Ethical Meat vs. Meat Hype: A Look at “All Natural”, “Grass-Fed” and Other Half-Truths 159 Comments

159 Responses to “Ethical Meat vs. Meat Hype: A Look at “All Natural”, “Grass-Fed” and Other Half-Truths”

• Will
  February 17th, 2009
  12:31 pm
  

  I’ve been a faithful vegetarian, aspiring vegan, for over 10 healthy years.

  It’s easy.

• Marshall Haas
  February 17th, 2009
  12:33 pm
  

  Some of those labels are quite laughable.
  However I’m 100% a meat eater

• David
  February 17th, 2009
  12:36 pm
  

  Tim, I agree that one of your best activities is getting to know your local butcher, and make sure they are pretty knowledgeable about what they are selling. I like getting my questions answered by them. For your fruits and vegetables its also good to pay attention to which country they come from since different countries have different standards for pesticides. Its pretty sad how bad food labels are manipulated. The good part is that the consumer is a lot more educated than they used to be. Now if we can lift this dumb ban in California over producing raw almonds (even though you can eat raw fish) that would be a good move.

• Tim Case
  February 17th, 2009
  12:37 pm
  

  As an american now living in Brazil, I’m amazed at how much better grass fed beef tastes. The difference in the meat here is very pronounced and you’ll notice that the flavor overall is much different, it’s a stronger flavor and varies quite a bit from cut to cut so that you can choose which cuts you eat not just based on their tenderness but in the different flavors they have, it’s also extremely lean compared to American beef. If you consider yourself a connoisseur of beef I think you are missing out if you’ve never been to Brazil or Argentina(even more so) to try their beef, and no going to the Brazilian or Argentine restaurant at your local mall doesn’t count.

• Jack Smith
  February 17th, 2009
  12:37 pm
  

  Skinny Bitch was also an interesting read on nutrition. I’ll have to check out The Omnivore’s Dilemma. Why does it seem like it is getting harder and harder to enjoy a good steak?

• Freya
  February 17th, 2009
  12:39 pm
  

  What a great article. I’m not a vegetarian, but I do really try to buy meat sparingly and held to a standard. I knew some of the terms, but others were a surprise.

• X
  February 17th, 2009
  12:40 pm
  

  Great article Tim. Most of the “healthy” things people eat are crap.

  When are you going to try a pure raw food diet? That just sounds like a Tim Ferriss thing to be doing.

• Damien K Quick
  February 17th, 2009
  12:50 pm
  

  Thanks tim! We did quite a bit of research in our local area to find a trust worthy local butcher that sources locally farmed ‘free range’ and ‘organic’ meat. conscious of food miles as well. we managed to find 2 such butchers within a 15km of our house, and feel much better for it.
  D

• Clark Valberg
  February 17th, 2009
  12:52 pm
  

  It is perhaps valuable to note that the (appropriate) practice of Kosher law also carries with it a long and detailed list of raising, slaughtering, and handling standards that make it popular choice for MANY health and environmentally-conscious Jews and non-Jews alike.

• Gennaro @ Enduring Wanderlust
  February 17th, 2009
  12:57 pm
  

  It comes down to marketing with these labels. They are a direct response to current fads. The same is true for labels on other products that claim a connection to other diets (Adkins) or who offer fat or sugar free products such as cookies. There is a bit of deception in each case. In the case of meat or poultry, it’s particulary important for regulations to be sound.

  Pollan’s most recent book was correct in saying that we are best served by eating mostly plants and limiting our overall intake of food. It’s also true that food is one of the treasures of life and we should enjoy it.

• Adam Steer - Better Is Better
  February 17th, 2009
  1:09 pm
  

  This is precicely why I’ve taken up the practice of buying meat directly from the farm. I sourced out great providers of longhorn steer and bison, bought a freezer, and purchased my meat in 1/4 carcass quantities. It is working out fabulously. And because I am 100% confident in the providence and handling of my meat, I have no problems with eating carpaccio or tartar.

  Thanks for the enlightening post. A few of those murky terms were even more meaningless than I though…

  Cheers,
  Adam

• Bleicke
  February 17th, 2009
  1:14 pm
  

  Hey Tim,

  What is your opinion on vegetarianism/veganism? I tried following the diet on your blog for about a month, then turned vegetarian (not sure if as a direct result of your diet :-). I don’t miss meat and it feels healtier.

  What are your experiences? Also sport-wise, since I’m performance-interested and heard animal products are bad for physical performance (source: “The Thrive Diet”, nice read also).

• Pete
  February 17th, 2009
  1:14 pm
  

  Good info, but I think I tend to subscribe to the “not care” camp. I grew up on a farm, have seen meat processed, etc. And I don’t care. I’ll continue to buy meat at the grocer, or via the county fair, or from the livestock our farm sends to the stockyards. I’ll order steaks and burgers and whatnot from any restaurant in the US. Sure, I’ll tend to stick towards leaner meats when I can, but all in all the whole “labeling” movement seems to mostly be scaremongering by the veggie crowd. Sigh….

• Jimflip
  February 17th, 2009
  1:26 pm
  

  Hi Tim,

  I was under the impression “air chilled” was related to the process after slaughter, rather than an interesting visual of battery chickens under an air-conditioner.

  “The air-chilling process, common in Western Europe for more than 45 years, is still fairly new in the United States. It refers to a specific method used to cool chickens after slaughtering. Most chickens in this country are processed by being immersed in ice water. By contrast, air-chilling cools chickens by blasting them with cold air.” – Carolyn Jung – San Jose Mercury News, March 26, 2008 (Courtesy of http://www.projo.com/food)

• topseekrit
  February 17th, 2009
  1:30 pm
  

  This is very timely, I’m in the middle of a 30 day vegetarian challenge and have discovered it’s really not that hard to achieve. I don’t eat red meat outside of the challenge but these labels make me cringe. I can only imagine the horror stories of chicken – part of me does not want to know LOL

  I’d love to see more posts on your veggie venture!

• Vegan Libre
  February 17th, 2009
  1:34 pm
  

  I stopped eating meat and all animal products (including dairy and eggs) almost 4 months ago. Before this I was eating meat 3 meals per day. There is tremendous peace of mind knowing that generally speaking, the food you eat won’t kill or harm you, and of course, you are not exploiting animals to feed yourself. I was a serious carnivore my entire life but going vegan was not as hard as some people might think. As for sports and workout performance, I exercise hard 7 days per week, including 3 days per week of weight training. You have to pay attention to how you feed yourself, but this is no different than when you eat meat – you can be undernourished no matter what your diet is. There is plenty of protein from many non-animal sources (legumes, soy, nuts, etc.) – it makes a lot of sense to go vegan if you are concerned about the quality and health issues behind consuming animal products. You should try it!

  - Leo

• Robert Plamondon
  February 17th, 2009
  1:35 pm
  

  I raise pastured poultry and eggs, and the fact is, everyone is approaching the issue backwards. The first thing to find out is, “Who has the best stuff, and how good is it?” If the best is good enough, the next issue is, “How can I get stuff like that in my neck of the woods?” Instead, the focus is on the kind of stuff that’s already flowing through supermarkets and health-food chains, which means it’s from high-volume producers. Wrong place to start.

  Top quality in meat and eggs requires thoughtful, sympathetic handling at every stage. You can taste the level of care — it’s better than any label. Stupid tricks like giving a flock of hens a tiny, barren yard won’t make the eggs taste any better, while raising them with low-density methods on a green pasture will.

  The other Achilles heel is that the good stuff is expensive. My eggs go for $5 a dozen, but in a city supermarket, they’d have to go for $10. Lots of people prefer factory-farmed eggs with a feel-good label to that kind of price.

• Jeremiah Bell (Digital Trainer)
  February 17th, 2009
  1:40 pm
  

  If you are interested in further reading. I would suggest The Jungle, the book you quoted. It was a great read.I originally found it through Fast Food Nation.

  If you are interested in the talking to butchers approach, I would also recommend The Confessions of a Butcher: Eating Steak on a Hamburger Budget by John Smith. J.D. over at Get Rich Slowly did a great review if you only have a few minutes.

  http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2009/02/14/confessions-of-a-butcher-eating-steak-on-a-hamburger-budget/

  Cheers,

  Jeremiah

• Sara
  February 17th, 2009
  1:45 pm
  

  Hi Tim,
  Thanks for trying to care.
  I’ve been a vegan for 32 years.
  I love it when my meat eating friends at least look at how the animal was
  treated and try and make the most human and healthiest choice.
  Aside from the inhumane slaughter and raising conditions-going vegan is the best thing you can do for our Greenhouse gas issues.
  United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization reports that livestock sector generates more greenhouse gas emissions than automobiles. It is also a major source of land and water degradation.
  Anyway-whatever you do, it’s great you are experimenting!
  Sara

• Aaron
  February 17th, 2009
  1:48 pm
  

  The lies and half-truths perpetrated by food manufacturers are astounding. What’s even more astounding is that people (literally) buy into it. For example, the term “organic”. It has been so overused to make it nearly meaningless. What is healthy about a pop-tart that is “organic”? Is it nominally better for you than a regular pop tart? Maybe, but certainly not as much as the marketers would have you believe. Mark Sisson did a great post about his awhile back. It is one of my favorites:

  http://www.marksdailyapple.com/organic-green-junk-food/

  He’s also touched on the meat issue recently…
  http://www.marksdailyapple.com/everything-but-the-squeal/

  Thanks for the great material, Tim. Keep up the great work.

• Lorraine
  February 17th, 2009
  1:53 pm
  

  Thanks for throwing light on this issue, Tim.

  I believe the only way to be assured that animals are raised and killed healthily and humanely is to know the farmer personally.

  I stopped buying meat for several years until I could find a–relatively–local farmer who could provide the assurance I need.

  New Yorkers: Sap Bush Hollow Farm sells TRULY grass-fed beef, pork, chickens and turkeys. The animals are humanely raised and slaughtered at the farm.

  Check them out at http://www.sapbush.com/

  The farm is run by 3 generations of the Hayes Family. Adele and Jim Hayes have been instrumental in creating New York State’s humane mobile slaughter units.

  Transport is horrifically inhumane and traumatic for animals that are often deprived of food and water and suffer untreated injuries as they are moved long distances for slaughter.

  I believe Sap Bush Hollow is the only farm in NY that’s USDA certified to slaughter on location.

  Shannon Hayes, Adele and Jim’s daughter is a gifted writer and author of The Grassfed Gourmet.

• Ricardo
  February 17th, 2009
  1:54 pm
  

  In conclusion, the best ones are :

  HUMANELY RAISED; CERTIFIED HUMANE

  BIODYNAMIC

  ?

• Tim Ferriss
  February 17th, 2009
  2:09 pm
  

  @Ricardo,

  In my opinion, yes, those would be three of the best (and best defined) designations: humanely raised, certified humane, and especially biodynamic.

  All the best,

  Tim

• James Darling
  February 17th, 2009
  2:05 pm
  

  I’m not sure how much this has taken off in the US, but here in the UK, what started as “Organic Vegetable Box” delivery schemes has turned into a fantastic way to delegate good food choices to not experts, specifically the producers themselves.

  For me, I cannot recommend Riverford enough. I put in a few hours of research, and tried a few schemes to find this one, but now I have, I no longer worry about where my food comes from, because I really trust them to provide fantastic, and ethical, food. They produce nearly all of it themselves, and have almost faultless processes.

  I’d recommend you have a look at http://www.riverford.co.uk/ and watch the 3 minute 30 video. It’s been one of my best outsourcing successes yet.

• John
  February 17th, 2009
  2:10 pm
  

  If Brazil beef tastes better it’s because it’s because you’re eating the rain forest’s soul.

• EC
  February 17th, 2009
  2:11 pm
  

  Great post and great topic. I’m all for people doing research and buying consciously. But part of buying consciously is also considering the whole. What about ethics?

  Do a quick google search on vegetarianism and you’ll find some interesting things to ponder.

  “For as long as men massacre animals, they will kill each other. Indeed, he who sows the seed of murder and pain cannot reap joy and love.”
  Pythagoras

  “Non-violence leads to the highest ethics, which is the goal of all evolution. Until we stop harming all other living beings, we are still savages.”
  Thomas Edison

  “Nothing will benefit human health and increase chances of survival for life on earth as much as the evolution to a vegetarian diet.”
  Albert Einstein

  “The time will come when men such as I will look upon the murder of animals as they now look on the murder of men.”
  Leonardo da Vinci

• John
  February 17th, 2009
  2:13 pm
  

  Ha! Like Bleicke, I also followed your slow-carb diet for a time and then became vegetarian. I think I felt guilty from eating all of those animals :)

• Darin Steen
  February 17th, 2009
  2:21 pm
  

  Hi Tim,

  What I have found is that in order lead an active life and to function optimally; I and my clients must move and work-out.

  When you work-out intensley we must take in high grade protein (amino acids) to repair the tore down muscle fibers. The goal is to alter the calories, and macro nutrients so that the muscles grow back bigger, and stronger; thus raising BMR and resulting in less fat.

  What I have found at the age of 44 (in June) is that a combination of live (mono diet) food days; in conjuction with high quality, unprocessed proteins is not only effective at muscle hypertrophy, but we can also get our organs and blood profile in line as well.

  [Darin, I'll check it out. Please do not the comment rules, however. Thanks!]

  Keep rockin and being the change in the world;

  darin (aka The Chicago Kid)

• Brian
  February 17th, 2009
  2:22 pm
  

  Another good read on nutrition is the “Paleo Diet.” The basic principle is that human dietary needs developed over millions of years of evolution and adaptation. As such, we are primarily suited to eating lean meats and vegetables and fruits as our ancestors did for millions of years. The modern diet filled with lots of whole grains and milks and cheeses is greatly out of line with our genetically programmed diet, and have only been around a few thousand years which is not enough time to have evolutionarily adapted. I think the proof is in the pudding on that one, the high prevalence of lactose intolerance, osteoporosis, and adult acne can often be directly related to grains and dairy products. Despite the big hubbub about calcium in milk, it is actually net acidic, and hence a net calcium loser!

  I think it behooves one to become a connoisseur of meat though. Beef should be 100% grass fed and finished. Corn and grain are not natural to the cow diet. Especially corn with petroleum fertilizers and pestilent dumped on it. One of the reasons liver has disappeared from grocery shelves is that the high volumes of corn most cows are fed makes their liver so acidic as to be a health hazard.

  One thing that warms my heart is that Bison (aka American Buffalo) seems to be making a comeback. If you live in the LA area there is a great Bison ranch with 100% grass fed meat that always shows up at the Santa Monica farmers market.

• Scott
  February 17th, 2009
  2:22 pm
  

  Before taking on a living food/raw food diet 5 years ago, I had gotten to the point of eating only grass-fed Argentinian beef at the corner store adjacent to a real Argentinian joint in Chicago. I argued about the benefits of grass fed with my Nebraska friend who had just been given a full (grain-fed) steer as a gift from his father. He had no time for my arguments on the benefits of grass fed. Looks like some of the grass fed claims can be mangled, based on the post. Living food is the only food with bio-electricity and live enzymes. Get a measure of your bio-electrical charge and you will be surprised. Top line is 650, my best at the height of my living food regimen was 90. A physics-based approach to health trumps a chemistry-based approach, in my five-year experience. Lost 20 lbs on a 180lb frame. People thought I was a waif. I felt best in my life. Felt like my electrons were spinning at a higher rate than before. Very little exercise needed (but recommended, of course). Digested meat actually slows the blood flow in the body. We want expressways, not country roads for blood streams. Meat eaters have long, straight intestines. Humans have long curvy intestines like vegetarian animals. You’ve heard all that. I feel better in spirit, mind, body and emotions as a living/raw food eater. I can eat a steak at times, but I feel awful for 24 hours and have to rehab from it.

• Chris - ZTF
  February 17th, 2009
  2:27 pm
  

  Definitely a very needed post. Hard to find a good resource on meats and what to look for when shopping. Sadly real meat from well reared animals is usually very expensive but we only short change ourselves buying the cheap stuff……The real problem comes when eating out as we have no idea as to what quality of meat we are being served, thankfully more and more places are serving up farm assured or organic meats and they say so on the menu. Any how thanks for the post Tim, definitely a keeper in my bookmarks for regular reference…..

• Bamboo Forest - PunIntended
  February 17th, 2009
  2:29 pm
  

  “Natural Meat” What about this one? Doesn’t this designation mean the animals were fed an all vegetarian diet?

• Steve Place
  February 17th, 2009
  2:31 pm
  

  I’ve always had the opinion that if you can’t watch the animal die and be processed, you shouldn’t be eating it.

  Aside from the ethical nonsense, we’re going to see a shift away from a lot of meat just due to economical reasons.

  First, if we do end up with some sort of carbon tax, it might also be applied to cow farts. Sounds funny at first, but the sheer amount of methane a single cow can produce is astounding. Harnessing that energy has been done and should scale out, but that’s another story.

  Second, we need to start looking at EROEI (Energy Returned on Energy Invested). How much energy does it take to process 1 kCal of beef vs. 1 kCal of Soybean (Tofu)? The spread is going to continue to increase, and in order to have simply affordable food, people will start looking towards plant-based protein.

  Third (and this is related to the previous point), how much water is being used per kCal of protein? The spread between plant and animal protein in this regard is astounding, and as the cost of water rises (holy crap just you wait) people will once again have an economic incentive to buy plant-based protein.

  If we ever get to a cap and trade system, or even water futures (it’s coming), the spread will widen further as people making plants can sell credits to people making meat. So that yummy fillet mignon helped to subsidize some hippie’s tofu salad.

• Scott Segal
  February 17th, 2009
  2:41 pm
  

  For those who want a very in depth knowledge of this topic, I suggest going to Youtube and checking out Seans videos.

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IfZohaycWho&feature=channel_page

• Paul Soldera
  February 17th, 2009
  2:44 pm
  

  Hey Tim, nice to see you are taking an interest in this. This in only the tip of the iceberg imo. Labeling laws in this country need a wholesale change of direction. It’s one thing to put marketing ‘puffery’ on a product claim (which I think most people are used to and automatically discount), it’s another thing to claim artificial ingredients as ‘natural’ (msg for eg.), trans-fat as ‘zero’ when it’s not, and as you point out (and TOD pointed out) ‘grass feed’ as ‘access to pasture and fed a bit of grass’!

  You should also read Nina Planck’s book (http://www.ninaplanck.com/) on real food (if you haven’t already). She makes a great case for eating natural fats. In fact, she gets a bit into the whole ‘cholesterol’ mess – should we be worried, shouldn’t we be worried?

  The advent of industrial agriculture is, imho, a classic example of market failure as a significant proportion of the cost (degraded individual health from eating processed and cheap foods) is not borne by the manufacturer. If they were making widgets and the widgets didn’t work properly, we’d return them. Instead they’ve convinced us they do work, and if they don’t, well, there’s a pill for that.

• Ryan | Lifegawker
  February 17th, 2009
  2:46 pm
  

  I have always been a carnivore

• Ryan | Lifegawker
  February 17th, 2009
  3:02 pm
  

  I admire and respect anyone that is vegetarian or vegan, but this is not something I aspire to be. I enjoy a nice steak (especially the Rib Eye @ SW Steakhouse at the Wynn in Vegas), I also like chicken and fish. Hell, I like meat in general, I don’t discriminate. But, my diet is balanced and I eat many fruits and veggies as well.

  With any food I buy, I always try to buy organic, no-antibiotic, no-hormone, no-pesticide, no-preservative (whole) foods whether it be milk, meat, fruits, nuts, or veggies. Regardless of the food being meat or veggie, I think proper raising and harvesting is important. Food today is so bastardized it is a bit disgusting. Walk through the freezer aisle in a Kroger, Publix, or Albertson’s and you will find more chemicals than real food in some cases.

  By the way, I agree with Clark Valberg in Kosher being a great way to go for all people, not just Jewish folks.

• Julia S.
  February 17th, 2009
  3:14 pm
  

  We are omnivores, so avoiding meat entirely is not always the answer. I have tried vegetarian diets and for me it doesn’t work – and yes, I researched carefully. I like to get my nutrients from my food, not pills, and a vegan diet especially requires supplements. I cannot give up eggs or fish, but I do long periods of time without red meat or even chicken as I am a fan of tofu. Everyone has different requirements – some can do vegan, some vegetarian of different levels, and some quite carnivorous. The main thing to remember is that we eat TOO much of it – not that we eat it at all. Anyone who goes on about the cruelty of EATING an animal is missing the “cruelty” of nature. Watch a hawk eat a squirrel and you get the picture. What we DO need to be deeply concerned about is how the animal we eat is raised and cared for. This list was really helpful, and I really didn’t think about hunting down a good butcher. I am willing to pay more for meat, since I know I don’t need to eat as much of it, if it is from an animal that was raised humanely. Do we remember Sunday roasts? The reason it was special was because beef was EXPENSIVE! You didn’t eat it every day! Chicken, maybe, beef, no.

  It’s all about perspective and perception. Nature eats meat. There is nothing inherently evil in it. We don’t need quadruple decker hamburgers! But the Sunday roast is not a bad thing. We could cut down the herds to 1/10the the size they are now and STILL have too much!

  Okay – thanks for letting me get on my soapbox! Great list, Tim, thanks!

• Bleicke
  February 17th, 2009
  3:21 pm
  

  Kosher? Have you seen an animal being slaughtered kosher?

  It’s an atrocity. Nothing against Jews (one religion is as stupid as any other), but if you have to eat animals, please try to kill them in one shot. Not let them bleed to death upside down hanging from one leg.

• Marcie
  February 17th, 2009
  3:24 pm
  

  Ah, one of my favorite topics :) Sara (and others) already touched on this – meat production in the US makes a *huge* impact on the environment. In my home state of North Carolina, there are more pigs then people! The Eastern part of our state is notorious for polluted groundwater because of it, and it smells awful to drive through there. My stepfather does research for the EPA on emissions from animals (yes, cow farts).

  I have gone back and forth on eating meat all my life; as a child, I never wanted to eat it and for now I have officially stopped – but I struggle with my son’s diet (he doesn’t really care for it either but I know he needs protein to grow). Plus, I realize that man (mostly men) evolved eating meat for survival. But the fact is, we don’t really need meat to survive anymore, do we?

  I also absolutely hate to see any food go in the trash. By some estimates, Americans throw away *half* of their food. That’s just disgusting. I have a tendency to make really small meals for myself, eat whatever my son didn’t eat, then have a snack if I am still hungry. And yes, I will eat meat before I’ll let it go in trash, but I really still can’t stomach red meat at all. It’s just not in my makeup to eat…blood. Blech :P.

  Anyway, I look very forward to your experiments with vegetarianism!

• noell
  February 17th, 2009
  4:19 pm
  

  Tim, are you still “experimenting” with a vegetarian diet? Looks like a lot of us are very curious…

  I became a vegetarian just over a year ago and within a week decided to become mostly vegan. By making beans/tofu/nuts my source of protein, I’ve really simplified the cooking/eating process. I can get fiber and protein from the beans (most people don’t get enough fiber with from the grains they eat), so I don’t have to eat nearly as much to get the nutrients I need.

  As one who has always dealt with hypo-glycemia, I’ve been thrilled to find that plant-sources of protein are better at maintaining a steady blood-sugar level for me. I’ve heard it’s a more stable protein from animal protein. Have you heard this?

  Julia–As a vegan I don’t need supplements. We do very well just eating a balanced and varied whole-foods diet and our family doctors have assured me we’re doing great.

• Tim Ferriss
  February 17th, 2009
  4:31 pm
  

  @Noell and All,

  I have found that an omnivore diet including lean, ethically-sourced, animal protein is best for me. For purposes of athletic performance, phytoestrogen avoidance, and bio-availability, I have found vegan/vegetarian diets to be problematic or inconvenient. For simply maintaining caloric load, I have also found vegetarian diets to be difficult unless you eat a lot of starch, which I do not due to the fat gain that generally accompanies such eating.

  Vegetarianism works for millions of people, and I’m all for each person finding their best diet. For me, looking at blood tests, performance, and everything else (I am OCD with the data, as you all know), this is a diet including lean animal protein.

  Hope that helps!

  Just my 2 cents and my personal experience,

  Tim

• Carrie Balkcom
  February 17th, 2009
  4:29 pm
  

  American Grassfed has a third party certified program that addresses confinement, hormones, antibiotics and animal welfare in it’s standards. We have a trademarked logo to look for as well. Ask your rancher/farmer or butcher if the product they have is certified by AGA.

• Sean
  February 17th, 2009
  4:46 pm
  

  A good read is “The China Study”, this is eating habits and patterns of millions of people around the world studied over 25 years. The most in depth research on food and removing the labels I have ever seen or read.

• SSbxoxo
  February 17th, 2009
  4:50 pm
  

  Waddled over here via Twitter.

  I rarely eat meat, and usually only that bought from a local butcher I’ve discussed certain issues with.

  As an Australian, I have the option of eating kangaroo meat. Kangaroos are much easier to breed/grow than cattle/sheep etc (they require less space, less water), are native to our habitat and cause less damage with their tootsies (we have no native animals with hooves, our topsoil doesn’t like them), and don’t produce the excessive amounts of methane that “traditional” meat animals do. The flesh itself is high in iron, ridiculously low in fat and also has something in it that helps lower cholesterol (don’t quote me, it’s something like that).

  All in all, if our nation can get over eating Skippy, it’s a damn good choice. Do you have any ‘native’ meats or similar to choose from?

• Vegan Libre
  February 17th, 2009
  5:01 pm
  

  @noell I could not agree more… also I will say that there is starch, and there is starch… brown rice for example is an excellent food for me, and anytime I eat mostly brown rice, I tend to lose weight very regularly… in fact I do brown rice “fasts” from time to time and this works brilliantly for me, both in terms of weight loss as well as clarity.
  I think many vegetarians have atrocious diets featuring massive amounts of cheese, but vegans who are committed tend to eat very well in comparison. I completely agree about the blood sugar balance when eating plant-based proteins and quality whole grains – this is no doubt due to the increased fiber in the protein sources we use versus ovo lacto vegetarians and regular meat eaters who find protein mostly from animal sources with little fiber to go along.
  As for supplements, I take an organic vegetarian multivitamin daily – mainly to maintain my B12 levels that are hard to get as a vegan – but so what? I have no problem with this. Going vegan I was able to cure my acid reflux disease, so taking organic B12 supplements is way better than taking 20-40mg of pharmaceuticals every day, trust me.

• Vegan Libre
  February 17th, 2009
  5:07 pm
  

  I should clarify that curing my acid reflux took more precise study of food chemistry – it was not just a magical thing that happened when I went vegan. But going vegan was an incredibly important first step. I could not be happier with the decision – and in fact, I am thrilled about the culinary expansion that I undertook as a result. When you are vegan you have to be very creative and thoughtful about feeding yourself, so this has opened my eyes to foods I would have easily ignored when I ate animal products.
  I think a good balanced diet with lean meats and good fiber/vegetables is probably great for most. The problem that I see is that “good” omnivore diets are difficult to sustain. Obviously if you do this, you should be very selective about where your meat comes from to avoid buying from factory farms that destroy the environment and seriously mistreat and exploit animals in the process. But if you can do this and maintain good balance, more power to you!
  For me, going vegan has been the best health decision I’ve ever made – both in terms of how I feel, as well as quantitative results (lower weight, much lower resting heart rate, etc.).

• Gyan
  February 17th, 2009
  5:15 pm
  

  I am an avid cyclist (I commute 27 miles / 45 km per day on my road bike and I mountain bicycle most weekends. I also do resistance training and core workouts several days per week. At 43 years old, I’m in the best shape of my life. On my daily bicycle commute it is extremely rare that I get passed by other cyclists; it’s usually me who is doing the passing, even those guys with the race team garb, and I have great endurance. In the gym I’m one of those guys who gets asked questions about how to build bigger muscles…So, how do I do it?

  Protein, protein, protein… You gotta have protein and meat is one of the easiest ways to get it. Unfortunately, it’s also one of the most environmentally, economically and potentially unhealthy ways to get it. To produce a pound of beef protein takes about 16 pounds of grain protein and around 2500 gallons of water. When you explore the economics of this protein conversion you quickly understand why there are so many subsidies (paid by taxes) involved in farming. On the environmental front, recall a few years back, there was a huge problem with spinach. It turned out that all of the cattle feces from the neighboring factory farm was leaching into the ground water and then being used to irrigate the spinach. Additionally, cattle are one of the principal producers of methane, a dangerous greenhouse gas. Then, on the health front, the cholesterol and fat in meat, even in the organic, grass-fed… animals is a major problem for human health (which brings us back to the economic front, as we all pay higher taxes to support the health care of the nation). Additionally, as those cattle eat all that grain, unless it’s organic grain, they’re concentrating all those chemical pesticides and fertilizers in their flesh, not to mention all the hormones and antibiotics they’re fed.

  I’ve been a vegetarian for most of my life and vegan-ish for the past 3 (on the rare instance, I’ll eat some cheese.) As a vegetarian athlete I’ve tried to ensure I get lots of high-quality protein in the most economically, environmentally and healthy ways. One of the best sources of protein on the planet turns out to be hemp seeds. Yes, ‘pot’ is good food! (Actually, hemp seeds come from a plant with almost no THC, and the seed is THC-Free. (If you’re wondering how that’s possible, think of the dog analogy: A great dane and a toy poodle are both dogs, but they have very different characteristics. In the same way, the hemp used for food and the hemp used for ‘getting stoned’ are both hemp, but have very different characteristics.))

  Hemp seeds are very high in protein (second only to soy), but with Omega-3 and Omega-6 fatty acids in an ideal proportion and without the estrogen components found in soy. Hemp is currently illegal to grow in the USA (because the government doesn’t recognize the difference between food hemp and ‘pot’,) but Canada and some eastern European countries grow it. Hemp nuts (the seed minus the shell) and hemp protein powders are easy and tasty, and high in fiber.

  The USDA recommended daily amount of protein is 0.5g per pound of body weight. A body builder should get between 0.8g and 1.2g per pound of body weight each day. Most people should probably get somewhere between 0.5g and 0.8g per pound of body weight each day.

• x
  February 17th, 2009
  5:36 pm
  

  I always get a laugh when I read labels that tout “Vegetarian-Fed” animals – particularly in the case of chickens. Chickens, like humans, are natural omnivores. You’re not doing anyone any favours by forcing them to be vegetarians.

• Generic
  February 17th, 2009
  5:45 pm
  

  I’ve been a vegetarian for over 12 years; since I was 14. It’s extremely easy to eat a high-protein diet these days compared to just a decade ago. One product example would be Tofurkey brand sausages (http://www.tofurky.com/products/sausages.htm). Try them and then compare their nutritional facts to regular bratwurst. http://www.johnsonville.com/home/nutrition-info.html vs http://www.tofurkey.com/products/sausages_si_info.htm. They taste better and are dramatically better for you. (Especially your conscience, if you have one.)

  I lift weights 5 days a week and look like a typical muscley “meathead”. People are always shocked when I tell them I’m a strict vegetarian and don’t even eat eggs. (The egg industry is even crueler than the meat industry). All I can do is laugh off their ignorance or else I’d be constantly depressed due to the futility of it all.

  I’ve found there’s no use in trying to educate people on the subject of vegetarianism. The level of cognitive dissonance it gives people is breathtaking. Of course, you know as well as I do what choice most people make when confronted with cognitive dissonance.

  If you really want to know what vegetarianism is all about, watch “Earthlings”. http://www.vimeo.com/1753971 If you can’t stand to watch the whole thing, think about what that means. How can you support something with your money and daily dietary and fashion choices if you can’t even bear to watch what you’re supporting? No doubt, the cognitive dissonance for almost all who watch “Earthlings” will lead not to a change in choices and behavior, but to more rationalization and apologist rhetoric.

  The ironic part of it all is how ridiculously easy it is to become vegetarian if one can get past the social conditioning they’ve been subjected to since they were introduced to solid foods. Therein lies the real struggle. Are you strong enough to choose something different than everyone else? Are you strong enough to not cower when someone says incredulously “You don’t eat meat?!” Unfortunately, most people that try vegetarianism find themselves to be among the weak.

  Wherever you personally fit in to the meat, egg, seafood and fashion machine, always remember one thing -
  “You have dined, and however scrupulously the slaughterhouse is concealed in the distance of miles, there is complicity.” (Ralph Waldo Emerson)

• EC
  February 17th, 2009
  5:46 pm
  

  Wow, some great comments…

  I encourage everyone to read Diet For A New America – the most current version you can find.

• Lynda
  February 17th, 2009
  5:48 pm
  

  Hi,
  I have literally just finished reading The Omnivores Dilemma – for those of you who ‘don’t care’, it is a great read – you may begin to care – even if only for the sake of your own health. As I am a New Zealander, the concept of the corn fed animal is alien to me as all our beef is grass reared, and it has struck me on more than one occasion when I have read various american diet and nutrition books that sooo much of the diet they recommend consists of highly processed food; e.g powdered egg white, processed turkey meat, texturised vegetable protein, and various synthetic protein powders and bars to name a few. I’m planning a trip via the States next year – please tell me you eat real food over there you guys! Lynda.

• KC
  February 17th, 2009
  6:04 pm
  

  “The Omnivore’s Dilemma” and “In Defense of Food” are the kinds of books that are life changing. Whatever these two books may prompt you to do in terms of your diet – vegetarian, vegan, whatever – they certainly change the way you look at nutrition and what you put in your mouth. That’s fantastic no matter the route you choose.

  Kathy Freston’s “Quantum Wellness” also presents an interesting take on all of this. She really delves into the spiritual and holistic side of pursuing a vegetarian/vegan path. It’s worth a read for some really thought provoking nuggets.

  I’ve also heard that “The China Study” is a must read. Anyone had a look at it?

• Bleicke
  February 17th, 2009
  6:24 pm
  

  China Study is nice: you get lots of statistical data (I won’t call it “proof” because all my meat-eating friends think it must be fake) on how most chronical diseases, like diabetes, cancer and heart disease, are directly related to animal protein.

  Unfortunately, the actual advice in the China Study is only a few pages long and can be summarized with “eat only plants in their natural state”.

  I recommend “The Thrive Diet” for healthy, vegan recipes and a vegan look on health food. It’s a “advanced monkey diet” book, but it’s great to read and I still found it helpful, though I didn’t make much of the recipes.

• Berni
  February 17th, 2009
  6:46 pm
  

  Tim,
  Here are some more great reads on this topic

  The Ethics of What We Eat by Peter Singer and Jim Mason

  The Meat Book by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall

  I’m a happy omnivore, very respectful of individuals making informed choices about what they eat and why. Thanks for a another great post!

• Tim Ferriss
  February 17th, 2009
  8:30 pm
  

  @Berni,

  Agreed on Singer and especially Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall. That man is amazing!

  Tim

• Mike
  February 17th, 2009
  7:59 pm
  

  Got to recommend the vegetarian thing. I am life long meat eater but last month decided to support a vegan visitor to our home by not eating meat during her stay.

  She was here a month and left last week. I don’t think I will ever eat meat again. I have lost 8lbs, feel healthier and fitter and I am more positive about life in general.

  I am now looking at veganism, juicing and a raw food diet.

  So thanks for reaffirming my decision Tim, and thanks to Hettie, aged 16, who taught a 44 year old grumpy old man a new way to look at food.

• Marcie
  February 17th, 2009
  8:22 pm
  

  I forgot to add, and I don’t think anyone mentioned yet, the high correlation between red meat consumption and certain kinds of cancer (usually bowel, colon, etc.) I believe most of this is attributed to the high amounts of processing…there’s a lot to read out there about this, here is just one example:

  bhttp://health.usnews.com/usnews/health/healthday/071211/high-meat-consumption-linked-to-heightened-cancer-risk.htm

  I also realize that general lifestyle choices (such as smoking) may be related to high (processed, fast) meat consumption. I certainly do think Tim is right to stick with eating “ethically sourced” meat if it’s the cards for you. I really like this post about a great pig farm in Iowa:

  http://www.elise.com/recipes/archives/006090the_meat_we_eat.php

• Charles
  February 17th, 2009
  8:45 pm
  

  Even if you decide you HAVE to eat meat, will you at least consider not buying animal products for clothing, furniture, etc?

  If you watch the documentary, Earthlings, you’ll understand that much of the animal products we buy are not simply “by-products.”

  Surely, there’s no reason we HAVE to wear/use animal products?

• A Restless Mind: Digest Tue 17th February
  February 17th, 2009
  9:59 pm
  

  [...] Labels on Meat: What they really mean [...]

• Erich Riesenberg
  February 18th, 2009
  4:00 am
  

  I am vegetarian but my dogs are not. Getting to know an actual farmer or co-op is probably the only way to be certain of what is being sold. Like any product, find a craftsman proud of his or her work and eager to talk about it.

  Mass food in America is so cheap, eat less meat of a better quality and all parties (including animals) are better for it. Living in Iowa, we have some of the dirtiest water in the nation due to factory farms, yet I get a regular delivery of true grass fed meat and eggs from happy free range chickens.

  By the way, anyone looking for homemade dog diets check out dogaware.com

• Gidon Ariel
  February 18th, 2009
  4:40 am
  

  I’m surprised at how little traffic the Kosher related issue got here in the comments.

  Here is a (surprisingly, because it is an Islamic site) good overview of kosher labeling:

  http://www.soundvision.com/Info/halalhealthy/kosherlabeling.asp

• We fed it only Twinkies and no-calorie sodas « indeed, indeed
  February 18th, 2009
  6:28 am
  

  [...] fed it only Twinkies and no-calorie sodas By indeedindeed A brief guide to what those buzzwords on your friendly meats [...]

• Coach Kip
  February 18th, 2009
  6:35 am
  

  I am in no affiliation with this brand but I just had a steak from “Laura’s Natural” no antibiotics, all natural, beef. It tasted significantly better than some of the other steaks I have had lately, I was very surprised.

  I certainly think that there is a lot of significance to all the labels, I just wish I knew which ones to trust.

• Mike Inscho
  February 18th, 2009
  7:56 am
  

  The Omnivores Dilemma was a great read, I recommend it to anyone who has any type of interest in their health (read: everyone). Another one of Michael Pollan’s books, In Defense of Food, also touches on some of this.

  I think all of this comes down to the fact that most people are lazy and do not want have to work to figure out what is bad food, good food and the best food. Even without all of the “low fat” “no carb” labels, omnivores have an incredibly difficult time determining what is the best for them to eat. “Industrial Food”, as Pollan put it, markets to this laziness at the expense of it’s consumers health.

  This is a post I wrote after reading both of these books and is similar in theme to this one. http://tinyurl.com/cqt95r

• Nate
  February 18th, 2009
  8:04 am
  

  As an American expat Here in Taiwan, you can buy special chickens termed “mountain chicken” this means that they are free ranged somewhere in the countryside and not raised in factory coops. They taste a lot better and a lot more lean, almost like duck meat.

  Does anyone know what all this steroid enhanced beef in the states does to your health long term? It is ironic that the united states has more hospitals and sick that most any other country. Perhaps it is true “you are what you eat”!

• noell
  February 18th, 2009
  8:10 am
  

  Thanks for your answer, Tim!

  I agree that it is a bit inconvenient at first to become vegan, but that is mostly just during the learning-curve or when staying with relatives. I would expect that learning to change what you eat takes about the same amount of time as it does to find out where you can find the most ethical sources of meat.

  BTW, quinoa is another great power house for protein.

• Scott
  February 18th, 2009
  8:20 am
  

  @Gyan I have hemp seeds in my cupboard as well. Getting protein to the mouth is different than getting protein to the cells through the small intestines. Protein in its most bio-available form is what the cells want. Turns out animal protein is acidic, and the stomach environment is alkaline. The body draws calcium out of the bones in order to convert the acidic protein into alkaline protein. What’s left? Also, large bits of animal protein actually can pass through the intestines into the blood stream where the white blood cells attack the supposedly good animal protein as an enemy substance. Turns out that plant based protein has no such impact. One my good days, I soak sesame, sunflower, pumpkin and flax seed overnight, rinse, add water, blend, filter and enjoy nature’s best balance of protein, carbs, fats, all of which have bio-electricity to turn the switch back on. There is no inflammation in the gut (leaky gut), and I feel full for 3-4 hours. Living food has 10x the nutritional value of raw, and 80x the nutritional value of cooked food, even vegetarian cooked food. We want the experience of cooking something. Why not get the benefits of making it alive then eat it. It is amazing.
  @Generic, been there too with the social issues. Recently though, one of my wife’s friends shared the bombshell that she was going vegetarian and canceling her weekly milk delivery. The friend calls my wife weekly for support and encouragement.

• Amy Rutledge
  February 18th, 2009
  8:22 am
  

  How great that people want to know as much about their food and where it comes from as possible. Current labels can be confusing, but consumers shouldn’t dismiss all labels out-of-hand. Animal Welfare Approved is a label worth searching out. The Animal Welfare Approved program and food label promote the well-being of animals and the sustainability of humane family farms. We unite conscientious consumers with farmers who raise their animals with compassion. Animal Welfare Approved was recently lauded by the World Society for the Protection of Animals as having the highest animal welfare standards of all third-party certifiers.

  You can find profiles of our farmers, read our standards, and find out where to buy Animal Welfare Approved products on our website, http://www.animalwelfareapproved.org. We encourage you to sign up for the mailing list, too, and stay informed about the issues, like the recent decision by the FDA not to require labeling of meat from genetically engineered animals.

• Zaid Rasid
  February 18th, 2009
  8:50 am
  

  This post has definitely opened my eyes. Thanks Tim. Being a Meatatarian, I didn’t even consider that there could be farms like Applegate that treat animals in a humane way. Thanks goodness for them. I think there will be a shift in all of us very shortly on the way we look at farming.

• Marco Gressi
  February 18th, 2009
  9:21 am
  

  A good option is to buy a big freezer, find a small local beef grower you like and buy a whole beast: you’ll get good clean grass fed beef for a few months at a good price.

• Cindy Sue Causey
  February 18th, 2009
  9:22 am
  

  Absolutely *GORGEOUS* bull.. Looks like the Charolais I’ve had my heart set on for many, many years now.. Never seen one that “ripped”.. WOW. :))

  Great article, too.. :)

• Orville Chomer
  February 18th, 2009
  9:45 am
  

  You should take a look at the book “Maker’s Diet” it goes into the whole grass-fed discussion. By the way, there is grass fed and grass finished. Many grass fed cattle are fed grass most of the time but are fed corn at the end of the process (finish) process.
  What I thought was interesting in the book is how it talked about how our bodies are designed to eat both fruits and vegetables and meat … the way our teeth are set up, the way our stomach digests food, etc.
  Also, the way a cow’s digestive system is set up is to eat grass-like material, and that when a cow eats something else, that the physical makeup of the beef is different.
  The conclusion in a nutshell is that if you eat beef from a cow that is properly raised the way it’s system was designed, the beef will actually be good for you! If you eat beef from a cow not properly raised there will be a cascading effect (negatively) on our bodies.

• Katee
  February 18th, 2009
  10:43 am
  

  Tim, you should check out this website http://www.bullmoosehunting.com/BMHS/Home.html I found about this place on urbandaddy.com. It seems like to me if you want real, non-hormone, wild free animal meat this is the place to get and eat it. I moved to Sac and can’t get to SF anytime soon, so let me know if you’ve been to this place or if you go. I’d like to know what you think. And thanks for your blog, I find it a good start to my day:)

• Jamie Pullman
  February 18th, 2009
  11:17 am
  

  Shalom Tim

  Dare I ask if the same rules apply to poultry?!?

  To a world of change

• Jen
  February 18th, 2009
  11:23 am
  

  I’m with you on the need for meat, Tim. My body has let me know that I am an omnivore. Being a classic protein type, I thrive on animal proteins. Carbs tend to slow me down and clog up the system. I am such a Jack Sprat that I do not tolerate beef or pork very well. I try to satisfy the need for darker meat by eating darker meat poultry and seafood.

  Ethically, I try to take the view of our ancestors. I strive to give thanks for the life that has been sacrificed so that I may live another day. I also strive to only eat as much as my body needs.

  A great resource for finding out if you are a protein or carb type is Paul Chek’s new Chek Connect site at https://www.chekconnect.com/. Just click the “Calculate Your Chi” button. You can also find this test in his book, “How to Eat, Move and Be Healthy.”

• Scott
  February 18th, 2009
  11:45 am
  

  I usually keep my freezer full hunting – South Texas, pigs and deer, mostly. Leaner, healthier, better tasting meat.

• Robert
  February 18th, 2009
  12:22 pm
  

  Very interesting!
  I,for one,am a moderate carnivore but I find that what works for me is somewhat of a lacto-ovo diet with lots of fat.
  But yes,it is very important to know the rancher or butcher because that will say a lot,regardless of the labels.

• Rich
  February 18th, 2009
  12:34 pm
  

  It is worth repeating…. “The China Study” is written for the practical, skeptical, thinking person who realizes that something is wrong with the way we are eating and wants to take action.

  It is true that he does not spend a lot of time telling the reader what they should do…. he go into great detail to explain what the Chinese do NOT do, and why that makes them successful.

  As Americans we tend toward solutions to problems that involve doing. We often fail when the solution involves refraining from doing.

• amanda
  February 18th, 2009
  1:00 pm
  

  @gyan:

  where can you get hemp seeds?

• Christian Nally
  February 18th, 2009
  1:01 pm
  

  Tim,

  As big fans of both the Omnivore’s Dilemma and 4HWW (with some experience with both movements) we’re holding a fusion get-together on these topics.

  http://activegaliano.org/remote-working-local-eating

  It’ll be on Galiano Island, BC, Canada, but we’ll have opportunities for remote participation.

  Updates will appear on the above link as planning proceeds.

  All the best !

• Nathan Hangen
  February 18th, 2009
  1:05 pm
  

  Add one more to the vegetarian crowd. “Animals are my friends, and I don’t eat my friends.” – George Bernard Shaw (I believe)

• dadoo
  February 18th, 2009
  1:21 pm
  

  Is it worth mentioning that eating “ethically” is, for the most part, an upscale luxury? I would suppose that an exception to that generalization would be a vegetarian who thrives on bean sprouts and dull food without end, but I would suggest that such a diet would be more motivated by the high of moral superiority than deadened taste buds.

  We all know that beautifully handcrafted furniture brings us more satisfaction than the particle board crap from Ikea which one must self assemble, wasting an otherwise fine Saturday afternoon. Alas, I must be content with this decor, because I can’t afford the thrill of an antiques auction at Sotheby’s.

  I guess, on balance, I would prefer that a chicken, for example, led a happy and unconstrained existance before its head was chopped off to provide me with a tasty drumstick. The reality, however, is that when middle class people like me go to the grocery, our purchasing decisions are motivated by what’s on sale in the poultry department, much more than an interest in some tiresome debate about whether during its life the chicken lived the lifestyle of a rich and famous chicken.

  It’s fine to want to do the right thing, and it’s fine to DO the right thing when you can afford it. The problem, of course, is that while the well-to-do among us can debate the issue, the planet has over six billion people on it, who need to eat lunch NOW!

  Dadoo

• anna louise
  February 18th, 2009
  1:25 pm
  

  This is a really interesting post and something close to my heart. After being a vegetarian since teenage years last year I made a very hard decision to eat meat based on health grounds. I too have read the omnivores dilemma amongst many articles when I was trying to come to terms with my very personal choice. For me key was understanding where the meat I eat comes from, the husbandary of the animal, its food stuffs and if the farm uses medication (spef antibiotics) as a matter of course. My personal choice coincided with research I was undertaking for a organic food co-op I voulnteer with. I’m UK based and found an excellent farm with fully traceable meat.

  One year on and I am now in sync with my new nutrition strategy. I feel much better and many people comment that I look much better. Vegetarianism and Veganism works for many and I have great respect for people who live with such strong ethics. It did not work for me, my body type is such that animal based protein combined with a small amount of unrefiend carbs provides my optimumn health. Eating this way has also made me feel more in sync with eating patterns before multinational corporations took over. I seek out farms that have animals as part of there overall farming system, balancing the cycle of life and death that comes with eating meat.

• Brett Cornwright
  February 18th, 2009
  1:35 pm
  

  Wow, I didn’t know that about grass fed. I guess we should opt for 100 percent grass fed, but I doubt that actually exists. :)

• Jack
  February 18th, 2009
  2:10 pm
  

  I think a simple way to eat responsibly is to patronize your local farmer’s market! Lots of plant-based foods, a little meat and you can ask the merchant where it came from. Chances are that if they made it to the farmer’s market, then it’s close and by definition fresh.
  It accomplishes lots of things: supports local community, sometimes family-owned farms, mostly guarantees freshness and you can see the seller, just like going to the butcher.

  Support the local, family-owned farm! Chances are you’ll eat better as well.

• Vegan Libre
  February 18th, 2009
  2:27 pm
  

  @dadoo , you are right that “ethically” produced meat (if there is such a thing) is much more expensive than the run of the mill stuff. Where I believe you are wrong is that vegetarians (and by extension vegans like me I guess) have numb taste buds! In reality your taste buds are numbed by animal fat and salt used to cure meat – try sticking to a vegan diet for about 90 days and then you will realize how great non-animal food actually tastes.
  Also, if you are budget conscious, you should consider a vegan diet – you can feed yourself quite well as a vegan for far less unless you are willing to eat very low quality meats, which terrible for your health.

• Joel
  February 18th, 2009
  3:26 pm
  

  I became a vegetarian in my teen years for one reason: to force myself to eat a broader range of vegetables, since I was always very picky with them. I found vegetarianism intriguing and I really began enjoying a lot of the foods/food prep that I discovered through it. Of course, now I enjoy eating meat even more :)

• Scott
  February 18th, 2009
  4:22 pm
  

  Produce can be pricey, but beans and rice are really cheap; eating vegan isn’t necessarily expensive. The guy who said animals are his friends, though, clearly never met a chicken. ;-)

• Dennis
  February 18th, 2009
  4:54 pm
  

  Hey Tim, great post.

  I didn’t have the chance to read all of the comments so I’m unsure if anyone else brought up the book “The China Study” by T. Colin Campbell. It’s a great read on the over consumption of protein (amongst other things) in the US and the many advantages to going vegan.

• TimW
  February 18th, 2009
  5:09 pm
  

  Vegan Libre wrote:
  “There is tremendous peace of mind knowing that generally speaking, the food you eat won’t kill or harm you,”

  Tell that to the people who died from Salmonella-tained peanut butter. Yeah, I know, you said “generally speaking”.

  I am all for anyone who wants to be vegetarian, vegan or a Pastafarian. Just don’t try and re-create me into your image, just I will not do to you.

  To the person who posted the inquiry “we don’t have to wear leather” and such, no, we don’t. But if animals are being killed for food, it seems a waste to just “toss” the rest of the carcass and “by products”, doesn’t it?

  There is a place for all of God’s creatures…right next to the mashed potatoes.

• Jeremy
  February 18th, 2009
  5:47 pm
  

  Tim,

  I’m surprised you even considered vegetarianism after all your praise for Dr. Eades, and all the overwhelming data that shows the the lack of amino acids a vegetarian diet includes. Not to mention all the anthropological, archeological, and genetical studies suggesting that, other than very high intensity athletes, we should be eating as a paleolithic human. Good to see you’re back on the meat.

  A few years ago, I started eating purely meat and leafy vegetables, with some fruit. The change in my blood work along with my physique is simply shocking.

  Cheers

• Bryan Smith
  February 18th, 2009
  9:20 pm
  

  Meat and Global Warming

  Believe it or not, 18 PERCENT of all global warming-causing emissions come from livestock. That’s more than ALL the cars, trucks, boats, airplanes and trains in the world.

  How do I know this?

  The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization published these numbers in a 2007 report after thorough research.

  http://www.fao.org/docrep/010/a0701e/a0701e00.htm

  The reasons for this are endless. Please educate yourself for the sake of the world your children will inhabit.

  Thank you.
  Be Veg! Go Green! Save our Planet!

• Fran
  February 19th, 2009
  1:33 am
  

  Kosher food methods? Didn’t you aficionados hear about the scandal at the huge national kosher AgriProcessors in Postville, OH last May? Rats. Cockroaches. Sick animals. Ripping the tracheas out of live cows’ throats. Tearing into conscious cows’ throats with meat hooks. Arrghh. They finally shut this place down and put the Prez in jail, although he was shut down for hiring illegals.
  .

• Chillum
  February 19th, 2009
  3:50 am
  

  Isn’t it interesting how many comments are posted on any nutrition blog post?

  Having seen some wonderfully outlandish stuff in these commments about foods containing “bio-electricity”, and the stomach having an “alkaline environment”, I do despair of people’s ever being able to improve their diet.

  (I’ll leave the “bio-electricity” one alone, since I don’t even know where to begin with that. I will point out, though, that the stomach digests food by secretions of powerful acids – mainly hydrochloric acid – and the pH level is generally in the range of 1 to 2.5, so it’s about as far away from being alkaline as you could physically get. I learned this in high school biology, and I presume most other people did, too. I can understand that they might have forgotten, but it’s not difficult to check before writing about it.)

  Just to avoid this kind of pseudo-science clouding your mind, can I suggest that, before reading any of the recommended books on nutrition, people check out “Bad Science” by Ben Goldacre? It’s a great read that helps non-professional scientists to tune up their Bullshit Detector – a very handy tool that I use almost every day. He has a great website too. It will probably help people to take some of those more wacky claims, backed up by non-existent or twisted scientific evidence, with a pinch of salt.

  Also – another thumbs-up here for Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall!

• Tim Ferriss
  February 19th, 2009
  12:17 pm
  

  Hi All,

  I highly second Chillum’s suggestion to read Ben Goldacre’s “Bad Science”. His column can be found at: http://www.badscience.net/

  Tim

• Julie Hilden
  February 19th, 2009
  5:12 am
  

  Please consider reading my article on my website about animal rights to consider whether it is moral to eat animals, from a Rawlsian perspective. This is not your ordinary animal rights argument and I think it will appeal to the unconventional thinkers who love this site — and to Tim.

  Julie Hilden

• Vegan Libre
  February 19th, 2009
  8:21 am
  

  @Jeremy, congratulations on improving your blood work by eating pure meat and leafy vegetables, and sticking to it. As a vegan I also avoid complex carbohydrates because they are just bad regardless of diet. Simple carbohydrates on the other hand are essential to eat if you exercise because your muscles actually burn carbohydrates (see any sports nutrition book for data on this), so I eat plenty of these.

  I want to point out that soy beans are considered a complete protein by the likes of the FDA consisting of essential amino acids (source: Wikipedia), and therefore make a fine substitute for meat nutritionally speaking. There is also plenty of evidence of long-standing cultures that sourced their protein primarily from soy, such as the Javanese (think Tempeh).

  I agree that for the most part our ancestors ate animals, but remember that they killed them up close and personal, rather than buying their products from the butcher case and dairy section. As for dairy, well, modern humans are the only animals out there who continue to consume the milk of other animals after they are weaned off their own mothers – so this is far from natural.

  Our distant ancestors did not harvest other mammals for their milk – this is relatively new (going back a few thousand years at most).

  So let’s be clear on how different modern omnivore diets are to what our distant ancestors ate. Therefore I would argue it’s not unreasonable to replace meat with soy, since the meat we consume today is almost nothing like the meat our distant ancestors consumed.

• Philip Robert
  February 19th, 2009
  8:32 am
  

  Tim,

  Enjoyed the article, but mostly I was looking for more information on that magnificent Bull. It looks like a Charlolais. So whats the story?

• TimW
  February 19th, 2009
  9:22 am
  

  @Bryan Smith

  Sure, the UN is never biased. But even so, that might be true if “global warming” were an actual event and not just cyclical changes in an ecosystem that predates Man by billions of years. I mean…record cold this year? Where’s the global warming? Or the promised ‘new ice age’ predicted in the 1970’s (I remember the reports).

  Oh, wait. I am sorry, I forgot. It’s not “global warming” anymore. It’s “climate change”.

  Science cannot even predict the weather in 3 weeks, but we trust, as absolute fact, scientists who say that “global warming” (even if true) is no doubt man-made and will never reverse itself and will destroy the planet and harm little puppies?

  Please.

  ###

  From Tim: Please play nice, kids. Debate is fine, but if the posts get too personal, they won’t pass moderation.

  Thanks for contributing!

• Jeff Nabers
  February 19th, 2009
  10:02 am
  

  In the U.S., I think there are some people like Tim who have regimens & metabolisms that result in being and staying fit most of the time. But there’s another category of people who are constantly having a hard time keeping from being overweight and also feel tired and not their best most of the time. Tim writes a lot about his personal experience, so some of his advice might not work perfectly for the second group of people. I’d like to point out something that I’ve found in my experience:

  Digestion of meat and bread causes your body to create lots of mucus and acid. The unhealthy mucus is all through your digestion tract and it is basically just a thick, sticky ooze that slows down the process and traps stuff and generally clogs you up. The acid is produced to break down the difficult-to-digest meat. 1) This requires a lot of energy from your body and results in feeling lethargic, and 2) Your body becomes acidic which makes it very vulnerable to sickness and disease.

  With my body, I’ve found that primarily eating fruits and vegetables is the key. I’m not a vegetarian, but I eat meat only a once or twice per month usually. I do love fish, and I eat sushi regularly. Also, having alkaline blood (rather than acidic) has resulted in me going several years at a time without getting sick at all. Everybody should test their pH; most will find that they are way more acidic than a healthy body should be. With proper pH and hydration, I’ve found that headaches, colds, and 99% of any health problems simply disappear.

• noell
  February 19th, 2009
  10:10 am
  

  Tim, I was thinking about the blood tests and data you researched. Like you, I am swayed by research–but most regular vegetarians don’t eat the way most of us here are talking about, so I would expect your data and research is skewed by vegetarians whose diets consist of a large amount of cheese and pasta and potatoes.

  The research you need to look at (unless you already have?) is to compare a diet based on whole foods…beans, tofu, brown rice, steel-cut or old-fashioned oats, quinoa, nuts and seeds, fresh vegetables, etc. Since only a very small percentage of us vegetarians eat that way, I highly doubt you were seeing research on this type of diet.

  And since eating this ways solves an enormous amount of micro- and macro-problems, it is right in line with your philosophy of getting the greatest amount of outcome for the smallest amount of input.

  @Dadoo–I only discovered flavor when I walked away from cream, cheese, and animal meat and turned instead to the many rich herbs and spices that grow on plants. My husband, who hasn’t made the choice to become a full vegetarian, prefers my vegan food over our old favorite restaurants. It’s so much more flavorful.

• Hugh
  February 19th, 2009
  10:29 am
  

  Dear all,

  Let’s be careful when painting “meat” with such a broad brush. 100% grass-fed, pastured animal products do not necessarily contribute to global warming, instead they can contribute to sustainable mixed farming that beats the socks off of monoculture fertilizer-reliant farming practices (which are indirectly encouraged by vegetarianism).

  Furthermore the protein and fat in grass-fed animal products are of completely different quality than grain-fed/industrialized meat. Any study comparing meat consumption to disease is mostly worthless without carefully controlling and defining the quality of meat consumed, which of course is never done.

  Meat consumption is here to stay, if only because significant portions of the Earth’s surface cannot grow vegetables but can be be used for livestock. Based upon that fact, by buying local, grass-fed animal products only, you 1) support local farmers 2) encourage sustainable animal husbandry 3) get unimpeachably healthy protein/fat into your body 4) reduce food miles and food monoculture.

  Where I live, to get adequate fat and protein year round on a vegetarian diet, I would have to rely on foods shipped across the country and world, and probably would have to rely on industrially processed foods (vegetable oils, soy products). Furthermore the high carbohydrate content of a vegetarian diet is questionable at best and extremely unhealthy at worst for those of us who are genetically-speaking not very adaptable to grain/carb-based diets. (I would argue that’s most of the human population)

  Therefore I believe that eating the highest quality meat is a MORE ethically sound choice than vegetarianism – it is a positive action that encourages a revival of healthy farming and eating practices, whereas vegetarianism strikes me as a negative or non-action that amounts to sticking one’s head in the sand. To draw an analogy, if you are against our car-centric culture, can you effect change more by never stepping foot in a motor vehicle again, or by participating in and encouraging things like car-sharing and public transportation?

  Thanks.

• Gabrielle Lennon
  February 19th, 2009
  12:22 pm
  

  Dear Tim,
  I hope everyone reading this article will also read “Diet For A New America” by John Robbins. Certainly some other options discussed are better than others (organic’s better than non-organic, for example), but eating any animal product (flesh, eggs, milk products) is awful for our health, our planet, the animals who are being killed or kept in horrific conditions (and eventually killed), and other humans on the planet who are starving.
  Production of animal products is a huge polluter of water, land, and air. Robbins’ meticulously researched book goes into the facts about all of the above in detail. It is horrible for our health. And research will show that many of the best athletes that ever lived were vegetarian and/or vegan (no animal products at all). In fact, athletic performance will improve the most from being a raw food vegan, specifically as Dr. Douglas Graham describes in his book, “The 80-10-10 Diet.” Dr. Graham trains many pro and Olympic athletes.
  Many people seem to care more about what they think their taste buds like (vegan food can taste just as good or better) than they care about our planet, their health and longevity, animals, and other people (including children) who are starving. (If people gave up meat-eating, it would free up resources to feed all the starving people on our planet.) Other people are just uneducated about it. Which can be easy because there are people out there who promote diets, claiming they are healthy, when they are not. (I.e. Atkins Diet.)
  It’s possible (and much more likely) to have all you want (optimal athletic performance, optimal health, longevity, tons of energy) on a vegan diet (no flesh, no eggs, no milk products, etc.)
  Thanks.

• Bryan Smith
  February 19th, 2009
  3:19 pm
  

  @TimW

  Are we short of water?

  1 serving of beef uses over 1,200 gallons of water

  1 serving of chicken uses over 330 gallons of water.

  1 complete vegan meal, with tofu, rice, and vegetables uses 98 gallons of water.

  Now put that together with the world’s growing water shortage, and the fact that A well-planned vegetarian diet is a healthy way to meet your nutritional needs. And maybe you will conclude that not only does a vegetarian diet reduce the emission of greenhouse gasses from livestock, but it also makes sense in terms of ecology, and resource conservation and optimization.

  One more thing:

  How many people in the world are hungry?

  862,000,000 people in 2008

  Grain currently fed to livestock is enough to feed 2 BILLION people.

  Go Veg! Be Green! Save the Planet!

• Jeremy
  February 19th, 2009
  7:35 pm
  

  @Vegan Lebre

  While I agree with you on some points I do respectfully disagree on a few counts. I’ll quote and respond to your comments.

  “@Jeremy, congratulations on improving your blood work by eating pure meat and leafy vegetables, and sticking to it. As a vegan I also avoid complex carbohydrates because they are just bad regardless of diet. Simple carbohydrates on the other hand are essential to eat if you exercise because your muscles actually burn carbohydrates (see any sports nutrition book for data on this), so I eat plenty of these.”

  We actually don’t need to consume any carbohydrates whatsoever. Inuits go six months of the year with nothing but fat and protein. There have also been several studies of aboriginals living today that eat nothing but relatively uncooked meat. The evidence showed that in their autopsies, on average, their bodies were much healthier than those of other vege societies.

  Our muscles don’t burn carbohydrates, they burn glycogen. Our bodies can and do convent fat into glycogen when we don’t have an excess of carbs. Other than long duration high intensity activity, more than low amounts of carbs aren’t needed.

  High amounts of carbs have been shown to cause of build up of advanced glycation end products, which are a leading cause of aging.

  “I want to point out that soy beans are considered a complete protein by the likes of the FDA consisting of essential amino acids (source: Wikipedia), and therefore make a fine substitute for meat nutritionally speaking. There is also plenty of evidence of long-standing cultures that sourced their protein primarily from soy, such as the Javanese (think Tempeh).”

  Because of the high carb content of legumes and the gastrointestinal problems and effects they cause, I prefer to stay away from them as a source of protein. And while they can replace meat, they also do not contain as many amino acids, to be sure.

  I try to keep per day consumption of carbs under 50 grams in one day, doing this would be near impossible without meat if I tried to maintain my muscle mass.

  “I agree that for the most part our ancestors ate animals, but remember that they killed them up close and personal, rather than buying their products from the butcher case and dairy section. As for dairy, well, modern humans are the only animals out there who continue to consume the milk of other animals after they are weaned off their own mothers – so this is far from natural.”

  I eat wild game for the most part, but I agree with you. I don’t drink milk.

  “Our distant ancestors did not harvest other mammals for their milk – this is relatively new (going back a few thousand years at most).”

  I agree. They did not drink milk.

  “So let’s be clear on how different modern omnivore diets are to what our distant ancestors ate. Therefore I would argue it’s not unreasonable to replace meat with soy, since the meat we consume today is almost nothing like the meat our distant ancestors consumed.”

  Considering the gentetical studies show that our bodies process foods in exactly the same way the did 200,000 years ago, I am going to try to find meat that is as close to what they ate as I can: healthful, very high fat meat, mostly organ meat. You’re absolutely right about the difference if choices we have now and then, but I feel that the change in going to a vegan diet is far more drastic.

  Until I read a study that refutes most of the reasearch I have gathered I am going to continue to eat this way. If you like, I have several hundred links referencing to the medical literature to back up my claims about anything I’ve said.

  Anyway, happy eating, and cheers to a long life. And excuse my typing… I’m in a rush :)

• Vin | NaturalBias.com
  February 19th, 2009
  7:50 pm
  

  Some of the things that have become acceptable in the food industry are really appalling. Meat has gotten a bad rap and it really shouldn’t be that way. The key is to find good farmers. For anyone interested, I wrote an article about why it’s important to make the effort to find quality meat. [link through name]

• Matt Miller
  February 20th, 2009
  8:27 am
  

  The sad fact is, as near as I can figure, that there is no good argument for eating meat, and believe me, no one enjoys a good steak more than I do. And I still do it.

  Environmentally, meat production to eat is a disaster.

  It is terrible for your health.

  From an animal rights standpoint, it is unconscionable.

  My opinion comes from reading the books below;
  the China study, eat to live, the hundred year lie, mad cowboy.

  I once read that it is more environmentally destructive to eat meat than drive a car. I can’t really know if this is true, but I am sure it is not far off.

• Gaz
  February 20th, 2009
  9:11 am
  

  Let’s all be clear about eating to “save the planet”, this is absolute rubbish!

  First of all we mean “save the human race” or at least help it survive for longer. The planet is a survivor, it has existed in different forms with and without humans and will more than likely continue to do so.

  Second if we really want to preserve our existence on this planet, then the food we eat isn’t the real problem, it’s the growing population. However we don’t like to subscribe to this fact as it’s not as easy for most face.

  Anyway a little off subject but there you go!

• Mr. Jackson
  February 20th, 2009
  11:00 am
  

  Most of these companies are compulsive liars.

• Doc Kane
  February 20th, 2009
  1:53 pm
  

  Great input from all. Can’t believe no one mentioned the book Dominion by Matthew Scully. It is one of the most interesting books concerning this subject I ever happened upon, and perhaps most interesting of all, it’s written by a gentleman who is a self-described “conservative” and former Bush writer.

  Go figure.

  And read it if you’re at all on the veggie-fence.

  Cheers,
  Doc

• noell
  February 21st, 2009
  8:47 am
  

  Such interesting different viewpoints here.’

  If I can disagree with a few of my fellow vegans–I really did not like Diet For A New America. The first one or two chapters were totally emotional and turned me off. I did not read the rest of the book, so it may be excellent, but for anyone who likes research/science-based analyses, the first chapter of Diet For A New America is rather embarrassing.

  I do suggest The China Study. It is very scientific, unemotional while also interesting, and cites not just the one China Study, but numerous other studies as well.

• Austin J
  February 21st, 2009
  6:54 pm
  

  Tim,

  Great post, more people need to be informed of the details behind this issue.

  And now, I have a challenge for you.

  I know from reading 4HWW and your blog regularly that one of your main philosophies is questioning assumptions. I have been questioning one recently that has literally turned my perception on its head.

  Three years ago I quit smoking immediately, and with no withdrawal pains, upon finishing a book called The Easy Way to Quite Smoking by Allen Carr. Now it’s three years later, and I’ve decided to give his book The Easy Way to Stop Drinking a try. I am almost completed, and it’s like being Alice tumbling down the rabbit hole.

  What if alcoholism is not truly a disease that only some suffer from, and can be cured immediately and with only minor withdrawal pains? What if all who drink regularly are actually on the same slope towards “alcoholism,” and the speed of their slide is the only variable? What if alcohol brings no benefits, and the whole thing is a confidence trick? What if doctors who recommend it today are no more informed than doctors 45 years ago who recommended smoking to patients? What if it brings neither a pleasure, nor a crutch to handling stress? What if we are meant to wake up after six hours almost every day full of energy?

  This book is a trip, man. I know you have minimal time, but I recommend it if you are able and interested.

• Ben
  February 21st, 2009
  10:30 pm
  

  Christ Masterjohn has written a review of The China Study. Dr. Cambell responded to this review and another written by Anthony Colpo. Masterjohn then replied to Campbell’s response. It gives the other side of the story, so to speak.

  As a libertarian, I have to blame much of the issues with American animal farms on government regulation. I understand people’s fears of an unregulated system, but wish more people would realize that any benefits also come with many consequences. One of those consequence in this case is the extra difficulty in cattle farming that the regulations create. These regulations tend to put small farms out of business at a much faster pace than the large factory farms. Joel Salatin has written on this subject. He has a book out called “Everything I Want To Do Is Illegal: War Stories From the Local Food Front” that I hope to read soon. He has written an article that is very interesting, and the basis for my mentioning his book, here: http://www.mindfully.org/Farm/2003/Everything-Is-Illegal1esp03.htm

• Jonathan
  February 22nd, 2009
  1:18 am
  

  Tim, can you please recommend a San Francisco butcher or two? I haven’t yet found a real butcher here; not even someone who can get me beef tallow.

• Tim Ferriss
  February 23rd, 2009
  11:56 am
  

  @Jonathan,

  Avedano’s on Cortland in the Mission is outstanding.

  Happy eating!

  Tim

• Weekend Link Love | Mark's Daily Apple
  February 22nd, 2009
  9:49 am
  

  [...] fed is important. Or is it? 4 Hour Work Week translates the labels on your meat. Learn how to sort through the tripe and the [...]

• Greg
  February 22nd, 2009
  1:07 pm
  

  Tim – Have a listen to the “Queen of Fats” all about Omega-3’s and 6’s. Fascinating stuff. Overly short version: fish are high in Omega-3’s because they’re one of the few/only sources of meat still fed plants. Any grass-fed meat will be rich in Omega-3’s!

  Listen to full interview:
  http://www.cjly.net/deconstructingdinner/042408.htm

• Weekend Link Love
  February 22nd, 2009
  10:22 pm
  

  [...] fed is important. Or is it? 4 Hour Work Week translates the labels on your meat. Learn how to sort through the tripe and the [...]

• Hannibal Lecter, M.D.
  February 22nd, 2009
  11:49 pm
  

  Since I’ve started eating vegetarians, I am feeling much healthier.

• Tim Ferriss
  February 23rd, 2009
  11:44 am
  

  @Hannibal,

  Nice :)

  Tim

• maxine
  February 23rd, 2009
  2:13 am
  

  I have been looking around websites re diet and foods. I have found this interesting and informative to read.

  My first thought, “Good heavens!! What an over growth stimulated bull!! How unhealthy and how uncomfortable that animal must be.” I have seen healthy, and even fat animals, but that is grotesque and unnatural.

  My concern for years has been that growth promotants will stay in the flesh and be passed on through the food chain. Has this been studied?

  Water to produce meat? All things use water – it goes in and comes out. One drinks in, bathes in, sweats, breathes and urinates out. Do these studies also monitor how much water actually comes back out again? The glass of water you drank may well have been in a dinosaur, a tree, a lake …. it recycles.

  I am an omnivore, but if I had to kill my meat, I’d probably be a vegetarian! I do believe, though, that if an animal is to be killed, it should be done so as quickly and cleanly as possible.

  Labelling – I tend to take it with a bucket of salt – it’s sales gimmick in most cases. I interpret ‘grain fed’ as not wandering in a paddock, but ‘lot fed’ – having cement or dirt under their feet, not pasture. Maybe I am just a sceptic.

  I am also doubtful re the hype on “cow farts”. Men can fart pretty well too. Have studies been done to see how the human population is contributing via farts? I’ve never heard of one.

  Subsidies – not all countries have farm subsidies, so that is not an argument for/against meat production.

  Has anyone heard of this? some 15 or 20 years ago I read of some drug that was to be tested at slaughterhouses. The unfortunate animals would be injected with a substance that would begin the “aging” process prior to slaughter, to give a more tender meat. I could only envisage that this must cause the flesh to begin breaking down prior to death.

  The horror of the thought of the pain this must cause the animal – to be ‘decaying’ alive…. Also, what happens to the people who eat the meat containing this drug? As I said, I read it many years ago and have never heard of it since. (They say what you don’t know doesn’t hurt you.)

• Isabel De Los Rios
  February 23rd, 2009
  6:37 am
  

  Great Post! I too experimented with vegetarianism way back when and suffered digestive difficulties and weight gain. Probably due to the soy and excessive starch. But that was only my own experience and my body telling me that it did need some lean meats.

  I get all my meat from http://www.grasslandmeats.com. I get chicken, bison, fish and some red meats and it is all absolutely delicious.

  Thanks Tim!

  Isabel

• Linkage for last week | Balanced Eating and Exercise.
  February 23rd, 2009
  7:51 am
  

  [...] Timothy Ferris has a great article on where your meat comes from- and what all those labels mean. If you haven’t read his book The Four Hour Workweek do so NOW. It’s dead on in it’s reminders of how life is worth living, and not slaving away at some job for 2 weeks vacation yearly. [...]

• Naturally Interesting
  February 23rd, 2009
  12:49 pm
  

  I’m curious as to assertion that “According to the USDA definition, “grass-fed” animals can also be fed grain.” That seems to imply the “grass fed” label lacks meaning.

  I just read the Federal Register on “grass fed” (PDF here: http://www.ams.usda.gov/AMSv1.0/getfile?dDocName=STELPRDC5063842). The relevant language is “Animals cannot be fed grain or grain byproducts and must have continuous access to pasture during the growing season.” The standard is 99% grass fed and emergency supplementation must be documented.

  It seems to me that “grass fed” is a fairly strong, USDA enforced regulation. As far as I can tell “certified humane” does not contain feed standards, rather it only enforces ethical treatment of the animals (I cannot find the standards – hit a 404, and then a registration required to access page). While I agree that knowing your source is ideal, that requires a significant investment of effort. Regulated labeling is lovely because there is transparent process behind it.

• Darrin Schenck
  February 24th, 2009
  9:39 am
  

  Tim,

  Love the blog and the book…huge fan that has implmented a lot of your material into my personal and professional life.

  Loved the post, and was glad to see some clarification on this subject matter. The scariest book I have ever read is by Dr. Michael Colgan, who has an athletes training institute in California, ro he did anyway. The book is entitled “Optimum Sports Nutrition” and he talked extensively about the meat industry and introduced me to the term “acceptable amount of fecal material” which in my mind was ZERO. Apparently industry standards are not quite as stringent as I am.

  Keep rockin!

• Kiesha Jean
  February 24th, 2009
  1:43 pm
  

  To see why Grass fed vs. grain fed is so incredibly important a great movie is for rent at blockbuster called “King Corn” http://www.kingcorn.net/

  Grain fed beef is directly related to the obesity epidemic in America

  Seriously, every American should see King Corn it’s amazing.

• Hannibal Lecter, M.D.
  February 25th, 2009
  3:10 am
  

  Thank you, Tim. Just wanted to give some of your vegetarian readers a heads off. Excuse me, I meant “heads up”. Bon appétit.

• Becky
  February 25th, 2009
  7:54 am
  

  I recently joined a CSA (community supported agriculture) group, and I’ve been gradually shifting toward buying locally grown, pastured meat/poultry. It’s amazing what a difference there is – the meat is leaner and more flavorful. It looks different, tastes different (better) and cooks differently than the supermarket stuff.

• FF4444
  February 25th, 2009
  11:28 am
  

  Lot’s of great info here. A few more points:

  1) I would definitely like to second the recommendations for “The China Study”! As an engineer I am used to making decisions based on graphs and statistics so this book was very informative. “Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease” is also good.

  2) From a health and environmental point of view the popular “lacto-ovo vegetarian” diet doesn’t make any sense to me. There are definitely health drawbacks for these animal products and you still have the environmentally dubious and inefficient process of raising these animals to get the food by-product.

  3) Google for vegan or vegetarian athletes/bodybuilders if you want to read about sports performance. Here are just a few examples:
  – Carl Lewis, vegan athlete, won 10 Olympic medals, including 9 golds, in a career that spanned from 1979 to 1996, competing for the US. He said, “most athletes have the worst diet in the world, and they compete in spite of it.” He also said “my best year of track competition was the first year I ate a vegan diet.”
  – Edwin Moses, hurdler for the US, is a gold medalist who went eight years without losing the 400-meter hurdle. Over his career, he won two Olympic gold medals.
  – Art Still, football player, Buffalo Bills and Kansas City Chiefs MVP defensive end, Kansas City Chiefs Hall of Fame.
  – Bill Pearl: 4 time Mr. Universe said “When I changed my diet over, I had less and less joint problems. All the poisons found in your system such as uric acid… is going to be stored in the joints of the body if it can’t be expelled through the kidneys or liver.”

• SME
  February 26th, 2009
  10:49 am
  

  Surprised no one has mentioned Nieman Ranch, an excellent source of humanely raised meat if you’re having a hard time finding it near you: http://www.nimanranch.com/index.aspx

• Nate
  February 26th, 2009
  7:41 pm
  

  I believe that is a Belgian Blue.

  Genetically enhanced or something. Lots of info on the net if you are interested.

  I cannot believe there is an argument about water required to produce beef. There’s tons of cows around here that just walk down to the pond or stream. How is that possibly a drain on resources?

  So what if cows fart or burp a lot supposedly creating more emissions than cars, trains, whatever. There was ONE undersea volcanic explosion fairly recently that created more emissions than all human sources combined since the turn of the century. We have worse problems than cow flatulence and better arguments to use to be a veggie if you choose to be so.

  For every animal you don’t eat I’m going to eat three.

• Saturday 090228 - Potomac CrossFit
  February 27th, 2009
  8:59 pm
  

  [...] What’s Your Meat Say? (via) Pat and Boz tackle Thruster/Row at CFNSC Active Shoulders v. Active Shoulders [...]

• Jeremy LeJyBy
  February 28th, 2009
  7:33 am
  

  About food, and more generally nutrition. I am interested in Tim’s remarks, but also in the choices of others who made a scientific survey and changed their own life accordingly. Here is an extract from the bio of Ray Kurzweil http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ray_Kurzweil (*emphasis* mine), who made a fortune inventing and selling the first OCR system and synthetizer keyboards.

  ###############################################################
  Kurzweil exercises frequently, does not eat to excess, and does not use drugs. Many others, however, are controversial and are explained by his obsession with living as absolutely long as possible and by his Transhumanist enthusiasm for using cutting-edge technologies and knowledge to extend human life. Kurzweil ingests “250 supplements, eight to 10 glasses of alkaline water and 10 cups of green tea” daily and drinks several glasses of red wine a week in an effort to “reprogram” his biochemistry. [64]

  Consuming large amounts of water is necessary for flushing toxins out of the body, and alkaline water allows the body to preserve important enzymes used for neutralizing acidic metabolic wastes. For this reason, Kurzweil abhors soft drinks and coffee, which are both acidic and drain detoxifying enzyme reserves. Kurzweil has taken criticism from nutritionists and scientists for his advocacy of alkaline water’s health benefits, and he responded to this over the Internet.[66] Green tea and red wine contain antioxidants that neutralize free radicals–a different type of toxin found within the body. Kurzweil also consumes red wine because it contains the compound resveratrol, which extends human lifespan according to some evidence. Kurzweil also takes pills containing high concentrations of the chemical.

  On weekends, Kurzweil also undergoes intravenous transfusions of chemical cocktails at a clinic to further reprogram his biochemistry. He routinely measures the chemical composition of his bodily fluids to ensure balance, undergoes preemptive medical tests for many diseases and disorders, and keeps detailed records about the content of all the meals he eats. On that last note, Kurzweil only eats organic foods with low glycemic loads and claims it has been years since he last consumed anything containing sugar. Kurzweil considers foods rich in sugars and carbohydrates to be unhealthy since they spike the levels of glucose and insulin in the bloodstream, leading to health problems in the long term. He instead eats mainly vegetables, lean meats, tofu, and low glycemic load carbohydrates, and only uses extra virgin olive oil for cooking. Kurzweil also diligently consumes foods rich with Omega-3 fatty acids (including small, wild salmon) and antioxidants.

  Moreover, Kurzweil is a firm believer that good health requires *sufficient sleep*, and he maintains low stress levels in part by meditating and getting massages weekly. He *exercises daily* with walking, bike-riding and use of workout machines, but advises against high-impact forms of exercise. Kurzweil claims that his rigorous efforts have yielded positive results, which are partly proved by the fact that his body chemical profiles show his biological age to be more than a decade younger than his chronological age. In fact, Kurzweil believes that his personal health regimen has actually slowed down his rate of aging. He also advocates maintaining a slightly below-average body weight on the grounds that it imparts some of the life-extension benefits of full-blown caloric restriction.
  ###############################################################

  Anobody knows about other famous examples who follow a (seemingly) cleverly designed diet?

• Recipe Book… » Blog Archive » Weekend Link Love
  March 6th, 2009
  10:31 am
  

  [...] fed is important. Or is it? 4 Hour Work Week translates the labels on your meat. Learn how to sort through the tripe and the [...]

• Mrs. Jones
  March 6th, 2009
  12:24 pm
  

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KtQj5bRORj4
  (3:29)

  A video in which Hank Green (from “Brotherhood 2.0″) talks about how reducing the amount of meat consumed is not only more healthy, but also saves incredible amounts of water. Very interesting talk.

• Chris
  March 8th, 2009
  1:02 am
  

  The best thing is to just become vegan(no animal products whatsoever) no meat, eggs or dairy. It’s also the best thing you can do for the environment and your health and of course you don’t contribute to animal cruelty.

• Protein Brownies, Benefits of Green Tea, and More!
  March 9th, 2009
  9:43 pm
  

  [...] Ethical Meat vs. Meat Hype: A Look at “All Natural”, “Grass-Fed” and Other Half-Truths [...]

• bob mcdonnell
  March 15th, 2009
  9:42 am
  

  I stumbled across a new category to add to all-natural, etc. Last week I was a semi-veg restaurant that had cage-free eggs on the menu.

  I wrote a somewhat cynical blog post on this right after. The cage-free eggs were tasty in a ham omelet.

• Michae Walker
  March 16th, 2009
  6:28 pm
  

  Honestly if they could make alternatives to meat products that feel and taste as good or better than the actual meats I’d stop being a meat eater that second.

  I’m willing to spend the extra money. But whenever I have something like a Boca Burger I can’t help by pawn over the utterly sensual taste of certain leans meats.

  I really don’t like having animals die for my own palette but I’m a whore for flavor…

  That to me is the challenge. The company that produces alternatives that are so convincing that in a double blind taste test people can’t tell or are more attracted to the non meats you’ll see me on that stuff quicker than a politician getting caught hypocritically doing what they condemn.

  Plus I don’t know why but Boca burgers just kick the crap out of my intestines. Which is kind of a pun, but I mean it in both popular senses of the term I suppose.

• Michae Walker
  March 16th, 2009
  6:30 pm
  

  @generic

  I’d also like to add that the argument “If you can’t watch it don’t support it” is pretty flawed.

  About 95% of the things I see on Dirty Jobs with Mike Rowe would have me vomiting all over if I was doing them. However a good amount of them don’t involve animal cruelty.

  Just because I couldn’t envision working in the septic system for a city I in no way want the people doing it to stop. It’s their wonderful service that keeps me from being neck high in feces. Which I think we all can agree is not a fun thing to be neck high in.

• Kinzie
  March 17th, 2009
  6:21 am
  

  When we all consume the recommended amounts of meat and veggies (ie a healthy balanced diet) and don’t process/waste so much and treat each other (including animals) with respect, there won’t much of a problem.

• Evan Donn
  March 21st, 2009
  10:36 pm
  

  I can’t believe with all these comments – especially with the constant repetition of the “meat is bad for you” idea – no one has mentioned Gary Taubes “Good Calories, Bad Calories”. It’s not an easy read, and it’s not a diet or nutrition book – it’s an exhausting examination of the hard science behind diet and health specifically as it relates to low fat vs. low carb diets and the health impacts of eating meat. It’s hard to read it and not conclude that most of the traditional arguments against eating meat (health related, not environmental) are not backed up by scientific evidence.

• Mergen
  March 25th, 2009
  9:59 am
  

  Ever tried eating meat in Mongolia?

  They are All Natural, Grass Fed, Free Range, Organic, Vegetarian Fed, Humanely Raised, Certified Humane, Biodynamic, and Local.

  Herds are raised in the wild as they graze on grass. Herders take care of the herds using same techniques passed down for thousands of years. The slaughtering is a traditional process. The animal is put to death in an efficient, rather natural, and quick manner. Then every part of the animal is sold. There are no vitamins or grains or diets for the herds.

  Mongolian meat packs quite a punch. I think the healthy dose of proteins also help make Mongolians some of the tougher, bigger people in Asia as well.

  I hope I was able to add something interesting to the discussion. And, there obviously are some great benefits to be working and living out of a developing country after all.

  Cheers,
  MC

• What’s the difference in meat? Grass-fed, all-natural… | How Do I Lose Weight Now
  April 10th, 2009
  10:39 am
  

  [...] author of one of my favorite books “The Four Hour Workweek“, recently discussed the differences of meat on his blog [...]

• warcraft gold
  April 20th, 2009
  3:18 am
  

  I'd go for HUMANELY RAISED; CERTIFIED HUMANE if ever 'coz I'm already a vegetarian and I'm proud to be one. The reason behind it, is because I can't imagine how they kill animals and secondly I think it's more healthy to be a vegan.

• Michael
  May 12th, 2009
  6:27 am
  

  The Omnivore’s Dilemma and In Defense of Food are great books for starting to learn about where our food comes from. For me, reading these books really changed they way I eat and made me think a lot about being a vegetarian.

  More recently Mark Bittman published a book called Food Matters. Its along the same lines as Pollan’s books. In the book Mark advocates a diet free from animal products during the day and then allowing for small portions of animal products for dinner. (And I think that should be from a humanely raised/pastured source) To me this is a pretty good way to go as it seems very healthy and is not as difficult as becoming a vegetarian/vegan entirely.

• Tim Ferris’ Guide to Meat Labeling | Vegan.com
  May 12th, 2009
  9:23 am
  

  [...] vary between farms, isn’t this the very least those animals deserve? (Via Mark Bittman.) Link. Spread the [...]

• The Meaningless of Meat Labeling « Farm To Table: The Emerging American Meal
  May 12th, 2009
  10:47 am
  

  [...] As always, take a moment and read the post. [...]

• Some Interesting Links - Bitten Blog - NYTimes.com
  May 12th, 2009
  11:58 am
  

  [...] Two well-thought out posts from others’ blogs. Here’s Tim Ferriss (the Four-Hour Work Week guy) on some of the facts about meat labeling. [...]

• Chris
  May 16th, 2009
  8:40 pm
  

  I’m not at all surprised that this post tuned into a discussion over whether meat is good or bad period, but what I am surprised about is that no one mentioned the health effects of soy. Most soy consumption is from non-fermented soy products, such as fresh/dry soybeans, soy flour, soy milk, soybean oil and tofu. This is a problem since many vegetarians use tofu as a source of protein. Also non-fermented soy is found in almost all processed foods. Non-fermented soy contains phytic acid, which has anti nutritive properties, meaning it inhibits absorption of certain nutrients, including iron. Also, it attributes to a variety of other health problems including: Thyroid problems, premature puberty and other developmental problems, cancer, brain damage, reproductive disorders, kidney stones, weakened immune system, and severe, potentially fatal food allergies. Not to mention that almost all soy is genetically modified.
  That said, fermented soy products can be included in a balanced diet, as well as they are organic, as the fermentation process reduces the phytic acid content, and produces natural probiotics. These include natto, tempeh, miso, and soy sauce.
  Also, I believe that humans are omnivores. The fact that humans have both canines and molars shows that we are meant to eat meat. However, I agree with previous posters that the meat must be grass fed in terms of cows, or pastured for poultry, and humanly raised and slaughtered.
  The ideal diet should come from healthy fats (of which coconut oil is the best for cooking, as well as metabolic health), grass fed or pastured lean meats, and slow carbs, with attention to plenty of fiber. The specific amounts of macronutrients consumed depend on the person, as some are genetically suited to low fat/low protein/high carb diets (again with slow carbs), many others are suited to a high fat/high protein/low carb diet, myself included. Most are somewhere in the middle, leaning more toward the latter diet.
  The lesson here is: Avoid processed foods, focus instead on healthy whole foods, organic and locally grown if possible, and listen to your body, it’s the best judge as to whether or not what you are consuming is good for you.

• LocalGlobalGirl
  May 18th, 2009
  11:37 pm
  

  I live in England. I go to my local butcher for most of my meat. He can tell me what the animal was fed and which field/farm it was raised on. Following the BSE outbreak and Foot&Mouth a few years ago, the importance of animal welfare and scrupulous husbandry practices have come to the fore. Consumers vote with their wallets. When it comes to meat I go for Quality not quantity.

• Eddie Shepherd
  June 1st, 2009
  7:15 pm
  

  Can you help Tim? … I apologize if this is a bit off topic … I couldn’t find a better place. For years I have attempted to eat healthy by finding ’safe’ – organic, grass – fed beef. But also, all the other ‘good’ types of food – like organic – that are not tampered with or sprayed with something … at my local supermarket.
  Would you mind giving us a list of the places that you recommend / use to purchase your favorite stuff … do you buy food online?
  Tim, I don’t live near any organic or healthy food stores.
  I can’t even find lentils at my local store that you have in your ‘geek to freak’ diet.
  Are there any affordable ( reasonably ) online places … to purchase grass fed meat, … organic vegetables, grains, fish, seafood … etc… and have them shipped to my door on a biweekly schedule? Any recommendations?

• Tim Ferriss
  June 1st, 2009
  8:28 pm
  

  Hi Eddie,

  No problem at all. I use (and invest in) http://www.foodzie.com, but some of it can be expensive. Also try http://www.eatwild.com.

  Good luck!

  Tim

• Tim Ferriss on Ethical Meat vs. Meat Hype | Simple, Good, and Tasty
  June 2nd, 2009
  12:00 pm
  

  [...] this terrific post on Tim Ferriss’ website (via the Farm to Table blog), discussing meat labeling. Ferriss referenced the article It’s a [...]

• Carolina
  June 19th, 2009
  10:16 pm
  

  I am interested i invetro eat. I prefer to call it, No Kill Meat.
  It might be interesting for say, Chilean Bass.

• Carolina
  June 19th, 2009
  10:20 pm
  

  Invitro meat, seems interesting. I like to call it, No Kill Meat.
  Might be very good for producing, Chilean Sea Bass.

• Sam
  August 6th, 2009
  6:05 am
  

  Great post.

  I personally source my locally and organically and mostly biodynamically. For those interested in reading further “The ethics of what we eat” By Peter Singer and Jim Mason was pretty enlightening for me.

  http://www.amazon.com/Ethics-What-We-Eat-Choices/dp/1594866872

• Energy Sources | Endurance Sports Nutrition
  September 10th, 2009
  6:34 am
  

  [...] content since animals eat what they are supposed to eat – grass – rather than grains. This link helps describe the differences between them all. These types of meats are much more in line with [...]

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