The kinder, gentler steak
Organic meats are a health food of sorts, but unlike many health foods, they taste better than standard products, says one Hudson Valley butcher who says that sales of organic meats now make up about 75 percent of his sales and are continuing to increase in volume.
Abdul Joulani purchased the long-time community butcher shop Jack”™s Meats on Main Street in New Paltz in 1991. Two years later he began advertising the option of organic beef products. Now, 15 years later, he is doing a booming organic meat business, offering organic fare including locally produced bacon, chicken, veal, lamb and pork.
He said although organic meats cost about 20 percent more than standard meats, people are willing to pay more because better taste is just a bonus to eating organic meat, which is healthier for humans and animals alike. “I wanted to offer something that is a lot healthier, I realized that regular meat isn”™t as good for you as organic and naturally grown meat. As I was learning about it, requests from customers about it made me realize there was some demand for it,” said Joulani.
When Jack”™s became the first butcher in the area to offer organic and natural meats, customer reaction was “absolutely wonderful and supportive.” Since then, he said, organic food sales have skyrocketed nationally and his business has increased “steadily,” with some customers traveling from around the mid-Hudson and others asking that organic meats be shipped to their homes. “I was kind of surprised when I realized a lot of people were really looking to switch to organic meats,” he said.
Jack”™s has since been joined in selling organic meats by other savvy butchers in the mid-Hudson area and nationally, including Fleisher”™s Meats in Kingston.
Nine cents of every grocery dollar is now going toward organic food purchases, up from less than one percent twenty years ago, according to Ronnie Cummins, national director of the Minnesota based Organic Consumers Association. He said the fastest growing segment of organic food is in organic meats.
According to findings from the Organic Trade Association”™s manufacturer”™s survey in 2007, sales of organic meat nationally grew from $253 million in 2005 to $330 million in 2006, a nearly 30 percent jump in sales.
“This shows no sign of slacking off, because consumers are more and more aware of the hazards of factory farms,” Cummins said, citing concerns over residual pesticides and hormones in beef, and fears about diseases arising from conventional meat production. Whether founded or not, such fears are a factor driving the organic meat business. He said in surveys of consumers who purchase organic meats “They say health is their primary concern.”
The distinctions are far from mere labeling. “Our message to consumer is you want grass-fed beef and meat as well as organic,” Cummins said. The nutritional profile of grass fed animal shows a six-fold reduction of non-healthy cholesterol compared to grain fed animals.
Cummins said the organic business is also a boon for the small and midsized farms that the mid-Hudson boasts, because smaller herds allow for the labor-intensive practices needed in organic agriculture. And it can pay. “Organic is viable for small- and medium-sized farms because you get a higher price for the meat,” he said.
Jack”™s Meats is supplied from various sources, including the organic Applegate Farms corporation headquartered in Bridgewater, N.J., which hires selected farmers to produce its line of organic pork, turkey and chicken.
He also gets his meats from a small family farm in New Paltz, the Veritas Farms where, according to proprietor and farmer Stephanie Turco who runs the farm with her partner Paul Alward, “Business is terrific.” She said that with no advertising except word of mouth, the Veritas farm”™s organic, grass-fed meats and poultry sell out very quickly through sales at Jack”™s and a health food store called Health and Nutrition that sells organic meats. They also attend a handful of select farmer”™s markets and have customers who travel to their farm to make purchases.
The term organic means the animals are raised exclusively on a ”™cide-free farm and are not exposed to the likes of pesticides and growth hormones. Grass-fed indicates the animals range about in the fresh air, though in so doing they may be exposing themselves to food that is not grown organically, say a neighbor”™s chemically treated hay and alfalfa field. Both organic and grass-fed classifications have garnered fans who view them as superior to the products of, for example, industrial hog farms that have become the whipping boys of anti-meat crusaders.
Turco said they encourage people to visit their farm and see how much more humanely and health-consciously the animals are treated as compared with factory farms.
Health issues, aside, Joulani says organic meats are increasingly popular because they taste better. He said that some shoppers are curious about the culinary benefits of organic fare. “I tell them to buy organic and if they don”™t think it tastes better, I will give them their money back. I haven”™t had to pay anyone back yet.”