How to Choose Good Meat

Choose meat from humanely-raised livestock, preferably that have roamed free feeding on their natural food source and raised without use of growth-promoting antibiotics or other growth-promoting drugs.

Avoid meat from animals treated with hormones / routine antibiotics or fed inorganic or GM foods

Avoid meat from animals / birds fed genetically modified (GM) food.   Today most animals/birds are fed on GM foods. (90+% of the corn and ~85% of the soy produced in the U.S. is genetically modified. GM foods present an ominous health problem in much of our food supply, since research is revealing that GM food consumption is wreaking havoc with our reproductive and immune systems.

Genetically Modified Foods

Avoid meat from cows given carcinogenic GM growth hormones;

Avoid meat from animals/birds given antibiotics.    Given, incidentally,  TO PROMOTE GROWTH. as well as to prevent infection;

Avoid meat from animals/birds raised in CAFO's.   They typically feed their livestock with GMO foods, lacking omega-3 fat, in addition to administering antibiotics and GM growth hormones.

Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFO's)

Prefer meat from livestock primarily raised on organic GRASS

NOTE: Meat from organically fed animals/birds does not necessarily mean that they were raised on grass - which is a common misunderstanding; however, at least these animals were not exposed to antibiotics, growth hormones, and pesticide-tainted grains.

Cows' stomachs are designed to eat grass - and not the typical grain-based diet of most U.S. commercial operations today. This diet is RICH in inflammatory omega-6 fat at and POOR in anti-inflammatory omega-3 fat content, contributing to the seriously detrimental health consequences of this imbalance both in the livestock themselves and those who eat their meat!

We need more omega-3

Where to Find Meat from Animals fed Organic grass ? - it may be possible to find locally, and it can also be obtained on the internet. The cost for this quality beef is about double that of CAFO sources, which are feeding animals government-subsidized corn (i.e. you're really paying more for the meat in indirect ways -not only through your taxes, but via other hidden costs. E.g. Ecological damage from using fossil-fuel based fertilizers, and also their damaging run-off from grain fields pollutes rivers and seas E.g. Down the Mississippi River into the Gulf of Mexico, where it is destroying algae - a main source of food for smaller fish, which are themselves the food source for bigger fish).

To help you find organic grass-fed meat in your local area:

www. LocalHarvest.org

Maybe share the beef from a grass fed cow with others -To get an idea of what you're dealing with - One quarter of a cow weighs ~ 150 pounds and fills about two freezer shelves.

Grass-fed beef has a different flavor and is usually a little tougher than corn-fed beef - ideally, it needs to be tenderized prior to cooking. It also has less marbling fat.

Lamb is usually from sheep that have eaten grass and is an excellent choice for dinner - don't forget the mint sauce! :)

How to lower toxin risk when eating meat

Cut off the covering fat of meat and don't eat blood

Covering fat and blood store and carry toxins.   This takes "Blood (Black) pudding" off the menu! Covering fat is composed of more harmful types of saturated fats than marbling fat, which is good for you in moderate quantities.

Marinades lower cancer-causing compounds in meat prior to cooking

Cooking food increases its levels of potentially tumor causing compounds called heterocyclic amines (HA's).   Frying and grilling meat is particularly dangerous, because the intense heat turns sugars and amino acids into HAs.

Marinating steak in beer or wine before cooking dramatically reduces levels of HAs.   Marinating steak in red wine or beer for 6 hours before frying can cut levels of two types of HA by up to 90%. Beer reduces a third type of HA significantly in just 4 hours.
Red wine marinade has a similar effect on HA levels in fried chicken.

• A marinade sauce made of olive oil, lemon juice and garlic can also lower HA levels in grilled chicken up to 90%.

Choose "clean" animals

Choose non-carrion-eating birds, or animals that chewed the cud and have cloven hooves

Which animals/birds are good to eat?

Choose least processed meat

Avoid meat "glued" together with "Meat Glue"

Minimize Processed meats

Eat meat in moderation

"Be not ... among those who gorge themselves with meat"

- Proverbs 23:20

Too much protein overburdens the digestive system and produces excessive amounts of acid.    This can increase oxidative stress and deplete alkalizing minerals in the body needed for various functions, including bone strength.

ACID/ALKALINE BALANCE

Excessive meat consumption can increase body's homocysteine levels, which can induce oxidative stress and a low-level chronic inflammatory response in the absence of antioxidants.   The amino acid homocysteine is formed from the metabolism of the essential amino acid, methionine, found in meats and dairy products. The homocysteine produced can undergo:

(1) Remethylation.    Utilizes active folate (MTHR), B12 and the enzyme MTHFR to convert homocysteine back to methionine.(Also this conversion occurs in kidney and liver via betaine homocysteine methyltransferase (BHMT) which transfers a methyl group to homocysteine via the demethylation of trimethylglycine (TMG /aka betaine, which serves as a methyl donor) to dimethylglycine (DMG)OR

(2) Transsulfuration.   Utilizes the active form of vitamin B6 (pyridoxal-5'-phosphate) and the enzyme cystathionine-synthase (CBS). Once formed from cystathionine, cysteine can then be used by the body to make protein and glutathione (GSH), a powerful antioxidant.

If either of these pathways are impaired (E.g. due to a deficiency of B6, B12, folate, betaine), then plasma fasting homocysteine concentrations are increased, significantly so in the remethylation pathway.

To understand the significance of ongoing oxidative stress causing a low-level chronic inflammatory response:

Chronic Low-level Inflammation -"A common factor in most health problems"

The "Big 3"- Chicken, Pork and Beef

Chicken

Buy birds which ran outside on pasture and ate organic feed.   Meat from such chickens is firmer and leaner compared to that from commercialized, cooped up, non-organic grain-fed chickens. Chickens obtain worms and bugs from the ground, which enhance the omega-3 content of their meat (and eggs).

A so called "Free-range chicken" didn't necessarily range outside.    It had access to the outside, but did not necessarily go outside, especially when its feed is inside.

Pastured / Organic grain-fed chickens Contain Significant Omega-3 Fat.   Having an Omega-6 : Omega-3 ratio of 2 or 3 : 1, compared to 20 to 1 in commercial grain-fed chicken.

Fat content of chicken is higher than you may think.    A chicken thigh or leg with skin has 56% of its calories from fat, and has 47% even without the skin -so skin doesn't actually make that much difference! Compare this to a T-bone steak having 42% of its calories from fat.

• Only chicken breasts with skin removed are low in fat
• Chicken contains just as much cholesterol as beef or pork

Pork, Bacon, Ham

If you choose to eat pork, bacon or ham:

• Ensure the pig's diet was not infected with worms.   Remember the days when many people kept a pig - they first boiled the scraps to make pig-swill.
• Cook pig meat thoroughly.   Crisp the bacon, cook chops/pork roast/ribs until browned and the juices are no longer running.This is not a meat to eat rare, even in the U.S.

Beef

Choose beef from cattle fed organic grass.   The 4-chambered stomach of a cow was designed to eat grass. Beef from grass-fed cattle is:

• Naturally leaner than grain-fed Cattle.   Due to the lack of dietary hormones and carbohydrates.
• A Significant Source of Omega-3.    Has a beneficial Omega-6 to Omega-3 ratio of ~4:1.
• A good source of conjugated Linoleic acid (CLA),    A fat that reduces the risk of cancer, obesity, diabetes and a number of immune disorders.