Best Steaks of All-Time

[PureCountry]

We had the best steaks we've ever eaten yesterday. We were given a bit of a taste test. Some steaks were from a Galloway X Simmental heifer, and the others were a purebred Galloway. They were both incredible, but the straight Galloway ones were better. Just melted on your tongue.

I say 'ones' because I ate 2 steaks.

Now, growing up an Angus man, I've always been pretty proud of our home-raised beef. BUT, we've never raised anything like the Galloway steaks we had yesterday. It's the first Galloway beef we've tried, and certainly won't be the last.

[mb_rancher]

That should make Mr Kaiser smile!!

[Cedar]

Were they grassfed or grainfed?

[cowman]

Well if they are so tasty, someone should market them as a branded product and get them down to the meat case at Safeway!
I think Randy is sort of doing that in high end restaurant trade right now?
If you build a better mouse trap, the world doesn't necessarily beat a path to your door? You have to get out and market that mousetrap?

[countryguy]

I heard through the g****vine that there is a fellow who was involved in a very predominant sandwich chain looking to start a new one using Galloway beef.

[newguy]

Best steak I have tasted was a 12 m0nth old steer weighing 1100 and had been on grain for arond 200 days. Carcass was hung 21 days . Calf was a angus limo cross. I do not think breed was as important as age,feed and proper hanging.

[PureCountry]

Cedar - they were finished on silage and grain.

Countryguy - you are correct. It is 'that guy'. We were at his home for Sunday dinner. He'll be opening his first restaurant soon.

Cowman - it's being marketed. It's in the fledgling stages, and it's a different group than the one Kaiser and I have been dealing with.

As for management vs. breed, I USED to believe the same thing, until I tasted that Galloway steak on Sunday. I always thought it was the aging, the cutting, the feeding, which all do play a part. But this man has been in the food industry for 30 years, and he says he's never tasted anything like it. So did the other folks sitting around the table. And after tasting it myself, I'm a believer too.

[grassfarmer]

Interesting, I thought someone on here was saying recently that all the steak sandwich served in resterants was currently coming off cows, or did I read that elsewhere?
Also on the silage and grain ration - the gurus in Stockman grassfarmer all claim that silage fed beef doesn't taste good. My experience of eating silage or silage/grain fed beef in the UK would kind of support that. Purecountry, you said this steak melted in the mouth - what did it taste like? - was it tenderness or taste that you were enjoying?

[PureCountry]

Both really. It was incredibly tender, and the flavor was out of this world. I've heard the arguments for grass-fed being tastier and healthier. I believe grass-fed is healthier, but I'm just saying this was unlike any other beef I've tasted. It was really that good.

[cswilson]

It's a damned poor rancher who knows what his own beef tastes like-the only way I'd get to taste Galloway was if my neighbors started raising them lol.

[cowman]

Now cswilson...I hope you aren't saying you're eating the neighbors steers? Not sure how many trees are in your part of Saskatchewan...but if none the neighbor might have to use a handy power pole! LOL

[cswilson]

I'll take the fifth on this one lol.

[kpb]

grassfarmer, since almost all of the beef in this country is finished on silage and grain, can I assume you're saying that Canadian beef does not taste good?

We've always fed silage and grain here to our calves and fattened and eaten a few ourselve and given the odd one to our friends and neighbours and I venture to say they always tasted pretty darn good to me. I must also not read the Stockman Grassfarmer closely enough because I don't recall them knocking silage-fed calves. In fact I thought in general they were favorably disposed to silage feeding as long as you use a wire to feed off the face of a pile. In Allan Nation's books he doesn't seem opposed to feeding silage, at least in my memory.

kpb

[grassfarmer]

kpb, we are maybe talking about slightly different things. The cattle that are fed in Western Canada are usually fattened on what, 80% barley 20% grain silage? In the UK cattle are often fattened either on straight grass silage or grass silage and maybe 3-8lbs of grain. The silage is usually above 70% moisture and fairly acidic. That's the beef i'm talking about that doesn't taste so good.

It's Gearld Fry that writes about silage fed beef having an off taste - he of course reckons that grass alone is what they should be fed on.

[kpb]

grassfarmer, yes, that makes a huge difference of course. I didn't realize that so little grain was used to finish in the U.K.

Is that due to a relative shortage of grain there? Or traditional practices? And, surely, it must take quite a while to finish a steer with just 3 to 8 pounds of grain a day and the rest silage???