Grass-Fed Beef

Grass feeding is a practice not yet familiar to all consumers. 100% grass-fed beef comes from cows who have grazed in pasture year round rather than being fed a processed diet for much of their life. Grass feeding improves the quality of beef, and makes the beef richer in omega­3 fats, vitamin E, beta-carotene, and CLA (a beneficial fatty acid named conjugated linoleic acid.

In general, we recommend sticking with lower fat cuts of beef if you decide to include this food in your meal plan. Lower fat cuts include top round, bottom round, eye of round, flank, and strip. Health organizations have traditionally recommended avoidance of higher fat cuts like tenderloin, ribeye, or porterhouse because it can be difficult to make room for the amount of total fat, saturated fat, and calories they contain. Since too much total fat, too much saturated fat, and too many calories in a daily meal plan can raise the risk of certain health problems, this approach makes sense to us, particularly in light of the fact that lower fat beef cut can still provide you with the nutritional benefits of 100% grass-fed beef in terms of omega­3s, CLA, beta-carotene, and vitamin E.

Recent studies have underscored the large difference in carotenoid content between grass-fed and conventionally fed beef. Grass-fed beef may contain more than twice the amount of beta-carotene and lutein that is present in conventionally fed beef. This relationship appears to hold true even if the cows have been fed silage during the winter months and pasture feed only during the summer. In addition, some researchers have suggested that the yellowish color of fat in grass-fed beef is a good way to determine the extent to which the animals have been pasture fed.

The cholesterol content of grass-fed beef has repeated been shown to be lower than the cholesterol content in beef from conventionally fed animals. The decrease in cholesterol that you are most likely to obtain when switching from conventionally fed to grass-fed beef is approximately 22–39%. Since a single 4­ounce serving of conventionally fed beef will typically provide you with 90 milligrams of cholesterol or more, and since the recommended limit from the American Heart Association is 300 milligrams per day (and only 200 milligrams if you are a person who has experienced heart disease or has an LDL cholesterol of 100 mg/dL or more), this 22­39% decrease in cholesterol from grass-fed beef could be very helpful to you in helping you keep your total cholesterol intake under the recommended limit.

You'll find yourself getting 500­800 milligrams of CLA (conjugated linoleic acid) from a 4­ounce serving of grass-fed beef. This amount is approximately two to three times greater than the amount found in non grass-fed beef. CLA is a fatty acid made from linoleic acid, an omega­6 fatty acid commonly found in food. However, CLA is unique in its chemical structure, and this uniqueness is associated with an increasing list of health benefits, including immune and inflammatory system support, improved bone mass, improved blood sugar regulation, reduced body fat, reduced risk of heart attack, and maintenance of lean body mass. Grass-fed beef also contains greater amounts of vaccenic acid than
conventionally fed beef. Various bacteria in our digestive tract are able to convert vaccenic acid into CLA once we've consumed grass-fed beef, and this process can further increase the practical amount of CLA that we receive from grass-fed animals. The omega­3 fat content of grass-fed beef varies widely, due to the wide variety of forage crops that can be planted in pastures (or that grow on pastureland in the wild); the age, breed, and health of cows; and seasonal plant cycles in pastureland. Some recent studies show up to 3.5 grams of total omega­3 fats in 4 ounces of grass-fed beef. That level would provide you with 100% of the daily requirement. In other recent studies, total omega­3s in grass-fed beef only reached 1 gram. Still, a single gram of omega­3s could make an important contribution to a person's health. Most of the omega­3 content of grass-fed beef comes in the form of alpha linolenic acid, or ALA. However, grass-fed beef also typically contains small­ to ­moderate amounts of other omega­3s, including EPA (eicosapentaenoic acid) and DHA (docosahexaenoic acid). The range we've seen in recent studies is 20­720 milligrams for EPA, and 10­120 milligrams for DHA. In all cases described above, grass-fed beef contained greater amounts of omega­3s (for ALA, EPA, and DHA) than conventionally fed beef.