O say can you taste the grass?

Image by Powerhouse Museum Collection via Flickr
Raising sheep on grass is common in Australia.

Editor's note: Today, I discuss grass-fed beef, lamb, milk, cheese and eggs, all of which are available in North Jersey.

The phrase "all natural" is thrown around with abandon, but there are no government or food industry standards to enforce it.


The best you can do is to look for meat and dairy products from animals that are treated humanely and raised on their natural diets -- free of antibiotics, growth hormones and animal byproducts.


Chief among them are pasture-raised Australian beef and lamb sold at ShopRite supermarkets, Costco Wholesale and other stores.


Unfortunately, labels carry little information on how cattle and sheep are raised in Australia, but ShopRite sales fliers call the beef -- sold under the Nature's Reserve brand -- "All Natural, Free Range, Grass Fed."


I was told by Meat and Livestock Australia Ltd. (MLA) that Nature's Reserve beef comes exclusively from cattle that are fed grass from start to finish. They are never confined to a feed lot, but they do receive some growth hormones.


The racks and boneless legs of lamb sold under the Costco label, Kirkland Signature, or sold without that label, such as the lamb osso bucco I saw last week in the Hackensack warehouse store, are from sheep raised in the same way-- except they do not receive any growth hormones.


Originally, MLA told me no growth hormones were used in beef sold under the Nature's Reserve label, but later corrected that.


Cattle and sheep stomachs are designed to turn grass into protein. When cattle are fed grain -- as the vast majority in the United States are to speed growth -- they can become sick. 


And the wide use of animal antibiotics is making humans resistant to prescribed antibiotics.


Nature's Reserve steaks, roasts and whole beef tenderloin for filet mignon are sold at ShopRite for about $6.99 a pound and even less when they are on sale. 


The meat is lean and contains beneficial Omega 3 fatty acids. It cooks quicker than conventional beef and is best when prepared medium rare.


I once saw grass-fed steaks from New Jersey on sale at Whole Foods Market in Paramus for $9.98 a pound, and the Fairway Market across town sold grass-fed, rib-eye steaks for $14.99 a pound and grass-fed burgers for $5.99 a pound in June 2010.


On Saturday, Costco's prices for Australian grass-fed lamb were $5.99 a pound for the boneless leg, $7.99 a pound for loin chops and $13.99 a pound for racks.  


Before I stopped eating meat nearly two years ago, the small lamb chops in the rack were my favorite. I would trim the rack and cut it apart, broiling the chops only until they were rare. They would literally melt in my mouth.


Of course, you don't taste the grass. But the meat is so pure and flavorful, compared to conventionally raised lamb, it needs little more than a bit of salt.


The current price of $13.99 a pound for a rack of lamb chops at Costco compares to the price I recall from a couple of years ago, $9.99 a pound.


The Australian whole beef tenderloin was ideal for slicing thin, marinating with Korean barbecue sauce and cooking quickly on a stove-top grill before wrapping the beef in red-leaf lettuce with rice, kimchi and garlic at the table.


Grass-fed beef and lamb are among several products from pasture-raised animals available in North Jersey.


Fairway Market sells milk from grass-fed cows. Trader Joe's has sharp cheddar cheese made with milk from pasture-raised cows in New Zealand ($5.49 a pound).


On Friday, for $5, I picked up two dozen Grade A Large Brown Eggs "from grass-fed hens with freedom in the field" at H Mart, the Korean supermarket in Englewood. The yolks are a healthy shade of yellow.


They are distributed by Swiss Villa LLC in Lykens, Pa., with a label that tells you the package is made from recycled PET, fewer than 350 hens forage on a pesticide-free acre of pasture "spring to fall," and the eggs come from "Swiss-peasant-descendant, small-scale farmers."


"You would enjoy seeing the hens scatter out over the pasture meadow each morning as dew droplets mirror the rising sun," the label says. 


I'm sure I would, as long as I was served a breakfast of their eggs right away.


Here are Web sites to help you find grass-fed meat.


Australian Lamb


The site lists Costco Wholesale and Stop and Shop supermarkets as sources of Australian lamb. Some brands to look for are Country Meadow Austral American Lamb and Opal Valley.


Australian Beef


ShopRite and Pathmark supermarkets in North Jersey are listed as sources.


Meat and Livestock Australia Ltd.


Meat and Livestock Australia is a marketing, research and development  agency that represents ranchers, processors, exporters and others involved in meat production in Australia.


To take a virtual farm visit in Australia, click on this link: 


On a Farm Down Under

Supermarket sale fliers abound

Image by Chris Devers via Flickr

You need a calculator when you go food shopping, even at a sale.

The 78th anniversary sale at Fairway Market in Paramus runs from May 6-12, 2011. 

I guess it was the original store on the West Side of Manhattan that opened 78 years ago. On my first visit, maybe 15 years ago, I found the aisles so narrow, impatient shoppers constantly rear-ended me with their carts.

During the Paramus sale, two containers of strawberries will be $4, though the size and brand are not given in the flier; a 64-ounce carton of organic, grass-fed milk will be $2.99; and Murray's antibiotic-free chicken drumsticks, legs and thighs will be 99 cents a pound, but only for the larger family packs.

Fresh, whole porgy and whiting will be $2.99 a pound, but that's nothing special. Mercury-filled Bumble Bee solid-white tuna will be 99 cents a can.

The flier carries a long, loving description of smoked king salmon from New Zealand that seems designed to hide its origin in a fish farm and its artificial color ($7.99 for 4 ounces or almost $32 a pound). This would be no bargain, even if it was wild-caught.

Pathmark is offering shoppers 55 years old and up 5% off on Mondays, if they spend $30 or more. 

The supermarket chain also is having a one-day sale on Saturday, May 7, with a 48-ounce container of Turkey Hill Ice Cream selling for $1.79 with a store card (limit one), and a $5 off coupon on a purchase of $50 or more or $16 off a purchase of $160.

On May 6,7 and 8, Pathmark also will double all manufacturers coupons up to $2, with a limit of 20, even those that say "do not double."

A&P's 5% off coupon for shoppers 55 years old and up is good on Tuesdays, if they spend $30 or more. Driscoll's strawberries are $1.99 for a 1-pound container May 6-12 with a store card.

After I wrote this, I bought the same strawberries at H Mart in Little Ferry for $1.49.

On Essex Street In Lodi, the International Food Wine & Liquor Warehouse has three packages of Earthbound Farm organic salads for $10 through May 17, but the flier doesn't specify the size.

If a 1-pound container of Earthbound Farms Organic Spring Mix is $4.79 at Costco, would three 12-ounce containers of other organic salads for $10 be a better buy?

A 3-liter tin of extra-virgin olive oil -- origin unknown -- is $12.99. Collard greens from Florida are 69 cents a pound. All loose olives are $4.99 a pound.

Say cheese at least 54 times

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Costco sells Parmigiano-Reggiano and more than 50 other cheeses.

Or maybe 55 or 56 times. This afternoon, I tried to count all the cheeses offered in a long refrigerated case at Costco in Hackensack, but now remember, as I write this, there is more cheese in another case I didn't look at.

So let's just say the warehouse store with the high-quality food at low prices -- on everything from soup to nuts -- carries more than 50 cheeses, in slices, wedges, wheels and blocks, as well as grated and shredded.

They are imported from Italy, Ireland, England, France and other countries or made in the United States for foreign dairies.

I love cheese, but have tried to avoid the full-fat ones, so I've gravitated toward skim-milk Parmigiano-Reggiano ($11.99 a pound) and Grana Padano ($8.99 a pound), both from Italy, and reduced-fat Jarlsberg Lite slices ($8.99 for two pounds).

Occasionally, I've brought home sheep's milk Manchego from Spain ($8.29 a pound), but I don't think I'm ready for a French cheese I saw today -- La Delice Saint Faron Triple Cream cow's-milk cheese ($9.49).

I plan to try a new cheese every two weeks, now that I have cut down on bread and pizza, and lost more than 20 pounds. So I bought Bufala Mozzarella from Italy, four balls of buffalo-milk cheese in milky water, for $11.99 (17.6 ounces).

Others I noticed today were Smoked Gouda ($5.49 a pound); Cave-Aged Taleggio from Italy ($8.29); and Cabot White Cheddar, aged for 14 months ($7.99 a pound). 

Fresh mozzarella was $3.99 a pound and grated Pecorino Romano from Italy was $10.99 for two pounds.

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Price fluctuations

Costco's smoked wild sockeye salmon, sold under the Kirkland Signature label, is now $15.39 a pound, and Earthbound Farm organic spring mix has edged up to $4.99 a pound, but no other food store can match these prices.

Items that have held the line include fresh, wild-caught haddock fillets from Iceland ($8.49 a pound); Legal Sea Foods Alaskan King Crab and Sweet Corn Chowder ($9.79 for two 20-ounce containers) and organic, triple-washed spinach ($3.99 a pound). 

Annoying practices

I stopped at H Mart, the Korean supermarket in Fort Lee, did my shopping, waited in the checkout line and started to leave the store when I noticed all the large bags of rice against the window.

A 20-pound bag of Kokuho Yellow Label, a California-grown rice we use, was on sale for $10.99, almost half-price, and the sale ended that day. Even though we needed white rice, I didn't want to wait on line again, and left, thinking if I returned in a week, this rice or another one would be on deep discount.

No such luck when I returned Wednesday, so, after keeping an appointment, I drove to H Mart in Little Ferry. The best I could do was the same 20-pound bag for $16.99.

A friend looking for snow melt said Home Depot in Hackensack only had 50-pound bags -- too much for him to handle. So he went to Pathmark in the same shopping center to do some food shopping and checked out, only to find smaller bags of snow melt on the other side of the register.

When he asked, he was told the store wasn't big enough to display them inside. Give me a break.

Blueberries done in by July heat

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I stopped at Pathmark in Hackensack this morning, hoping the supermarket I rarely patronize had some Jersey Fresh blueberries, but the sign in the produce section explained why I found only Canadian and Michigan berries.

In small type, the store apologized for featuring Jersey blueberries in its flier and explained July's heat brought a premature end to the season, which was to run until mid-August.


I bought a pint of blueberries from British Columbia for $1.97 with the store card. Except for one or two soft ones, these Driscoll's berries were fat and sweet.

The (nearly) $4 cantaloupe

When I checked out at Pathmark with one pint of berries and two cantaloupes, they rang up at  $2.99 and $3.99 for each melon. I applied for a store card, and that brought down the price for the California melons to 97 cents each.

Grilled-vegetable sandwich 

Blueberries may be long gone, but other Jersey produce is showing up in stores. I bought a Jersey beefsteak tomato at ShopRite, and Jersey eggplant, green pepper and zucchini at Whole Foods Market.

For dinner last night, I used a nonstick, stove-top grill to prepare the vegetables with extra-virgin olive oil and, after they were on a plate, a sprinkling of salt and more oil. They substituted for a salad with my Boca soy cheeseburger. The eggplant was like custard.

This morning, I toasted a roll, warmed the vegetables (including a grilled, non-Jersey red pepper) and layered them with low-fat cheese to make a sandwich. I used hummus as a spread, and ate kimchi on the side.

How low can they go on beef prices?

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Three supermarket circulars came with the newspaper this morning, offering beef for $1.47 to $5.99 a pound.


The A&P flier declares: "We will not be undersold!" USDA choice, boneless top round London broil is on sale for $1.47 a pound. Choice is one of the three grades U.S. agricultural officials assign to beef: prime, choice and select.



The Pathmark circular offers USDA choice New York strip steak for $4.99 a pound ("save up to $5 a pound").


At Fairway Market in Paramus, "whole, fully trimmed beef" for filet mignon is on sale for $5.99 a pound, but there is no indication whether this meat was raised in the U.S. or what grade it might be. Fairway usually features USDA prime beef in its circulars (prime has the most fat or marbling), but the absence of that phrase in today's circular might prompt you to ask questions at the store.


Only the Pathmark flier says anything about how the beef was raised. Its steaks are "Western grain fed." You can assume the beef sold by the three stores was raised conventionally with antibiotics, growth hormones and animal byproducts.


Contrast these sales with the $3.99 to $4.99 a pound charged by ShopRite  when it has a sale on free-range, grass-fed beef  from Australia. In March, A&P and Pathmark had Australian leg of lamb on sale for $1.99 a pound -- the lowest I had ever seen.

Free-range Australian lamb for $1.99 a pound

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For Easter, A&P and Pathmark are discounting free-range, grass-fed Australian leg of lamb for only $1.99 a pound. The sale at both starts today.

The Pathmark ad doesn't specify the country of origin, though it's likely Australia or New Zealand, where lower costs allow ranchers to raise their animals naturally, without antibiotics, growth hormones or animal by-products. You need a Pathmark card to get the sale price. I haven't seen the ShopRite circular to compare prices.

The leg of  lamb is semi-boneless.

At Fairway Market in Paramus, conventionally raised American leg of lamb with the bone is $5.69 a pound. So you can see what a great deal Pathmark and A&P are offering. Unfortunately, even though lamb is an all-time favorite, I won't be buying any because of our meatless-meal pledge.

New beaujolais, lower price for Australian lamb

I have been very happy for decades drinking the new beaujolais from France with my Thanksgiving turkey, and may choose the light, fruity wine again this year. Total Wine & More in River Edge is selling the 2009 red wine from producer Georges Duboeuf for $7.49 a bottle. I bought the same wine for $7.99 last week at the liquor store next to Costco in Hackensack (you don't need a membership card to shop there).
 
We had some nice dinners of  free-range, grass-fed Australian shoulder lamb chops I bought on sale for $3.69 a pound with a store card from Stop & Shop, but they were a lot bonier than pictured in the sale flier. Now, Pathmark is offering these same chops for $2.49 a pound with its store card, from Nov. 27-Dec. 3. The lower price may make the bone factor easier to swallow.

Peddling hype at the supermarket

Premium is a word some supermarkets love to use, even though it is meaningless. All natural is a phrase favored by food producers who are trying to hide the unnatural things they do to the animals they raise.

You'll find lots of similar words and phrases in the sale circulars of North Jersey supermarkets, including A&P and Pathmark. (A&P owns Pathmark.)

Pathmark says its marinated top round London broil, sliced chicken breast and rotisserie chicken are "gold quality." So is the domestic Swiss cheese it sells. There's no indication that the beef or poultry are raised on vegetarian feed and without antibiotics or growth hormones.

At A&P, 1855-brand boneless center-cut pork chops are "all natural, premium." The Angus boneless top round London broil is "premium gold," but only USDA Choice, the middle grade of three used to classify beef. Marinated meats are "gold quality" and Plumrose sliced bacon is described as "premium." Again, we are told nothing about how the animals were raised or whether the bacon has harmful preservatives

A&P's circular trumpets "See Red & Save," referring to "Red Tag Savings." Circulars that are filled with hype are just making me see red.