Grass-fed, grass-finished Colorado beef

Living conditions: Larga Vista Ranch cattle are rotated through grass-alfalfa pastures to fatten, producing flavorful marbled “low-choice” grade beef. The meat is lean but still marbled with enough fat to be good-tasting. Our cattle are never on prairie pastures and thus have no gamey taste.

Nutrition: 100% grass-fed beef has less total fat than grain-fed, and the proper amount and ratio of omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids. Omega-6 fatty acids are much higher in grain-fed beef and excess omega-6 intake has been linked to chronic inflammation, a contributing factor to many deadly diseases.

The fat of pasture-fed beef contains conjugated linoleic acid (CLA), which has strong anticancer properties. CLA also encourages lean muscle buildup and helps prevent weight gain. CLA disappears from beef when cattle are fed even small amounts of grain, as does the proper ratio of omega-3 to omega-6 fatty acids. That's why we go beyond organic requirements by never feeding grain to our cattle. Feeding corn to cows also causes their rumens to become more acidic which is a problem when consuming meat from such animals. Almost all of the microbes that reside in the gut of a cow that might get into the meat are usually killed off by the acidic environment in the human stomach. Not so with E. Coli 0157:H7, which has evolved in the acidic rumen of corn-fed cattle. This new acid-resistant strain of E. Coli (never seen prior to 1980) is deadly to humans. Cattle finished (fattened) on grass, as opposed to grain in a feedlot, do not pose this problem.

Beef fat is a good source of palmitoleic acid which has antimicrobial properties.

The saturated fat portion of beef fat is high in stearic acid, a saturated fatty acid which may help reduce cholesterol.