Best burger, #2: Do you know (or care) where it's from?

I can assuredly say that I don't want my burger coming from anything to do with "#2"

Seriously though, I will generally opt for a well executed veggie burger which renders the point moot. The beet-quinoa option at Mussel & Burger Bar rocks.

Cows werent created to eat corn, they dont do it very well, and it doesnt add to the flavor of the meat.

One long term study...
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19351974

From one story on subject...

But corn marbles the meat with desirable fat, so producers don’t want to do that.

Fat is flavor.

Fat is added to burgers. Without fat you have a hockey puck on the grill. Grass fed beef, especially, has to have fat added to it because of it's lack there of. 80% meat 20% fat is a normal ratio.

Cows love corn. Much like people do. It's their digestive tract that is not great at metabolizing it. If you have ever raised cows and had them get out of their enclosure you know that corn is one of the only things that can get a giant land animal to move where they don't want to go. It's like candy!

Much like sugar or starches in a human diet bring about fatty people the same goes for animals. Cows are ruminant animals, so their multiple stomachs ferment their foraged food for this slow burn digestion. Yes, grass in ruminants makes for great digestion and metabolic health, but that does not mean that cows only eat grass, or that corn is necessarily bad for them. A diet only of corn like in large CAFO operations out west, are famous for making sick animals. This is because they are having only corn, all day, everyday. This makes the animals highly susceptible to disease. So the expedient solution for large factory operations is to add antibiotics to the feed. Operations like this know that the diet they have the cows on is endangering herd health, so they inoculate them through the very same feed that is stressing the cows immune systems. It is a sloppy solution as we all know, that is done to meet a demand for fat cows.

I know that it is easier to speak in absolutes like "cows can't eat corn" or "all corn has antibiotics", but it is a little more complicated than the bumper stickers would lead you to believe. Cows can be fed grain, and many places finish grass fed cows on grain to achieve marbling, and added weight, but still remain antibiotic free.

I know that it is easier to speak in absolutes like "cows can't eat corn" or "all corn has antibiotics", but it is a little more complicated than the bumper stickers would lead you to believe. Cows can be fed grain, and many places finish grass fed cows on grain to achieve marbling, and added weight, but still remain antibiotic free.

Adriel, Thank you for explaining this so well. A friend of mine owns a medium sized "operation" out in western MN and has in the past explained the process of properly "finishing" beef to me...but with only that fundamental knowledge to go on I was not about to debate the "grass fed or nothing" amongst us. As explained to me by my friend "properly" finishing beef is almost a science and it isn't something that is learned overnight.

Thanks Steve!

Finishing is very much a science and an art as your friend knows. It's fine tuning an animal's diet like you would tapering the meals of a prize fighter for weigh ins. You are trying to juggle weight, health, and costs. It is one of those long honored traditions of animal husbandry that is hard to explain to those who are so far removed from it. Nothing wrong with all grass fed, but it has become a measuring stick by which some gauge good beef production versus animal cruelty. Corn finishing, or grain finishing, has been a practice since the dawn of agriculture. I don't think we should be painting such a practice with such a broad brush, based on an industry extreme like forced corn feeding. Just my two cents.

I don't think we should be painting such a practice with such a broad brush, based on an industry extreme like forced corn feeding. Just my two cents.

And the choir sang: "AHHHMEN".

I don't think we should be painting such a practice with such a broad brush, based on an industry extreme like forced corn feeding. Just my two cents.

And the choir sang: "AHHHMEN".

And that choir is very big! The one singing grass fed is much smaller.

1017446_754749134538047_523852588_n.jpg

"Grass" fed beef