Ruminations

An article in the New Zealand Trade & Enterprise, available on the web, suggests that American farmers are being pressured to reassess and revamp their dairy operations, where most of the 9+ million cows live indoors. According to the article, “The vocal animal rights movement in the United States is putting pressure on containment farmers to let their animals live in the open, and retailers such as Whole Foods Market are paying a premium for “range-fed” milk. … The country’s largest co-operative, Dairy Farmers of America, has told its 18,000 members that pasture-based farming is the way of the future.”

This is good news for the consumer, and we hope for U.S. dairy farmers, as well, who are struggling for survival. Read the article here.

Filed by admin at 6:03 pm under Nutrition, Diet & Food Politics
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In response to the New York Times article Oct. 6, Ridge Shinn submitted this letter to the Editor:

To the Editor:

Re illness from contaminated beef, (“The Anatomy of a Burger,” Oct. 6), scrutiny of meat processing will not identify the real villain: grain fed to cattle.

Corn — or any grain —   is not healthy for ruminants. Nevertheless, feedlot cattle are given large quantities of this inexpensive feed, and often endure a condition known as acidosis, or “acid indigestion.” Consequently an acid-resistant strain of E.coli has developed that can survive in the grain-fed bovine. If passed on, it can also survive the acid of the human stomach and cause illness.

In contrast, cattle that live in pastures, eating grass and hay, are likely to have healthy guts and little, if any, of the acid-resistant E.coli, according to a Cornell University study. http://www.news.cornell.edu/releases/Sept98/acid.relief.hrs.html

When the bovine digestive system, which has evolved to process grass, is allowed to function naturally, it is very unlikely to cause a problem to human health.

Ridge Shinn

Founder, Hardwick Beef

Filed by admin at 5:57 pm under Better Beef, Food Safety
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Yes, Virginia, pasture-raised beef is better than grain-fed beef. That’s the theme of NaturalNews.com, and this succinct summary of what is so wrong with post-WWII beef production.

There are many good links from this article to other well-written pieces, as if we need more persuasion: http://www.naturalnews.com/027199_meat_cattle_health.html

Filed by admin at 5:54 pm under Uncategorized
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Our newest favorite blogger is Hannah Wallace, who writes on Food Politics for The Faster Times on the web (www.thefastertimes.com). Her Oct. 9 blog entry discusses the stomach-roiling topic of E. coli in factory-farmed beef, discussed in a long article in the previous Sunday’s New York Times magazine. Unfortunately, as the article and Hannah discuss, not much has changed over the years in assuring food safety in America’s meat packing industry. After reading the original article, as well as Hannah’s Cliff Notes (her term), you will likely never eat another mass-produced burger.

One way to avoid E. coli contamination is to keep it from proliferating in the cow’s rumen.  If it does not develop in the rumen (because of grain feeding), obviously then it won’t be in the manure, the meat or the spinach.

Hannah Wallace’s blog: http://thefastertimes.com/foodpolitics/2009/10/09/cliffs-notes-to-the-times-e-coli-investigation/

NY Times article: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/04/health/04meat.html?_r=1&em

See also Cornell University’s study: http://bakewellrepro.com/ruminations/?p=10

Filed by admin at 5:45 pm under Food Safety, Nutrition, Diet & Food Politics
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We were pleased to read in the Sept. 16 issue of the Washington Post about a mother who decided to tackle the thorny issue of her son’s bad eating habits, specifically of fast food. She set out to prove that fast-food items cooked at home save money as well as calories.

Her conclusion? “Not only is homemade food almost always more nutritious (lower in calories, fat and sodium), fresher and better for your family in most every way, but it’s also significantly less expensive and, in most cases, once you have your ingredients on hand, no more time-consuming.”

Read about her efforts here: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/15/AR2009091500749.html

Filed by admin at 5:35 pm under Nutrition, Diet & Food Politics
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Recently the New York Times visited Bryn Teg, a farm in the Northern Kingdom of Vermont, that’s owned by Judith Jones. She is a long-time editor at Knopf who edited Julia Child’s Mastering the Art of French Cooking, among many other noted authors, and is herself an author (The Tenth Muse and The Pleasures of Cooking for One). The farm has a small herd of grass-fed beef that includes Black Anguses and Belted Galloways.

Hardwick Beef’s own Michael Gourlay is mentioned in the article as advising Jones’ step-daughter Bronwyn Dunne on the herd and grass-finishing the cattle. Not only does Judith Jones relish the fact that her family is using the land for pasture and raising “contented” cows, but she also enjoys “a return to the true beef flavor that she hadn’t experienced since she was in Paris in her 20s,” as the article notes. “… this is what meat should taste like,” she says.

To read the entire article, click here. 

To read Judith Jones’ blog about her adventures in farming, click here.

Filed by admin at 12:03 am under Better Beef, Nutrition, Diet & Food Politics
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According to Allan Nation, editor of The Stockman Grass Farmer, the grass-finished beef market has exploded in the last five years. As interviewed and reported by the North Platte Bulletin, he says the good news for grass-fed beef farmers is this: “Although grass-finished beef amounts to only one-percent of the market, that percent amounts to a billion dollars, Nation told producers at the recent Nebraska Grazing Conference in Kearney.”

Read the interview here.

Filed by admin at 9:20 pm under Beef Marketing
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Yes, the New York Times reports on a farm that offers a vacation for only $332 a night (guests sleep in a tent with a flush toilet and running water). Plus, the guests get to do the work on the farm. What a deal!

This article discusses other farms that offer the chance to pay to get your hands dirty: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/26/dining/26farms.html?emc=eta1

Filed by admin at 7:46 pm under Uncategorized
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In America’s heartland, the New York Times reports on the return of a family’s farmland to raising heirloom crops and restoring local agriculture once again. The Travis family succeeded in buying back the land sold by his grandmother to developers. Now they grow unusual varieties of crops and very successfully sell them to restaurants. They are most pleased to bring back white Iroquois corn that was close to extinction and now is their most sought-after crop. An encouraging story to counter the factory farming throughout the U.S.

Read the full story: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/30/magazine/30food-t-000.html?_r=1&emc=eta1

Filed by admin at 7:40 pm under Sustainable Agriculture & Policy
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Roger Cohen, a New York Times columnist, recently traveled to France, and offers fresh insight into food safety and the reality of live food for people who want to be healthy. In stark contrast to Americans’ preference to have their food arrived pre-packaged, he writes, “the French don’t believe what they’re eating is genuine unless they’ve seen gritty proof of provenance. …”

Later in his column, he concludes, ”The American healthcare debate is skewed. It should be devoting more time to changing U.S. culinary and eating habits in ways that cut the need for expensive care by reducing rampant obesity, to which anxiety, haste and disconnectedness contribute. France has much to teach, guts and all. ”

Here’s the link: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/31/opinion/31iht-edcohen.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=Op-Ed%20Columnist:%20%20Advantage%20France%20&st=cse

Filed by admin at 7:29 pm under Food Safety, Nutrition, Diet & Food Politics
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