Grass-Fed Cows A New, Healthy
Food Trend

By Jeanette Trompeter

Click here to watch the video

(WCCO) Earlier this year, the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced its biggest beef recall ever: 143 million pounds of beef products.

The feedlot video that led to that recall was disturbing, showing sick cows prodded, pushed and forklifted into our food supply. If you found yourself wondering if there was a better way, a growing number of farmers were working to assure there is.

The farmers raise cows that are fed on grass, rather than corn, which some farmers doesn't sit as well in the bovine digestive system.

"The nicer the grass is, the more they eat, the better they gain," said Dan Coughlin, a farmer with Coughlin Stock Farms.

Like any farmer, Coughlin wants his cows to get big. He's just doing it a different way, without hormones or antibiotics. Instead, he only gives them minerals. And once a day he moves the herd to fresh pasture.

"They've been moved since they were baby calves with their moms, so they're really easy to move," he said.

Coughlin used to ship his cows from Londsale, Minn. to a Nebraska feedlot. Not anymore.

"This is a much prettier scene than 10,000 head standing in a feedlot," said Coughlin. "If you were a cow, you'd certainly sooner be here than in a feedlot."

A happy farmer raising happy cows often leads to a happy wholesaler. Take Todd Churchill, for instance. He owns Thousand Hills Cattle company and sells beef raised on 40 farms, including his own. He became interested in grass-fed beef after his first child was born.

"We became, like a lot of parents, a lot more health-conscious. It's alright for me to eat Oreos, but I don't want my kids to eat them," said Churchill, who found beef can be healthy if cows are raised a certain way. "When cattle are fed grass and only grass (or hay), they turn this into omega 3 fatty acid."

Omega 3 is good for hearts and brains. We usually think of getting it from fish or nuts, not beef.

Feeding cows grass isn't a new practice. In fact, it's quite well established.

"Up until 1960, corn was too valuable to feed to cattle. It was for people, pigs and poultry," said Churchill.

U.S. agricultural policy changed and corn prices dropped. Now that corn prices are going up, Todd expects more farmers to switch to grass.

"We've done some revolutionary studies and found that cattle have four legs, and they will harvest their own food, if you let them," said Churchill, tongue slightly in cheek.

Grass-fed beef sales are actually a tiny part of the meat market, but at Kowalski's, they're up 46 percent since last year. That's quite an increase when you consider that beef sales around the country are actually down 6 percent. Furthermore, grass-fed beef isn't cheap. Thousand Hills ground beef costs about twice the price of regular hamburger.

At the Strip Club, a new steak place in St. Paul, chef JD Fratzke will not serve any beef unless it's grass-fed, saying he offers his guarantee it tastes better.

"It takes like Minnesota to me," he said.

If you decide to grill up a grass-fed steak, be careful -- this meat cooks quickly. Fratzke recommended searing it until you get a mark, then moving it to a cooler part of the grill. Once off the grills, let the steak rest a minute. That way the juices get reincorporated back into the steak. Click here for more tips on cooking with grass-fed beef.