Re:Grass fed or Wagyu – anyone dryage these?

[Anonymous]

Aegwyn11 wrote:

quote :

SmokieOkie, welcome to the forum! If you haven’t already, I hope you take the plunge into home dry aging…its a lot of fun.

I have been wet and dry aging beef for well over 25 years. Dry aging is very tricky w/o a walk in cooler. I prefer wet aging to dry aging for competition BBQ briskets, but prefer dry aging for grilling cuts. This is what has stirred my interest in the dry aging bags.

Just need to set the record straight here on several items as SmokyOkie has made several inaccurate statements. I don’t proclaim to be an expert, but I’ve come across a great deal of information during my research that I can share.

I am very well versed in Wagyu beef. I have consumed thousands of dollars worth of Wagyu beef, everything from briskets to steaks to burgers. I have been in touch with every commercial producer of Wagyu beef in the UNited states at one time or another.

If you would like to engage in a debate, I am more than willing to do so, but I don’t know as I think that you would be one to call my statements inaccurate or to “set the record straight”.

I am simply sharing my experience.

SmokyOkie wrote:

quote :

Grass fed beef is just a marketing gimmick. Fat is what makes a good steak, and they don;t spend all the $ grain feeding beef at feed lots just to increase weight, they do it for quality flavor.

Grass fed beef is the cheaper alternative. Feed lots charge a pretty good $ to prepare cattle for market.

Grass fed beef is usually more expensive for a myriad of different reasons. One of the primary reasons is the amount of time and space required for grass fed cattle when compared to grain fed. Reference:

http://beefissuesquarterly.com/thegrassisalwaysgreenerorisit.aspx

Some people like grass fed better and some grain fed better. Its a totally different taste. Personally I like grass fed better than corn fed (grocery store stuff is typically heavily corn fed). But I also like the Waygu samples I got better than grass fed.

What you are not taking into consideration is that all beef is grass fed before being sent to the feedlot to finish it. Grain feeding is an extras step. I am very familiar with cattle ranching. If you think the Wagyu beef is expensive, you really wouldn’t want to pay what it would cost if the beef was raised grain fed.

In the 70s due to Nixon’s price controls, ranchers slaughtered their herds on a wholesale level w/o sending them to the feed lost.
They called it baby beef. It was young beef, but not veal, and it was 100% grass fed. They did so because the could not justify the cost of finishing the beef at the feed lot given the low price they were allowed to command.

Grass is next to free. Corn is fairly expensive.
I stand by my original statement that it is a marketing hype, and see nothing in your source that disputes that.

SmokyOkie wrote:

quote :

As to Wagyu, there is only one ranch in the US that produces purebred Wagyu beef.

I could easily be wrong on this one, but I’m pretty sure this is inaccurate as well. If you look in the classified section of the American Wagyu Association, you’ll see lots of different ranches selling full bloded Wagyu. Reference:

http://www.wagyu.org/wagyuads.htm

Please allow me to emend my statement. There is really only one ranch that produces any considerable quantity of full blood Wagyu for the consumer market. Of course there are ranches that deal in full blood Wagyu. If there weren’t there would be no cross breeds. Perhaps that has changed since I last checked about 9 months ago.

SmokyOkie wrote:

quote :

It really isn’t as good as the Wagyu/Hereford or Wagyu/Angus cross beef for grilling. It is probably better for eating raw like sashimi though.

I have cooked both and eaten both raw.

Not that Wikipedia is a totally trustworthy reference, but I’ve seen this other places…the reasons for crossing Wagyu with more traditional breeds was to meet demand…not for taste. Reference:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kobe_beef#.22Kobe-style.22_beef

If you’ve eaten raw beef, more power to you. I’ll stick to cooking it on my
Primo.

Which Primo do you have? I’m looking hard at an oval. Nice cookers

I guess I am speaking from personal experience. I have eaten a lot of Wagyu beef. To me and the others that have dined on it along with me, the fat content of the purebred Wagyu is so high that it is a bit unpleasant when the fat begins to render (rare to medium).

As to eating it raw, I was merely referring to the way that it is typically consumed in Japan. Though I have no problem eating raw whole muscle beef

SmokyOkie wrote:

quote :

Dry aging should improve the flavor and texture of any beef though. the only thing that I would wonder about is through the loss of moisture (a good thing for flavor), one would change the ratio of fat to lean (because you would lose lean weight, but not fat weight), and this might end to being to greasy in some cases.

Which producer’s beef did you settle on and what kind of price did they quote you?

I’m hopeful that dry aging should improve the beef. The guy at the ranch I’ve been talking to has some experience with dry aging this beef and he assured me that it makes it out of this world.

The guys I’m talking to are at Strube Ranch. The ranch is in East Texas (close to where I was born and raised), the feedlot they use is in Sioux City, IA (1 hour away from me now), and their storage is is Omaha, NE (3 hours away). I’m waiting on one more answer and then I’m going to drive down there any pick some up either tomorrow or Saturday.

I’d rather not say the price, as its pretty spendy :blush: Lets just say the strip loin is around 3x as expensive as what I paid for my previous Choice strip loin here at a local meat market.

I am very familiar with The Strubes. they are a good producer. I am, however, aware of another producer whose product I prefer.