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Natural Diet

Not too long ago, I heard someone make a generalized statement about organic meat (and I'm paraphrasing): "The 'organic' label is just a means of charging more for the same thing." This might be a bit simplistic, but I can sympathize: the organic label has been defined and re-defined into insignificance. Now supermarket shelves are being stocked with products labeled "all natural," a term the the USDA does not even define.

A few years ago, when organic food was becoming mainstream, I was completely turned off by it. I had been eating chemically-treated food for my entire life. Why should I pay more to change my eating habits? And, honestly, I'm not sure that today I even care about the "organic" label. There are occasionally various produce items that I prefer to buy organic, but it's not something I really get too concerned with.

Even though the term is not regulated and can be thrown around without regard, I much prefer the idea of "all natural" food. It's not that I'm ideologically opposed to using chemicals on plants, but if someone is going to make the effort to raise their produce without chemicals, I might be willing to pay more for it. The idea of a local smallholder growing produce not because it's a profitable market, but because they love to is appealing to me. And the success of farmers' markets suggests that it is appealing to quite a few others. In fact, I would rather buy (non-certified-organic) produce from a farmers' market than something labeled "organic" in a grocery store.

Keep in mind that just because something is "organic" does not mean it is not mass-produced. Of course, again, I'm not ideologically opposed to mass-production of produce, but if I'm going to buy a pound of carrots, I'd be willing to pay a little more for some than came from six rows of carrots rather than five acres of carrots. But the beauty of farmers' markets is that you generally don't have to pay more for produce from a local smallholding farm.

In the end, however, I generally don't get too worked up about produce. I'm more concerned with meat, perhaps because they are self-aware beings. In terms of beef, it is generally considered that the best (ie most flavorful) meat comes from cattle that are grass-fed. Yet this remains only a fraction of the beef produced and sold in this country. Most cattle are fed on "grains" or on corn, which is a more expensive feed.* But here's something more disturbing: the rising cost of corn means cattle diets are being supplemented with other high-energy foods. High-energy in the form of potato chips and M&Ms, byproducts from companies like Hershey's. Junk-food-fed beef: I want to see that label at the grocery store.

Gourmet's Barry Estabrook makes an important point: junk food is no less natural to a cattle's diet than corn. Cattle are grass eaters and their stomachs are ideally suited for digesting grass. As a result, feeding cattle corn or grains prompts an unnatural use of antibiotics to help the cattle cope with their unnatural diet. Despite this fact, less than 10% of the cattle raised in the US are raised on grass. Why? Because it's "inefficient." It takes more time to mature the cattle and requires a lot of land, land that could be more profitable growing crops--like corn. Grass-fed operations often find it difficult to remain profitable, even when they charge 25-30% more for their beef.

Most grass-fed beef falls under the "organic" label and will show up in grocery stores as such. (However, not all organic beef is grass-fed.) So to suggest that feeding cattle their natural diet and labeling it "organic" is a scam to charge more for the "same thing" is pretty short-sighted. The standard mass-produced feedlot beef you find in your grocery store is probably more profitable and is certainly sold in greater volume. Given its prominence, I think it is more correct to argue that "standard" beef is a practice of selling a lousy product for significant profit.

* Side note: dairy cattle are generally fed corn, supplemented with grains, as the high amount of starch is ideal for the production of milk. However, the purpose is the same as with beef cattle: more efficient production of the end product. It seems, however, that grass-fed dairy is more inefficient than grass-fed beef.