Worst Corned Beef. Ever.

This past St. Patrick’s Day, we had the worst corned beef. Ever.

What we had was a grass-fed uncured corned beef. It was more expensive than our usual corned beef, and not nearly as red or as fatty-looking. Or as tasty.

Grass-fed beef is never going to be as fatty as corn-fed beef. Corn is used as beef feed because a) we have a helluva lot of corn in this country, b) corn bulks up the cattle before harvesting, and c) corn puts flavorful fat on the meat. Without the fat, there’s going to be less flavor, less lushness on the tongue, more toughness to the teeth.

Years ago, when cattle were allowed to spend their lives grazing on grass land, all beef was grass fed. The cow, in fact, is “designed” to eat grass; its stomach is not really suitable for eating corn all its life long. In fact, eating corn over the long-term will cause cows to develop some serious digestive problems. That’s one reason why corn-fed beef is fattened up fast and then harvested before the beast suffers and perhaps perishes from ulcers, resulting infections and other maladies that result from stuffing its chambered stomach with something it has not evolved to be able to digest.

We should really be eating more grass-fed beef, not only because it’s more natural for the cow, but because it offers certain health benefits to the eater. Grass-fed beef is leaner, lower in calories, helpful in lowering LDL cholesterol and high in the much vaunted omega-3 fatty acids, which research indicates is good for lowering the risk of heart disease, even attention deficit disorder and Alzheimer’s.

Problem is, grass-fed beef just is not as tasty as corn-fed beef, at least to those of us who grew up on the stuff. If you’d never tasted corn-fed beef, grass-fed beef would not suffer so by comparison. But we have, so it does.

I posted a picture of our sad, dry, leathery-looking St. Patrick’s day corned beef on Facebook. Oak Parker Mike Janowski asked, “Uh…if it’s uncured, then how is it corned?”

To that, I can only respond that we do allow restaurants and other food retailers to call their food that which it is not, with no apparent consequences, as I mentioned in a recent post about “chicken” at Native Foods Café.

So this corned beef was not “cured” in the traditional sense, and as Rob Leavitt of Chicago’s The Butcher and Larder commented “Uncured = lack of nitrates. Usually means celery powder is added instead.”

Nitrates are a controversial ingredient in cured products. Some research indicates the nitrates could lead to increased risk of Alzheimer’s, diabetes and Parkinson’s Disease.

Other, somewhat contradictory research indicates that nitrates are not all that harmful and that, in fact, vegetables are a huge source of nitrates in the diet.

And substituting lots of celery salt for nitrates raises the sodium level, which may not be healthy for those seeking to avoid salt.

So, when buying corned beef, I’m going to use as my guide the only certain standard I have: taste. If it tastes good, I’m going to eat it. Until further notice, I’m going with corn-fed corned beef.