Find us on Google+

Not Close to our Farm? Try U.S. Wellness Beef...

How Missouri Beef is Your Best Health Food

Now there has been some discussion about the heart-healthy aspects of Missouri grass-fed beef – a all-natural health food. Here's a pretty well-documented summary from Eat Wild (http://www.eatwild.com/healthbenefits.htm):

Summary of Important Health Benefits of Grassfed Meats, Eggs and Dairy

Lower in Fat and Calories. There are a number of nutritional differences between the meat of pasture-raised and feedlot-raised animals. To begin with, meat from grass-fed cattle, sheep, and bison is lower in total fat. If the meat is very lean, it can have one third as much fat as a similar cut from a grain-fed animal. In fact, as you can see by the graph below, grass-fed beef can have the same amount of fat as skinless chicken breast, wild deer, or elk.[1] Research shows that lean beef actually lowers your "bad" LDL cholesterol levels.[2]

Data from J. Animal Sci 80(5):1202-11.

Because meat from grass-fed animals is lower in fat than meat from grain-fed animals, it is also lower in calories. (Fat has 9 calories per gram, compared with only 4 calories for protein and carbohydrates. The greater the fat content, the greater the number of calories.) As an example, a 6-ounce steak from a grass-finished steer can have 100 fewer calories than a 6-ounce steak from a grain-fed steer. If you eat a typical amount of beef (66.5 pounds a year), switching to lean grassfed beef will save you 17,733 calories a year—without requiring any willpower or change in your eating habits. If everything else in your diet remains constant, you'll lose about six pounds a year. If all Americans switched to grassfed meat, our national epidemic of obesity might diminish.

In the past few years, producers of grass-fed beef have been looking for ways to increase the amount of marbling in the meat so that consumers will have a more familiar product. But even these fatter cuts of grass-fed beef are lower in fat and calories than beef from grain-fed cattle.

Again, there's nothing about grain-fed beef that's inherently bad. It's feeding our nation right now and doing just fine at that. Factually, it's not the beef that is the problem, it's the lifestyle and the other fried foods which are also adding in additional fat content, which most people don't work off while sitting in front of the TV or video game.

But that's another discussion for another time.

Come, do a working vacation out at our farm and walk a couple miles with me every day in heavy boots and humid weather - that will start melting the pounds off...

References:

1. Rule, D. C., K. S. Brought on, S. M. Shellito, and G. Maiorano. "Comparison of Muscle Fatty Acid Profiles and Cholesterol Concentrations of Bison, Beef Cattle, Elk, and Chicken." J Anim Sci 80, no. 5 (2002): 1202-11.

2. Davidson, M. H., D. Hunninghake, et al. (1999). "Comparison of the effects of lean red meat vs lean white meat on serum lipid levels among free-living persons with hypercholesterolemia: a long-term, randomized clinical trial." Arch Intern Med 159(12): 1331-8. The conclusion of this study: "... diets containing primarily lean red meat or lean white meat produced similar reductions in LDL cholesterol and elevations in HDL cholesterol, which were maintained throughout the 36 weeks of treatment."

Don't Miss Out - Get Your Name on The List!

Sorry we missed you this year. Our beef was spoken for in 3 days this season, as people can see the value of buying direct from the farmer at wholesale prices. The good news is that we have more steers coming on this next year, so will be able to help more people with this incredibly good-tasting beef. Fill out that contact form today so you can get your name on the list for next year!

And our harvest season is in Spring, right up to June, not all year round.

As more people find out about our farm, more people want our product. Unfortunately, we can't provide our beef to everyone. And some people simply live too far away.

So we did some research and found U.S. Wellness Meats for everyone else. They are another Missouri grass fed beef producer, who also deals in other produce from local farmers nearby. And they ship next day to your front door. Well worth checking out.