Pink Slime – Another Reason to Buy Grass-Fed Beef from a Local Farm

The delectable words ‘pink slime’ give me flash backs of reading Upton Sinclair’s ‘The Jungle‘ in high school, with its gut churning descriptions of the unregulated meat industry of the early 1900s. The scary part is that it’s 2012, and the meat industry is still bending over backwards to sell us who-knows-what in a stamped and labeled package reading “Fresh Ground Beef” – in this case the who-knows-what is ‘pink slime’ or ammonia sprayed beef trimmings.

Thank you government for allowing the meat industry to falsely advertise their products and blatantly lie to the public about what they are purchasing to nourish their bodies. Nothing quite says nourishment like a plateful of corn-fed antibiotic-pumped 70% ammonia saturated cow parts! Here’s what the ABCNews article says about how pink slime is made:

pink slime

The “pink slime” is made by gathering waste trimmings, simmering them at low heat so the fat separates easily from the muscle, and spinning the trimmings using a centrifuge to complete the separation. Next, the mixture is sent through pipes where it is sprayed with ammonia gas to kill bacteria. The process is completed by packaging the meat into bricks. Then, it is frozen and shipped to grocery stores and meat packers, where it is added to most ground beef.

Mmmmmmm, tasty centrifuged reconstituted ammonia meat bricks.

pink slime

I know grass-fed beef from a family owned farm you trust is hard to find and certainly not cheap; but it costs the farmers more to produce high quality actual beef from cows that walked around and ate what they are meant to eat (grass, not corn). If cost is an issue, try eating beef less often – but don’t buy the mass produced meat substance; not only will you be supporting the meat substance industry, but you’ll also be asking your body to try and process pink slime.

One website that has a fantastic collection of locations across the US to buy grass-fed beef is Eat Wild. They offer a plethora of information on farms, cows, and grass fed beef in general. We live in Houston, TX, so a great website for our local grass-fed beef is Georgia’s Texas Grassfed Beef. If you live elsewhere and know of a place, please leave us some comments! We’d love the info.

[Original ABCNews Article by Jim Avila]