous to be able to grow your own! The mince was absolutely delicious – we cooked it into a bolognese sauce, and there was no fat whatsoever coming off the mince…
our hunter gatherer skills are needed in a different way, now we are ‘civilized’, for tracking down ethically and organically produced food especially for urban dwellers :)
Jane, that’s true. A little enlightenment is a troubling thing – once I’d started looking into this, there was no going back to simply buying anonymous meat from the supermarket…sigh.. ;-)
I think that’s what I keep coming back to with so many foods…”Do I want to feed it to my sons?”
Glad you found some that you were happy with Celia :-)
(I like Tea with Hazel’s comparison.)
Thanks Brydie! It took a little while.. :)
I’ve been looking forward to reading this post. I love the flavour of grass fed beef particularly the Cape grim beef from Tasmania. Plus grass fed has omega 3’s in it but often yes there are some gristlier bits.
Thanks for putting up with me rabbiting on about this over the last couple of months, love.. ;-) I’ll look out for the Cape Grim – that’s a Greenham product as well, I believe..
Thanks for a very informative post Celia. It’s horrible to think about what really happens and even worse to think that it’s actually allowed.
I haven’t bought meat from the supermarket for quite a while now. Super Butcher, a wholesale butcher here that’s open to the public gives us a lot of information about the production process and different types of meat in his weekly newsletters.
Claire, that great that you have such a good option and access to information. I actually rang Greenham’s today to find out more – their Tassie beef is all grass fed, hormone free and processed in Tasmania before being shipped out.
Great informative post Celia, it is a rather hard topic to unravel isn’t it?
The best beef I’ve had was my Dad’s pampered Dexter cows, from the Sunshine coast. They refused to leave the pen in the morning until they all had their cuddles, they were fed organic peanut meal, molassas, and fresh herbs from dad’s organic farm- but best of all for them, they guzzled down whole mangos that fell off the trees, eating them whole but efficiently ejecting the pips at the other end of their digestive systems.
It was hard to say goodbye :(, but they taste delicious :)
Becca, it’s such a morass of misinformation! Cattle is often given top-up feeds in the pasture – I don’t have a problem with that, especially if the alternative is the beast going hungry – but the whole grain-fed issue is a different story. And practices vary so much from one producer to the next. Which is why it was good to find the Greenham’s, as well as the organic pasture-fed scotch which I bought from Haverick’s last time I was there…
Hi Celia:-) This post is so relevant! When consumers start consistently requiring this type of ethically and sustainably produced food and buy it when its available more and more options become viable for farmers. We live in WA and recently two butcher shops have opened in our vicinity selling only locally and ethically produced meat and poultry. The taste is as I remembered it from my youth – nothing like the watered, tasteless product sold by the supermarkets – but the cost is the same. And to top off the joy we now have a dairy outlet selling Jersey milk from the South West of WA. Beautiful creamy milk and thick cream which is perfect for the yoghurt, mascarpone, butter and cheese we make. All at the same cost as similarly labelled but inferior products in the supermarket and we get to support the farmers at the same time! We buy our flours, sugar, spices, etc. in bulk from the wonderful Kakulas Brothers in the centre of Perth and our fruit and veg. is WA-produced and bought at the markets. My husband and I realised with glee the other day that the only things we buy on a regular basis at the supermarket are toilet paper and tissues, baking paper and foil. If we’re doing this, thousands more must be … I think we’re on the cusp of a consumer-led revolution and together we just might impinge on the consciousness of big business at the same time as we lend a hand to farmers and small business so they get a fair return for effort:-)
Deb, I really didn’t want this post to come across as sounding like I was telling anyone else what to do – this was about my own personal quest and what we’re happy to put on our table. Everyone has their own preferences, budgetary constraints and ideologies to follow and I would never presume to tell anyone else that our path is right and theirs is wrong.
Having said that, I do hope you’re right, and that there is indeed a shift in the Zeitgeist, and that more and more people will ask questions about what they’re buying, read labels, and make informed choices.
Thanks for the information. I buy from a butcher who claims his meat is grass fed. It tastes pretty good. Buying food is becoming so tricky, we try to do the best we can.
Deb, that really is all any of us can do. Sometimes options just aren’t available to us, and we have to make the most of what we can get. It’s good that your butcher can supply you with grass-fed beef – I think at the moment most local beef is grass-fed unless otherwise labelled as grain, although there is some confusion over whether or not they’re “grain-finished” (which I don’t believe needs to be declared).
There are certainly also a growing number of farms selling meat direct to the public, which makes it a lot easier to find out the relevant information… in the past I have emailed several farms to ask a range of questions, from age of slaughter of their lambs, to whether their sausages contain gluten…. However, you are generally committed to buying in bulk which worked fine when we had a separate freezer, but isn’t so practical now with our small freezer!
Abbington, that really is a big part of the problem – without the freezer, it’s hard in the city to buy in bulk. The only alternative seems to be to track down a really good butcher and pay the premium!
It is so sad that times have resulted in feeding cattle all types of strange hormones and feed! To buy organic / naturally raised beef costs the earth too!
Have a happy day.
:-) Mandy
Mandy, that’s why I was so happy to find the rump on sale! It’s all gone now unfortunately, I tried to get some more yesterday…
I admit, I always mean to do more research into the food I buy but I’ve yet to get around to it. But I’m terribly inspired by you – next time I head to the store, I’m definitely noticing the details on my meat!
Hi Megan, thanks for stopping by! A little research is a tricky thing – the more I know, the harder it is to find produce that I’m happy to put on the table! :)
Hi Celia
To further help your research, I suggest this page: http://www.mla.com.au/Livestock-production/Feeding-finishing-and-nutrition . It explains the difference between grass feeding, supplementary grain feeding, drought feeding and feed lots. Most beef cattle in Victoria and Tasmania are grass fed.
You can also buy by breed of cattle ie we have grown Charlois which are grass fed. They grow slowly and have marbled meat. The meat is mostly exported (to France in particular) but it is available in Australia. A lot of meat in butchers is Fresian; in supermarkets it is often Hereford.
Meg, thank you for this – it’s very useful information. I’m slowly getting my head around the breed issue – I’ve noticed for example that almost all Wagyu and Angus is grain-fed for a period of time. The beef coming from Tassie seems like a good option for us, as there is state legislation in place prohibiting the use of growth hormones and (I think) genetically modified feeds…
I only buy ‘happy beef’ and I can taste the difference. Having a mincer at home makes all the difference as I know what I am getting in my ground up meat. Lovely post Celia :)
Thanks Tandy! :)