Grass-fed vs. corn-fed beef

While grass-fed beef is healthy and nutritious, corn-fed beef is something different. Medical and environmental studies show that the production and consumption of corn-fed beef has had devastating effects on American health, as well as the negative environmental impacts due to corn production and feedlot farming. The pervasive presence of corn and corn by-products in the American diet lie at the root of the problem. Corn, especially in massive quantities, becomes a toxic substance. Corn has a high glycemic index, meaning it is easily converted to sugars in the body. Sugars are readily stored in the body as unhealthy saturated fats. Shortly after World War II, farmers started feeding corn to their beef because it produced a fatter steer, faster. Fatter and faster meant more profits. Corn has been cheap and heavily subsidized by the U.S. Government for decades. Feeding corn to beef and isolating them in feedlots not only gave rise to the modern agricultural industrial complex with its giant corporate packers and processors, but also began the trend away from whole foods and the movement towards sugary, processed foods. As cattle became sick in the feedlots from overcrowding and the unnatural corn diet, producers began to feed the cattle antibiotics to help keep them “on their feed”. In the ongoing pursuit of fatter and faster, use of growth hormones became common practice. We now understand what a dire mistake all of this has been, and how our health has suffered as a result with higher rates of heart disease, cancer and diabetes.

You are what you eat... Cows are also what they eat.

The nutritional benefits of returning to grass-fed meats are powerful and amazing:

• Studies have shown that there is a direct correlation between the cow’s diet and the nutritional value of the meat to the consumer.
• Grass-fed beef contains twice as much beta-carotene as grain-fed beef.
• Grass-fed beef has elevated concentrations of Vitamin E, as much as four times that of grain-fed beef.
• Grass-fed beef is naturally leaner with approximately 27% less fat than corn-fed beef, and lower in calories than grain-fed beef.
• Omega-3 essential fatty acid levels in grass-fed beef are two to four times greater than meat from grain-fed animals.
• Grass-fed beef has the desirable omega-3: omega-6 ratio that is recognized as health promoting.
• Meat from grass-fed animals are the richest known source of CLAs or conjugated linoleic acids. CLAs are currently thought have potent benefits in reducing cancer, atherosclerosis, onset of diabetes and body fat mass.
  

"Good fats vs. bad fats" Current scientific literature supports claims that grass-fed beef contains higher proportions of healthful lipids (healthy fats) and antioxidants important to human health compared to that of conventional (grain-fed) beef.

Read more about the health benefits of grass-fed beef. Click here to download a PDF (88kb).