Photos of recipes from the new book Tender Grassfed Barbecue
Photos of recipes from the cookbook Tender Grassfed Meat
We Need Real Restaurants Serving Real Food!
By Stanley A. Fishman, author of Tender Grassfed Meat and Tender Grassfed Barbecue
Restaurants aren't what they used to be.
Do you ever get tired of the poor quality and high prices of most restaurants?
I certainly do. The main choice seems to be between chain restaurants serving large amounts of the worst factory foods, or higher-end restaurants serving tiny portions of somewhat better food. The taste is often mediocre at best, and if you are used to eating real food, your stomach will often rebel against what you have put into it. And the money you spent on this expensive meal could have bought you a large amount of excellent grassfed meat and real food, since restaurant prices can be so high.
I run into these problems in supposedly high-quality restaurants with great reviews and reputations, as well as the more pedestrian places. Even the smaller ethnic restaurants have similar problems. Most of the time, I count myself lucky if I do not get an upset stomach after eating at a restaurant. Just about all of the time, I go home hungry because the food lacks the nutrients my body has become used to when eating real food.
Enough is enough. Instead of accepting the current miserable situation, we need real restaurants serving real food!
The Problem
When I was a child and a teenager, many restaurants were excellent. They had to be. This was a time when most families had good home cooks, and most people just would not go to a restaurant unless the food was better than at home. This set a very high standard for taste and quality. Also, there were no GMOs, and much of the food was far more real than it is now.
We now live in a time where most people do not know how to cook. Packaged factory foods form a huge part of SAD (Standard American Diet). Most people have been brainwashed into thinking all food is the same. This lack of competition has allowed restaurants to get away with mediocre food, terrible ingredients, and huge prices.
The Solution
We should no longer accept mediocrity or worse. A meal at a restaurant should taste wonderful, use high-quality real food, be cooked and served under sanitary conditions, and leave you feeling satisfied after eating it. Nothing less is acceptable.
I have nine suggestions toward reaching this goal.
1. Serve real food only.
This is crucial. Even restaurants that boast of the quality of their ingredients often use factory ingredients to save money. They often buy from restaurant supply companies that supply the cheapest factory food. Food should be organic or the equivalent, preferably local. One of the few restaurants that does it right is Chez Panisse, in Berkeley, which buys almost all of its foods from quality local farms and ranches. This is a good standard.
2. Drop the factory meat and serve only grassfed and grass-finished meat.
This seems like a very radical suggestion, and it is. But the rewards of implementing it are immense. Grassfed and grass-finished meat is far superior in nutrition, much more satisfying to the appetite, and is perhaps the oldest food of humankind. It tastes much better than factory meat, when properly cooked. I have made this suggestion in a number of places, and the answer is always along the lines that grassfed meat is “tough.” No, it is not tough. Properly cooked grassfed meat is very tender. The chefs and cooks just need to learn how to cook it.
3. Serve only wild fish.
Most restaurants serve only farmed fish, which are the nautical equivalent of factory meat. Farmed fish are fed a totally unnatural diet, and are far less nourishing than wild fish. Wild fish taste much better.
4. Stop using modern vegetable oils, and use only traditional fats in cooking.
Almost all restaurants use modern vegetable oils. The favorite modern oils are soy and canola, as they are also the cheapest. These modern oils, which were never used prior to the twentieth century, have a terrible overbalance of omega-6 fatty acids, and are far inferior in nutritional value to traditional fats such as butter, lard, ghee, beef tallow, coconut oil, pure extra virgin olive oil, etc.
5. Serve a full plate of nourishing food, and fill up the empty spaces.
Few things annoy me more than ordering an expensive entrée and getting a tiny serving, with plenty of empty space on the plate. When I was a child, you could not even see the bottom of the plate until you had eaten something. Now, tiny portions of expensive entrées are “plated,” which is a fancy term for increasing profits by shortchanging people on food while leaving large areas of the plate empty. This results in people going home hungry, or buying appetizers on equally empty plates to try to satisfy their appetites. While this may increase profits, it is not fair to the customer, in my opinion. While restaurants seem to love the “deck-of-playing-cards”-size meat servings pushed by the government, they still charge huge prices for these tiny portions.
6. Throw away the microwave.
Many restaurants reheat a frozen entrée in the microwave, and serve it as “fresh.” Not only are there serious concerns about what microwaving does to food, but this practice is detrimental to both nutrition and taste. Freshly cooked food tastes much better.
7. Keep it clean.
Many restaurants are downright filthy. Many restaurant refrigerators are not nearly cold enough. There is no excuse for this. Every kitchen, serving area, food storage area, dish, and utensil should be clean. No exceptions. Every refrigerator should be at least forty degrees, or colder. People often get sick from the filth in restaurants and their food, and this can always be avoided.
8. Cook it great, every time!
Restaurant cooks and chefs are supposed to be professionals, who cook for a living. Every single dish they turn out should taste great, every single time.
I have eaten in many restaurants where a dish is good one time, and terrible the next. Many dishes are poorly cooked and mediocre. This can ruin a restaurant’s reputation. Good ingredients, properly cooked, taste great. It is that simple.
9. Stop using chemicals and flavor enhancers.
No restaurant should use MSG or other chemicals to artificially enhance the flavor of their food. Not only can these chemical additives be harmful, they mask the taste of poorly cooked food, and deceive the public as to the quality of the meal.
Many in the restaurant industry will claim that these suggestions are too expensive. As recently as the 1980s, many restaurants had similar standards (except for grassfed meat). Restaurants have a great ability to buy food wholesale, and to negotiate prices, especially when they are buying from individual farms and ranches. But more to the point is that restaurants are already very expensive, and I see no need to spend money on poor quality restaurant food.
This post is part of Monday Mania, Fat Tuesday, Real Food Wednesday and Fight Back Friday blog carnivals.
Aging in Reverse with Real Food—Then and Now
By Stanley A. Fishman, author of Tender Grassfed Meat and Tender Grassfed Barbecue
photo credit: 4johnny5 The redwood tree gets stronger and more beautiful with age.
My wife gave me a wonderful gift for Christmas. A DVD showing photos of our son when he was a baby and a small child. He looked great, and it was amazing to see how tiny he used to be. But there was someone else in some of the photos. Someone who did not look great. Someone who looked sick and strained, even at the happy times when these photos were taken. That someone used to be me.
These photos were taken from twelve to seventeen years ago. The man in those photos looks so much older, weaker, and sicker than I look today. The difference is so remarkable that I think it is worth describing. It is a living testimony of the difference that switching to real food can make.
The Skin—Then and Now
Then. The man in the photos has pale, pasty skin, quite blotchy, with a very unhealthy pallor. I remember that it was often itchy and irritated, with small growths that would come and go.
Now. My skin is smooth, supple, and a healthy color. It is hardly ever itchy and never irritated. The growths are gone.
The Mouth and Breathing—Then and Now
Then. The man in the photos always had his mouth wide open, and often appeared to be gasping for breath. I remember that I was on many medications for asthma and the constant respiratory infections I was afflicted with. I saw doctors frequently and occasionally had to be rushed to the emergency room when I got an asthma attack that the medication could not control. I remember that I could never get enough air, and could only breathe through my mouth. Often breathing and gasping for air would end with a nasty, painful hacking cough.
Now. My mouth is shut unless I am talking, or eating, or laughing. I breathe easily through my nose at all times. I hardly ever notice my breathing, which is effortless. I do not cough, or gasp, or choke. I am on no medications (over-the-counter or otherwise), and have not seen a doctor for at least nine years.
The Hair—Then and Now
Then. The man in the photos had dull, damp, thin, coarse hair that looked like it was about to fall out. I remember that I was losing hair, with ever growing bald spots.
Now. My hair is lighter in color, with a fair mixture of gray. But it is very thick, and gleams. It is soft and full-bodied. It never falls out. In fact, the bald spots seem to be shrinking a bit.
The Eyes—Then and Now
Then. The man in the pictures often had a look of pain in his eyes, even at the happy times when those pictures were taken. I remember that I was almost always in pain, with all kinds of discomforts, aches, and soreness—all over my body.
Now. My eyes are calm and serene. Many people tell me I have “kind eyes.” I usually feel good, with no pain or discomfort of any kind. When there is an occasional bump or ache, it goes away very quickly.
Posture—Then and Now
Then. The man in the photos is always slumped, whether sitting or standing. I remember that it seemed hard to hold my head up, to sit or stand straight, as I was so tired all the time. It was so hard just to get out of bed in the morning.
Now. I sit and stand straight naturally, without even thinking about it. I am full of energy most of the day and much of the night. I am eager for the day, which is always full of good things. I leap out of bed without effort.
What Did I Do Differently?
I switched completely to real food, in particular, grassfed meat, and stopped eating processed and factory foods. I followed the dietary guidelines of the Weston A. Price Foundation, modifying them a bit to eat only meats that are grassfed and grass-finished. It took years, but all my many illnesses healed, and I have had no need for drugs or doctors.
This is what real food can do.
This post is part of Monday Mania, Fat Tuesday, and Real Food Wednesday blog carnivals.
Using the Whole Goose, the Traditional Way
By Stanley A. Fishman, author of Tender Grassfed Meat and Tender Grassfed Barbecue
Goose casserole from delicious, nutrient-dense goose
Why get a goose? The goose has relatively little meat, lots of skin, a huge amount of bone, and a very large amount of fat. However, the meat is very nutrient-dense and filling, and absolutely delicious when properly cooked. The crisp skin is even better. The bones and fat give incredible flavor to the meat, and have many uses of their own. We get so many benefits from every goose.
We had a wonderful roast goose yesterday, for Christmas dinner. But that was just one of the benefits provided by this most delicious bird. My ancestors would use the whole goose, for food and other purposes. So I decided to do the same. I was delighted to find how many benefits could be provided by a single goose.
The Christmas Dinner
We bought the goose so we could have a traditional Christmas dinner. The goose not only provided the delicious main course, but also contributed to the stuffing and gravy.
The goose was supposed to be naturally raised. I examined the liver of the goose. The liver was firm and clear, a sign of a healthy bird. The ancient Romans used to examine the livers of chickens before a possible battle. A clear liver was the best omen. I think of it as a sign of a healthy goose that will be nourishing and tasty.
The goose itself provided the main course, a roast goose. I removed the interior fat and set it aside to render into liquid goose fat. The liver and heart were minced, and reserved for the stuffing. The neck and other giblets were set to simmer in a quart of filtered water, to provide a stock for the gravy.
I stuffed the goose with a sage, onion, and apple stuffing, moistened with plenty of whole pastured eggs, using cubes made from sourdough spelt bread, and mixed in the minced liver and heart.
As the goose roasted, it released a huge amount of fat into the pan. I removed the fat from the pan several times, and saved it.
When the goose was ready, the kitchen was filled with a wonderful aroma, and the crisp skin made it a most appetizing and beautiful sight. In fact, the goose looked and smelled so good we forgot to take a picture of it.
When it was time to make the gravy, I used goose fat drippings from the pan, along with sprouted spelt flour, as a base for the gravy, along with the goose broth made from the neck. Browned drippings from the pan were used to color the gravy and enrich its magnificent flavor.
The crisp skin and flavorful, tender meat of the goose were absolutely delicious, greatly enhanced by the stuffing and the very flavorful gravy. Goose is a very nutrient-dense meat, and very satisfying. We all felt wonderful after the meal.
The Leftovers
Goose bone broth, slowly simmered to perfection over many hours, is one of the tastiest of broths. We also had a lot of meat and skin left over, as well as stuffing and gravy. I trimmed the skin, and a fair amount of the tender meat from the carcass. This would be used for a goose casserole.
The rest of the bones, including the wings and the wing tips, and the sizable carcass, went into a large stockpot for goose bone broth. I started the broth early this morning, and it will simmer slowly into the early evening, so all the nutrients and flavors will release into the broth. This will give us many quarts of delicious, nutrient-dense, goose bone broth.
Goose casserole will be for lunch. I will chop the goose skin and meat into small bits, and add it to the stuffing and leftover gravy, with some more liquid from the simmering broth pot until it is just the right thickness. The mixture will be slowly simmered until it is hot and tender, and will be delicious. I know, because I have done this before.
The Glorious Goose Fat
I rendered the fat I removed from the goose, which turned into a nicely colored yellow liquid. I saved this in a mason jar, along with the goose fat I collected during the roasting process.
Goose fat has many uses. It is great for cooking and marinating. It has a somewhat beefy flavor, and can really enhance the flavor of all beef, from steaks to roasts to pot roasts. Potatoes roasted or sautéed in goose fat are a favorite dish in many European countries. Goose fat is wonderful for sautéing any kind of beef, and is perfect for caramelizing vegetables.
You can also use goose fat to baste any roast meat, and it gives great taste and crispness to roast chicken.
The ancient Greeks and Romans used goose fat to treat their wounds, and reported it was very effective. The same peoples would rub goose fat into aching joints and muscles, and considered it to be a very effective remedy. I have no personal experience with this, but these ancient peoples used it for those purposes.
Cool goose fat is a terrific moisturizer, being particularly soothing for dry winter skin. It will make you smell a bit like goose, but is very soothing.
So as you can see, we got a great deal of benefit from our goose, and we will be enjoying the flavorful fat and delicious broth for some time. Our ancestors knew just what to do with a goose.
This post is part of Monday Mania, Fat Tuesday, and Real Food Wednesday blog carnivals.
Give the Gift of Real Food
By Stanley A. Fishman, author of Tender Grassfed Meat and Tender Grassfed Barbecue
This delicious holiday meal of grassfed prime rib, pan-roasted potatoes, and sautéed cabbage was a joy to cook and eat.
This holiday season, like all holiday seasons, is a time to give and receive.
Gifts are a wonderful way to express your appreciation of another person, whether it is a relative or a friend. Some people are impressed by expensive, fancy gifts. I prefer gifts that give a real benefit, and the price or status of the gift is not important to me. A gift that shows something of the giver is often the best of all. A gift that gives pleasure, and supports joy, is a gift I cherish, both as a giver and a receiver.
Would you like to give a gift that has the following benefits:
- Gives great pleasure to the person who receives it
- Gives great pleasure to the giver
- Creates a wonderful aroma in the home
- Makes the person who receives it feel wonderful
- Improves the natural functions of the body
- Creates a wonderful feeling of contentment and satisfaction
- Warms the body and soul
For me, this most magic of gifts is real food, skillfully and lovingly prepared.
The Most Traditional of Gifts
Many decisions are being made about gifts at this time of year. In modern times, we often think of commercial products like electronics, jewelry, designer clothing, and a host of other products when we are deciding what to give. Yet in older times, one of the most popular and appreciated gifts was that of food. Not just any food, but special foods that would not only be appreciated for their wonderful taste, but would nourish the body and soul of the receiver. These special foods were not factory candies and cakes, but some of the most nourishing and delicious real foods available.
Not only was the giving of special foods a tradition, but the cooking of those foods by a skilled cook was a much-anticipated blessing of the holiday season, and great efforts were made to have this happen. This was true for almost everybody. For the poor, the holiday season might be one of the few times they actually had grassfed meat or pastured pork to eat, or another special meat such as goose, or duck, or a capon. Grassfed or pastured meat, or wild fish, were the featured highlight of holiday meals. The traditional European holiday feast dishes covered such wonderful dishes as roast prime rib of beef, pork loin roasted with the skin on, rack of lamb, saddle of lamb, roast stuffed goose, roast stuffed turkey, roast duck, and many others.
What made these gifts unique is that they actually nourished the bodies of the lucky people who ate them, improving their natural functions and creating a wonderful feeling of well-being and contentment.
Traditionally, these foods were real food, not factory food, and were exactly the kind of traditional food our bodies welcome and thrive on.
It is true that many holiday foods were special desserts. But these were different than modern desserts. They always contained large amounts of saturated animal fat such as butter, lard, and egg yolks. They were only served at the end of a meal, when the eater’s body was well-nourished with traditional fats and other nutrients that protected the body from the effects of the sugar in the desserts.
GMOs, pesticides, and artificial chemicals had no place in these wonderful, traditional foods.
While you may not find much real food in the supermarket, local farmers and ranchers, and farmers’ markets often have wonderful real food available, including grassfed and pastured meat, and organic or the equivalent vegetables and fruits. There are some wonderful Internet sources of great grassfed and pastured meat. Three of my favorites are U.S. Wellness Meats, Homestead Natural Foods, and NorthStar Bison.
Give the Blessings of Your Cooking
Even the best quality real food needs a skilled cook. A skilled cook can turn the best natural ingredients into a feast that will provide great eating pleasure and nutrients to all who are lucky enough to share in the meal. If you can cook, the time and effort you put into making a holiday feast is a wonderful gift to all who eat it, and to yourself.
If you do not think of yourself as a skilled cook, I have some good news.
Cooking wonderful real food is easy, and simple. There is an old saying, “God gives us good meat, the devil sends us cooks.” The meaning of this saying is that high-quality food should not have its great natural taste overwhelmed by fancy and complicated cooking. The wonderful natural flavors and tastes of the food will do most of the magic for you. All you have to do is bring them out. The recipes I use create wonderful food, yet most of them are very simple and easy to use. Tender Grassfed Meat and Tender Grassfed Barbecue are full of simple recipes for grassfed and pastured meat that result in wonderful food, cooked in an easy and natural way.
I spend a big part of the holiday season planning and cooking the holiday feasts, as a gift to my loved ones. It is also a gift to me, as I also get to share in the feast!
This post is part of Monday Mania, Fat Tuesday, Real Food Wednesday and Fight Back Friday blog carnivals.
Feast Without Fear — on Real Food
By Stanley A. Fishman, author of Tender Grassfed Meat and Tender Grassfed Barbecue
Santa's Workshop is the newest addition to my wife's Christmas Village collection this year.
The holiday season has come. It should be a time of joy, a time to celebrate. Wonderful, special meals have always been part of the holiday season, but an ugly new element has entered the scene in the last few years—fear. Every holiday season, we are barraged with fear—fear of getting fat, fear of eating fat, fear of indigestion, fear of getting sick, fear of cholesterol, fear of heart disease, fear, fear, fear!
We are told, over and over again, to count calories, eat low fat, substitute dead factory foods for the rich, traditional holiday foods of our ancestors—where is the joy in that?
All of that fear is nonsense, if you eat properly prepared real food. Leave the factory products in the supermarket, and buy grassfed meats, grassfed organ meats, pastured pork, pastured poultry, traditional dairy, wild fish and seafood, organic or the equivalent fruits and vegetables, real pastured butter, traditional fermented foods, and make this the basis of your holiday feasts. You will not only enjoy a magnificent feast, but feel much better after eating these truly nourishing foods.
There is nothing to fear about eating real food. Nothing.
The Joy of Feasting
Almost every culture on Earth has celebrated holidays by enjoying a special meal, or meals. The finest meats, fish, vegetables, and almost every other kind of food were carefully prepared by traditional methods, and served in quantity during the feast. Many of the best recipes were specially designed for the holidays, and served only at that time. The Christmas feast was so important in old England that wages often included a fat goose at the holiday season—so even the middle and poorer classes could enjoy a special holiday feast. Fear of the food was not even an issue for most of our history, and the feasts were cherished, looked forward to, and enjoyed, with great gusto. Feasting is one of the most universal and traditional human joys, and a feast should be an occasion for pleasure, joy, and good fellowship for all.
This joy is often absent in modern times, where carefully designed propaganda has convinced many people to be afraid of food, especially the rich holiday specialties enjoyed by our ancestors. Fear ruins joy.
Real Food Feasts Are Good for Us
Not only is joy great for human health, along with being a great deal of fun, but the traditional foods of the feast are great for the natural functions of our bodies. Often these meals center around special cuts of meat, poultry, and fish, cooked in a traditional manner with rich sauces and side dishes. If real food is used, we are talking about grassfed meat, pastured pork, pastured poultry, wild fish and seafood, and flavorful organic fruits and vegetables. We are also talking about plenty of pastured butter, pastured cheese, and the wonderful saturated animal fat that comes from the pastured animals. These foods are exactly what our bodies crave, and give us the nutrition we need for our natural functions to work at their very best, which leaves us satisfied and feeling wonderful. When we eat a well-balanced meal of real food, we are getting all the nutrition that we need.
Traditional foods that are eaten at this time are often especially rich in the nutrients that our bodies crave.
Even though many traditional holiday desserts come with sugar, the traditional forms of these desserts are loaded with butter, cream , lard, egg yolks, and other sources of saturated animal fat that help protect our bodies from the effects of sugar. And the original forms of the desserts contained far less sugar than modern desserts.
When we are eating real food, our bodies regulate our appetite by what we actually ingest, because there are no phony chemicals or dead foods to con our bodies into overeating.
Many people equate feasting with feeling bloated or stuffed. I used to, until I switched completely to real food. I have never felt bloated or stuffed since.
Our Holiday Feast Plans
We have four feasts during this holiday season: Christmas Eve, Christmas, New Year’s Eve, and New Year’s Day. We start planning the menus right after Thanksgiving, and look for the best real food we can find.
This year, we will have grassfed prime rib for Christmas Eve, redolent with the unique, mouthwatering flavor that only grassfed prime rib has, along with a plethora of delicious side dishes.
For Christmas, we will have a pastured goose, stuffed with a traditional apple stuffing roasted inside the bird, with crisp goose skin—one of the most delicious things on earth, gravy from the drippings, and other wonderful side dishes.
New Year’s Eve will bring a pastured pork loin roast, with a magnificent fat cap, marinated with Polish seasonings, roasted on a bed of apples, surrounded by roasting potatoes crisped to perfection by the melting pork fat, and many other wonderful side dishes.
New Year’s Day itself will bring another prime rib. Why two prime ribs? Since we eat only grassfed beef, we could not decide whether to get a prime rib from U.S. Wellness Meats or Homestead Natural Foods. Both have wonderful meat, yet the flavor is quite different because the plants the cattle graze on are quite different. We solved the problem by getting both, and having them on different holidays. Besides, a major holiday is a perfect excuse for the expense of prime rib, a cut we all love.
How much will we eat? As much as we want, no more, no less. And we will feel wonderful.
This post is part of Monday Mania, Fat Tuesday, Real Food Wednesday and Fight Back Friday blog carnivals.
Why Grassfed Meat Is Better
By Stanley A. Fishman, author of Tender Grassfed Meat and Tender Grassfed Barbecue
Grassfed Butter Steak, Tender Grassfed Barbecue, page 76
One of the questions I get asked most often is this—“What is different about grassfed beef?”
Many people seem to think the only difference is that grassfed beef is “always tough,” and that grassfed beef lacks the “great flavor” that is supposed to come from “corn feeding.” I have found that properly cooked grassfed meat is very tender, has much more flavor, and a much better texture than conventional beef.
There are many important differences between grassfed and conventional meat. The very composition and content of the meat is very different.
Because of the vast difference in the qualities of the meat, grassfed meat is best when cooked differently than conventional, “corn-fed” meat.
How Grassfed Meat Is Different
Grassfed Meat Is an Ancient Food
Grassfed meat, coming from herbivorous animals eating their natural diet of grass and meadow plants, is one of the oldest foods of mankind, maybe the oldest. This means that the human body has adapted over uncounted thousands of years to digest and process this meat. Our bodies know the composition of grassfed meat, and how to absorb nutrients from it, and expect to find all those nutrients there when they digest the meat. Conventional meat has a totally different nutritional profile, and had not been eaten by humans until the twentieth century. Grassfed meat, fat, and bones are perhaps the most primal of foods.
Grassfed Meat Has Superior Nutritional Value
Grassfed meat has the proper balance of omega-3 fatty acids to omega-6 fatty acids, containing far more omega-3s than conventional meat. Grassfed meat is also rich with CLA, a valuable nutrient that has many benefits. Conventional meat has a much higher ratio of omega-6 fatty acids, one that does not occur in naturally-fed meat. Conventional feedlot beef has far less CLA and omega-3 fatty acids than grassfed meat. Grassfed meat is also richer than conventional meat in many other nutrients.
Grassfed Meat Has Far Less Water and Should Be Cooked Differently
Grassfed meat is denser than conventional beef, and shrinks far less in cooking. Conventional meat is often quite watery, and that water cooks away when the meat is cooked, resulting in much more shrinkage. The need to deal with the water has led to the development of modern meat-cooking techniques, which will ruin grassfed meat. Because grassfed meat has far less water, it is best when cooked differently than conventional beef.
Grassfed Beef Tastes Much Better
Properly cooked grassfed meat is not tough, but tender, and has much better flavor than conventional meat. I can no longer stand the taste and texture of conventional meat, because grassfed meat tastes so much better. Grassfed meat from different breeds and producers taste different, in many wonderful ways, providing a wonderful variety of deep, rich flavors. The best comparison is with the many varieties of fine wine, which have many different tastes. Conventional beef always tastes the same—blah.
Grassfed Meat Cooks Faster and Easier
Grassfed meat cooks much faster than conventional meat, and is much easier to cook. This statement may surprise some people, but grassfed meat has so much flavor that it needs far less in the way of spices and sauces to be absolutely delicious. When you know the right techniques for cooking grassfed meat, it is very easy to cook. Tender Grassfed Meat: Traditional Ways to Cook Healthy Meat and Tender Grassfed Barbecue: Traditional, Primal and Paleo are both full of easy ways to cook delicious grassfed meat.
There are many other differences, but these are the major ones. Tender Grassfed Meat and Tender Grassfed Barbecue both cover the subject in detail, pointing out the many differences in the composition and cooking qualities of grassfed and conventional meats.
This post is part of Monday Mania, Fat Tuesday, Real Food Wednesday and Fight Back Friday blog carnivals.
Raw Vidalia Salsa Provides Balance for Grassfed Meat
By Stanley A. Fishman, author of Tender Grassfed Meat
Raw vegetable salsa goes so well with grassfed meat.
Many traditional peoples would always eat vegetables with their meat. Since meat is acidic, and vegetables are alkaline, this helped them maintain a proper pH balance in their bodies.
It is a German tradition to eat plenty of vegetables with steak, and a Latin American tradition to eat a raw vegetable condiment with meat, in the form of a salsa, chimichurri, or Pebre.
My upcoming barbecue book includes several such recipes for raw vegetable condiments. This recipe did not make it into the book, because I invented it last week, and the book is done except for the index, which is well on the way. It is a very tasty and satisfying recipe, so I thought I would print it here as a gift for my readers.
This recipe combines the sweetness of organic Vidalia onions with traditional salsa ingredients to form an absolutely delicious side dish for any grassfed meat. The fresh vegetables are full of enzymes and other nutrients, which will help with digestion. While it calls for organic ingredients, the equivalent of organic is just as good.
INGREDIENTS:
5 ripe red organic tomatoes, finely chopped
1 medium organic Vidalia onion, peeled and finely chopped
1 organic red bell pepper, seeded and finely chopped
1 organic green bell pepper, seeded and finely chopped
¼ cup fresh organic cilantro leaves, finely chopped
2 stalks organic celery, finely chopped
2 tablespoons unfiltered organic extra virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon unfiltered raw organic apple cider vinegar
1 tablespoon Thai fish sauce
1 teaspoon freshly ground organic black pepper
1 teaspoon coarse unrefined sea salt, crushed
1 teaspoon to 1 tablespoon organic hot sauce of your choice, depending on how hot you like it (optional)
Combine all ingredients in a large bowl. Stir until well mixed. Let rest in a covered bowl for an hour before serving. Tastes best at room temperature. You can refrigerate this for a few days, if you have any left.
This post is part of Monday Mania, Real Food Wednesday and Fight Back Friday blog carnivals.
Traditional Barbecue Methods Are Worth the Effort
By Stanley A. Fishman, author of Tender Grassfed Meat
Pastured pork spareribs barbecued the traditional way.
Convenience has a high price. I just threw out an old cookbook that was all about making cooking easier by using prepackaged mixes, canned soups, broth cubes, microwaves, and other modern ways to make cooking easier. The main cooking skill you needed to use this book was the ability to open packages. Nothing was mentioned about the miserable nutritional profile of such “foods,” or about the effects of all the chemicals and preservatives. Or the fact that real cooking tastes so much better.
Convenience is a big part of modern American barbecue. Gas grills, pellet grills, premade factory sauces, premade factory rubs, premade factory marinades, all make barbecuing so convenient. The problem is that this convenience destroys the very factors that make true barbecue so delicious and nourishing.
I used to barbecue on an electric-powered grill that used wood pellets as fuel. You could actually set the temperature for how hot you wanted it, in degrees just like an oven. All you had to do was make sure the hopper was full of pellets, and then turn it on. It was easy to use. I thought the food cooked on it had a nice flavor, much better than any gas grill.
Well, a funny thing happened in the two years I spent writing my upcoming barbecue book. I decided to try to recreate traditional barbecue methods. This meant making a real fire, with real lump charcoal, or hardwood briquets that were made completely from hardwood, or burning hardwood down to coals. This meant making all my own marinades and bastes, from scratch. I got a common kettle grill that was powered by nothing but my own body and the fires I built in it. I used this grill to cook every meat recipe in the book, at least twice. And the barbecue I produced on this traditional style grill was so much better than the pellet grill, there was no comparison.
It was less convenient, and took a bit more effort. But it was worth it.
I decided that I was going to make the most traditional American sparerib barbecue I could, for a friend who came over two days ago.
I made an heirloom baste that was developed in the 1930s, by simmering various fresh vegetables and spices for hours, straining the liquid, and refrigerating it overnight, then adding a few traditional seasoning liquids, and simmering it again.
I used this baste as a marinade for some pastured spareribs, which sat in the baste for two days.
I built a fire out of hickory wood and hickory charcoal, and burned it down to coals, using tongs to move various pieces so they would fit properly in the fire bed.
I drained the ribs, boiled and strained the baste that had marinated them.
I made a rub out of various traditional spices, and sprinkled it all over the ribs.
I cooked the ribs slowly, first with moderate heat, then with low heat, basting them every 20 minutes, for two and a half hours.
We were rewarded with spareribs that were so good it is hard to describe them. So tender, with a nice pink smoke ring, and the kind of deep, smoky barbecue taste that can only be created by real barbecue, with a real fire, made with real fuel. That taste was so outstanding and memorable that I am still savoring it, two days later. It was the real thing.
No gas grill, no pellet grill, no processed condiments will ever come close to producing the real thing.
It was well worth the effort.
This recipe for spareribs is advanced, but I was trying to make the best ribs I possibly could, in the old style.
I intentionally kept most of the recipes in my upcoming barbecue cookbook simple and easy to make. All of these recipes rely on the magic of real fire, real fuel, real seasonings, and real grassfed and pastured meat to make totally delicious and nourishing food.
This post is part of Fight Back Friday and Monday Mania blog carnivals.
Natural Salt vs. Industrial Salt
By Stanley A. Fishman, author of Tender Grassfed Meat
Natural unrefined sea salt on the left and industrial salt on the right.
Salt is necessary for life. If you get only some of the salt you need, you will experience serious health problems.
If you do not get a minimum amount of salt, you will die.
Yet salt is vilified and blamed for high blood pressure and other diseases. The idiotic nutritional guidelines issued by the government demand that everybody cut their salt intake substantially. Various city governments are also trying to seriously reduce the amount of salt eaten, even putting restrictions on restaurants.
The studies are inconclusive and often contradictory. Yet no authority bothers to distinguish among the two major kinds of salt:
- Salt as it is found in nature, which comes with dozens of minerals and other substances;
- Industrial salt, which has everything but sodium chloride processed out of the salt.
Natural salt has been used by humans since the beginning of humanity. Industrial salt did not even exist before the twentieth century. But this crucial difference is ignored by a large portion of the medical profession and by the government, which considers all salt to be the same.
There is a great difference between the two salts—in composition, nutrient content, and taste. Natural unrefined salt is greatly superior, in every way but one.
The Two Salts Are Different in Composition and Nutrient Content
Natural, unrefined sea salt contains dozens of trace minerals and other substances.
Industrial salt contains only pure sodium chloride, and chemicals and sweeteners that have been added to make the salt eatable and free-flowing.
When we eat salt, our bodies have evolved to expect all the trace minerals and other substances to come with the salt. When those minerals and substances are not in the salt, our body craves them, and sends out the hunger signal to eat more salt. But no amount of industrial salt will satisfy this craving, because the minerals and other substances are just not there. This craving causes many people to eat too much industrial salt.
Natural, unrefined sea salt contains all the trace minerals and other substances that our bodies have evolved to use when salt is consumed. This kind of salt is very satisfying, and I find that it takes much less natural salt to satisfy my salt hunger.
The Two Salts Are Vastly Different in Taste
Many years ago, my father bought me a subscription to a renowned medical publication. The very first issue contained an article on salt. The author, a scientist with many letters after his name, asserted the following:
All salt, from the cheapest supermarket brand to the most expensive sea salt, is the same.
All salt, from the cheapest supermarket brand to the most expensive sea salt, tastes the same.
I promptly cancelled the subscription to the publication. Why? Because both of those statements were utterly untrue. I knew that the composition of these salts were different just by looking at the content of the salts. I knew the taste was different because I have a tongue.
Unrefined sea salt comes in various forms, which vary in taste, but all of these sea salts taste so much better than industrial salt.
In fact, pure sodium chloride tastes so harsh and bitter that nobody can stand the awful taste. That is why sweeteners and chemicals are added to change the taste. One of the most common additions to industrial salt is—sugar.
Salt Is Refined for Profit and Ease of Use
Why is salt refined? Money. The trace minerals extracted from refined salt are valuable and have many industrial applications.
Industrial salt is much cheaper. That is why industrial salt is used in most processed foods.
The other reason is convenience. Unrefined salt tends to clump together, and not flow freely. The user must break up the clumps to use the salt. Industrial refined salt flows freely and easily, because it has chemicals added to make it so.
I would much rather deal with salt clumps than eat industrial salt.
I only use unrefined sea salt for cooking and seasoning. I have two reasons: I believe my body has evolved to use salt in its natural form with the trace minerals, and unrefined sea salt has a much better flavor.
Some people have asked why Tender Grassfed Meat uses only unrefined sea salt in the recipes. The answer is that unrefined sea salt tastes so much better.
Disclaimer: I should mention that I am not a doctor or a scientist, and I am not advising anybody on the safety or usage of salt, or what salt, or what amount of salt to eat. I am merely describing my understanding of the differences, and my personal reasons for only using unrefined sea salt.
This post is part of Real Food Wednesday, Fight Back Friday and Monday Mania blog carnivals.
Collard Greens Make a Great Side Dish for Grassfed Meat
By Stanley A. Fishman, author of Tender Grassfed Meat
Ingredients for traditional organic collard greens with natural uncured bacon, organic hot sauce, and unfiltered raw organic apple cider vinegar.
While grassfed meat is my favorite food, part of the pleasure comes from eating it with delicious side dishes. Some of these side dishes are so good they become favorites, and are made time and time again. The recipe in this post is one of my favorites, and I have made it often. It goes wonderfully with every kind of grassfed meat. I love to make this dish with collard greens that have deep green, firm leaves.
Collard greens originated in West Africa, and are loaded with nutrition, with many vitamins and minerals concentrated in their deep green leaves. They are a staple of traditional soul food. Traditionally, collard greens are cooked for a very long time, with some kind of fatty pork. More modern versions cut the fat, but not mine. I keep the pork fat but reduce the cooking time.
I happened to mention this recipe during an Internet chat on Twitter that was sponsored by Seeds of Change, a wonderful organic seed company that is preserving real organic seeds and making them available. My good friend Kimberly Hartke, of the blog Hartke Is Online, asked me to post the recipe, so here it is.
Quick Collard Greens with Bacon
Serves 4
INGREDIENTS
2 thick slices fatty uncured bacon, or 4 thin slices, (if the uncured bacon is not salted, add 1 teaspoon of unrefined sea salt)
2 cups filtered water
1 large bunch fresh organic collard greens, with deep green leaves
3 tablespoons unfiltered raw organic apple cider vinegar
1 teaspoon thick red organic hot sauce of your choice
1. Wash the collard greens well with filtered water, making sure any soil or sand is washed off. Remove the leaves from the stem, tearing the leaves into 2 to 3 inch pieces. Discard the stems.
2. Pour 2 quarts filtered water into a stainless steel pot with the bacon, and bring to a slow boil. Cover, and cook for 10 minutes. This will cook a lot of the fat into the water, where it will really flavor the greens.
3. Add the greens, vinegar, and hot sauce to the pot. Bring the pot back to a strong simmer. Cover, and cook for 20 minutes. Remove the greens to a serving dish with a slotted spoon.
Serve and enjoy with the grassfed meat of your choice. This recipe goes perfectly with the recipes for grassfed meat contained in my cookbook Tender Grassfed Meat.
This post is part of Weekend Gourmet, Real Food Wednesday and Fight Back Friday blog carnivals.