USA Farmer: 99% of Your ‘Healthy’ Eggs & Meat Are a Scam!

People want red meat, bright red. Does that always mean that it's nice and fresh and healthy for us? Most meat in the grocery store is kept that bright cherry red by gassing it. But it doesn't stop the degradation process. So you can buy a package of meat off the grocery store shelf and it can already be rancid.

Is Vital Farms really pasture eggs? No. Most of those birds are never on pasture. This is farmer David. Today, he's exposing why 99% of organic and pasture-raised labels mean nothing and how to source products without hidden chemicals killing your gut.

What percentage of pasture-raised eggs are actually pasture-raised? Virtually none. People have this idea that they're all out on pasture and you know, it's this beautiful and this wonderful thing. And the case is is most of them never even see the sun. The average person, they're paying a premium hoping to bring back a premium product to their family and they're not. They're just getting swindled overwhelmingly.

Labeled organic. Do you think that's mostly chemical-free and totally safe? Absolutely not. Buying milk from the grocery store is going to have human growth hormone in it. This is a conversation I've never had on this health podcast. The truth is, most of the meat and eggs that we buy every single day are actually a scam. From beef being gassed to stay fresh to pasture-raised eggs from birds that never actually see the sun, your food quality is being compromised.

Now joining me today is farmer David who has spent over 15 years mastering regenerative farming to heal his own family's health. And we're also talking about the current tick invasion which is actually making you allergic to red meat. Now we're here to open your eyes to the current practices not to alarm you but to empower you to make better decisions. And to that end, if you want to take control of your health when doctors can't, an easy step is to hit the subscribe button because next week I'm sitting down with Molly Robbins to discuss the mineral deficiency epidemic making us sick.

So, David, my first question, if somebody buys meat and eggs and it's labeled certified organic, is that really chemical free and safe for us? That's a great question. Um, as regards to the chemicals, I think if it's labeled organic, it does not have the chemicals that organic production standards say it's not going to have, right? Like that part's very much I think accurate. Those those things tend to be policed pretty well. Uh in regards to is it raised in the way that most people think it is? Absolutely not. I think people when they see that organic label, they have in their minds, you know, this idyllic rolling landscape and there's like five animals, you know, and there's a cow and two sheep and a chicken and they're just pecking and the sun's shining. And the truth is organic doesn't stand for any sort of production standard at all. Into most organic beef is raised in a feed lot. So the same lack of grass, it's just grain, just organic grain that they're being fed. Organic chickens can still be raised in are still raised in confinement chicken houses. Um, you know, 100,000 birds a thing. You know, they don't have to see the sun. Uh, you know, organic pork can still be raised in the same you know, open sewer underneath floored um, you know, thing. So in that it it there's no production standard in terms of like how the animals are housed and raised that are tied to organic at all. And so because a lot of the positive nutritional benefits that come with like pasture-raised regeneratively raised um farming um, which does really have higher nutrient levels in the food. Those are the kinds of things that translate to health benefits. And so, uh, I think most people buying organic expect they're getting that and no, they're not.

That is mind-blowing. I think that people if they buy certified organic or if it says organic on the label, they have a guarantee that it's got its cows have been on the grass and they're grazing on grass, but that's not the way that that it is. Um, David, you're a farmer and you have been uh, you have fed from the farm, which is an amazing farm that produces great quality products. How long have you been a farmer for? Well, that's a great question. So, I was born and raised on a farm. Um, the farm's been in the family since 1965. So, early on, I didn't have very much of an interest in it. Uh, from the time I was 15, though, I decided I wanted to make a living in agriculture. I wanted to farm uh full-time, and I I really put my full-time and attention behind that. Started buying my own livestock, started um taking a very active role in managing day-to-day operations on our own farm. And so, you know, all told, that's about 16 years now of uh continuous um uh farming day in day out on kind of a full-time level instead of uh, you know, just helping out here and there.

So, is it right to say that your dad and your grandfather and your family were all farmers as well? Is it right to say? That's correct. Yeah. My grandfather um was a farmer. Came here in 1965 and uh started a family farm here with my grandmother. Um, my father was born and raised here along with his siblings. He stayed on to continue farming and then um I was also born and raised here and uh came up and eventually um, you know, took over the family farm and so it's gone through a lot of iterations over the years and changes with the generations um, but the the heart and soul of it been the same which is to you know provide nutrient-rich food uh for the families that we serve and restore the health and vitality of the land. Perfect. And there's a reason why I asked that because we're about to go into the mind-blowing information about meat, eggs, chicken, and dairy, which people are going to be very unhappy with you about, but it is the truth. But you are a farmer with a load of experience and generational experience. So, this is the truth about what's happening in farms in the US currently.

So, let's move on to beef as the first food that we're going to kind of expose. Now, you're saying that the color of the meat doesn't mean that it's fresh. People want red meat and they want really bright red. Does that always mean that it's nice and fresh and healthy for us? No. So that's a a a big misconception. And so most meat in the grocery store is kept that bright cherry red by gassing it. And so there's nothing like inherently harmful in the gas they're using. Um, outside of the fact that it totally it gives it an unnatural cherry red color and it totally masks um the ability to discern like freshness by color at all. And so as just kind of a default, they gas the meat. Um, they're using um carbon um dioxide. Basically, they're they're forcing all the oxygen out and and holding it with that. And so in an oxygenless environment, it u artificially cherry reds changes the cherry red color. And so you can buy a package of cherry red meat off the grocery store shelf and it can already be rancid. Um, because it will still doesn't stop the degradation process. It does slow it down some, but uh, it doesn't stop that at all. And the color won't change. And so, as long as it's not exposed to oxygen.

So, real fresh meat when you're first cutting it is actually kind of a um dullish red brown. It will brighten really quickly, not to a cherry red, but kind of a a a brighter red. And for half an hour maybe and then it's going to start taking on kind of a duller red to an almost brownish. That's the natural color that meat takes. And so like if you go buy it, you know, from a butcher that, you know, it's freshly cut out, you know, the freshest steak, you know, we could ever grill just right after harvesting the animal is going to be kind of a dullish brown. Um, because that's that's a natural coloration. That's exactly what it's going to take on. And so if the meat isn't gassed, you can judge freshness by color to a certain extent because as it's going to start degrading, it's going to take on a grayish color um as it's actually truly aging. Well, no one wants to buy that and the grocery stores, you know, don't want people to not buy their product or be able to tell how fresh or not it is based on color. And so gassing it eliminates all that and you get a very uniform cherry color that everyone's like, "Oh, it's perfectly fresh." It is similarish um in a kind of an unnatural way to that that bright red color you get with beef after like half an hour of it being cut, but it's uh, you know, when you've seen the real thing, you're just going you look at it and you go it's so fake. Uh, and then knowing of course that you know even be you know, just a couple hours old is going to be kind of a dark red um to even kind of a reddish brown in coloration which there's nothing wrong with it. That's exactly what it's supposed to do cuz it's exposed to oxygen and it's going to go through those color changes. So, if you freeze the beef while it's going through those color changes, it'll actually like freeze like partially colored one way and partially colored another, which is pretty cool. Um, and again, that's all just how it was designed to do. That's the beef actually reacting to oxygen in the air and going through its standard cycle and it's going to taste excellent. Um, you can actually get into bigger issues when you gas it and hold it because you can't tell how how fresh it is at that point and and say is no longer a gauge at all of you know quality and freshness.

So if this meat is gas and what's the name of the gas again? Most of the time they're using carbon dioxide. So what we exhale right? So, we breathe in oxygen, breathe out carbon dioxide. And so, they're using that to um force out the oxygen. So, they they've got it compressed in cylinders on the packaging machines. And it literally it's like a it sounds like Darth Vader mash and uh it it it sucks out the oxygen and then pumps in the the carbon dioxide which turns it to a cherry red color and then uh and then it holds it there. So, as long as the packaging seal doesn't break, then that carbon dioxide gas will stay in there and um keep that color for indefinitely. You know, it'll it'll go rancid and and completely, you know, uh degrade before that color changes. But if they put the gas in the meat, how do you know when the expiry was or you don't know? You not by sight. You can't tell. No. So, you'd have to then go by, you know, the packaging label um and that kind of thing as well. And so, um, yeah, so then then you're stuck just looking at the label and then the label says, "Well, it's it's fine." Well, it might be like one day from expiring. You don't necessarily know it. It looks good. People understand that, um, you know, from a marketing standpoint, they understand that people are going to look at it that their first thing isn't necessarily going to be to check the date cuz if it looks good, then, oh, it's fine. I'm going to cook, you know, cook it tonight. I'm going to cook it tomorrow. Uh, you know, it's kind of funny, but it's like what they discover with like laundry detergent of all things that that people don't actually look at laundry detergent to see if their clothes are clean. They smell it, right? And so then all the emphasis on laundry detergent changed to a smell because that's how people determined if it was a good, you know, clean or not. And the same way with with beef, the the powers that be discovered that people aren't really checking dates and labels. They're looking at the color. Well, does it look good? If it looks good, then it is good. And so, um, it's allowed them to, you know, dramatically extend the shelf life of the meat or at least the salable shelf life of the meat where people will actively buy it even if it's actually quite old.

I don't know about you, but like I was shocked when I first heard this from you and I was like, what? My meat is being gassed even though it might not be harmful for us, but I want to know what I am buying and if my food is expired, I don't want to pay for it. I want fresh meat because I want to eat meat that is fresh and good for me and good for my family. Um, next point about beef. Uh, so a lot of people shop from Walmart and grocery stores like Walmart. They buy their meat from there. Um, you say that there are five main meat packers in the US? That's where all the meat comes from. Can you tell me who they are? Oh, that's a great question. So, they go by a couple different trade names. JBS is going to be the biggest one in beef. Then you have Cargill. Um, you have Tyson. You have um and then you get into kind of some smaller entities that they they frequently like buy each other out and change hands, right? And so there is always kind of turning and churning as to like what um, you know, there was Pilgrim's Pride, there was other ones, you know, the the names that they put outward facing are not necessarily reflective of that, but yeah, somewhere between four and five big companies um control the majority of all beef, pork, chicken um meat processed and distribution. And so each one of them is bigger in its own, you know, individual segment. Cargill has a is a force to be reckoned with in pork. Um, Tyson has got a and Cargill both have enormous poultry presence. JBS is smaller there. But they all um control those markets and they also um typically control you know from like farm to the end product with the exception of beef that is normally bought from independent farmers at some point in the production cycle and then taken to a feed lot. Though that is changing as well. And so that gives those companies a tremendous amount of control though when it comes to pricing, distribution, um, and also the ability to play with the markets a little bit to suit their own interests as well. Um, because basically if they all, you know, they don't have to sit down in a meeting to decide, you know, we're going to like slowly walk prices up, you know, they all benefit from prices walking up. If they all do it at the same time, they can functionally, you know, it doesn't have to be a collaboration. They're more than smart enough to know not to do something dumb like that where they could get nailed on it. But they can all see what's happening if they all start slowly walking prices up. Then everybody benefits from their perspective. Of course, the person buying it is is not benefiting at all. U that kind of u massive market share also makes it really vulnerable to, you know, issues and pricing issues. You know, the last time beef got extremely expensive um from on the retail side of things was um Tyson shut down just one of their beef plants under fairly suspicious circumstances. Um, it was it was supposedly a fire um that happened and it shut the plant down. Um, there's kind of some funny stuff that went down with that like they stopped buying beef cattle for that plant like a week and a half before the fire happened. So, it was really convenient that they didn't have any cattle lined up to be slaughtered a week and a half before the fire that they didn't know was going to happen happened.

But, I was looking at at a a company uh that is very famous for their um supposedly pasture-raised eggs. They've taken a lot of flack lately about them and but it was a picture deal done by like two photographers paid by the company and the picture was getting hammered because one it was a farm that supposedly had 50,000 chickens on pasture. It's like a picture with like five birds in it. And two, one of the guys had a bag of chicken treats in their hand of like um basically like scratch treats that you can throw to induce chickens to like run out and stuff. And they were pointing out that like very clearly they were like actually having to do some work to try to like lure the chickens out of the barn because they'd never been out of the barn to actually like go outside so that they could get a picture of anyway. And just the the the irony of uh that and you know and again those guys didn't even realize you know like that other people would see that and be like uh you're holding a bag of chicken treats. Like why you know why do you need a bag of chicken treats for a photo shoot with 50,000 birds on pasture? it's like shouldn't they be outside? Um, anyway, so you get it's interesting stuff but again those the the companies you are very interested in in branding that to convey that it's a premium race product so that they can extract a premium pricing because from their model if they can raise it the same way or virtually the same way. um then they can make a tremendous amount of additional profit by selling it at supposed premium whether that's pasture-raised or organic or you know any other you know kind of freerange you know modeling that they can put on it. When the average person shopping at the grocery store sees those things and they see the you know maybe a nice picture or you know maybe there's not even a picture on it but the description and they have in their minds how this is raised and they can see a little family farm that they once visited and they're like oh yeah it's it's probably from that farmer right next door and it's not um you know it's greenwashing where the these companies are actively trying to convey one thing while producing it a different way for a profit margin and you know but the average person thinks that they're you know they're paying a premium premium hoping to bring back a premium product to their family and they're not. They're they're just getting swindled overwhelmingly.

Okay. Question about the eggs. Is that brand that you're talking about Vital Farms? Yeah. Yes, it is. Okay. I want to talk more about that one. People going be like, "What? I know Vital Farms. I might and I might buy it." Um, so getting back to the beef now. People might be thinking, "Well, who cares if like these companies, five companies produce all the meat?" Well, this is why it matters. Labeling matters. If somebody buys grass-fed, David, is it really grass-fed? Sometimes. So, uh the the the official like legal ease for grass-fed allows grain finishing. So, uh they they just have to have spent some time on pasture eating like the the actual regulation just requires that they have spent some portion of their life on pasture for an extended period of time. It still allows like the last 120 days can be an exclusive grain feeding diet or a mixed grain. So, if you're just buying grass-fed, it it is almost certainly also had um an extensive amount of grain feeding as well. So, it technically did eat grass. Um, but when you're talking about an herbivore like a cow or a sheep, you know, their their systems and stomachs are designed to eat forage and digest forage and break that down, it does take a longer time for them to gain weight and get finished. So, that's a good eating experience and quality. Corn accelerates that process dramatically. Um, but it also acidifies their gut to the point that it eats holes in their stomach lining. It necrodes their liver and sometimes their heart. So most beef processed in the United States, overwhelming amount of it, um, the livers are condemned because they're actually suffering from liver failure when they're being harvested. And so, um, because of the amount of grain in the diet and their bodies are just not designed to handle it. And so it's ruining their livers. But because on a a grain diet, they can typically get them finished and harvested um around a year and a half old, um, they're not that doesn't manifest itself in dead animals. The fact that their bodies are shutting down and dying because of the diet they're being fed or at least their internal organs are um, you know, notwithstanding, as long as they can harvest them before that happens, then they're, you know, okay with it. Versus a grass-fed to grass-fed finished animal that's never had any grain is probably going to take uh two and a half years, maybe almost 3 years on a really well-managed forage chain um where they're just able to take the high energy tops of the plants and to finish and really fatten. Now, that fat is going to be filled with phytonutrients, with CLA, with omega-3, um, you know, all those good things. Uh, and it's going to taste delicious, too. But it takes time to build that. And so the grain shortcircuits that it can produce that same kind of finish in a way. It doesn't taste the same at all. And it also doesn't have any of those, you know, nutrients um from that process. And that's how most grain uh or most cattle in the United States are finished is on grain. And so even if they're labeled grass-fed, they're almost certainly still grain finished. And so if it doesn't say grass-fed to finish or you don't know the actual farm that's doing it, then um, you know, it's not. So because that's the other irony is is in um beef particularly. There are so few processing um options to get beef done for small independent farmers in particular. So the vast majority of beef run through these um top five or four companies and it v it really does vary at five versus four cuz one will buy out another one and then another smaller one will kind of come up and take its spot. Uh, they control the processing and they have got massive massive um processing facilities on a scale and and mechanized to an astounding level. you know, their processing cost per beef might only be 100 bucks. And so, but when it comes down to like an independent beef producer, they are going to be fairly depending on the state, there might only be one or two, maybe three or four um different places that will do it. The cost is going to be probably somewhere like 700 to $900 a beef animal. So, dramatically, I mean, you're talking a massive cost increase. And labeling is actually going to be a lot harder because um labeling happens through USDA and so they regulate that and it's not it's hard to get labels approved and through and because of that it means that a lot of the small operations probably don't even have label claims on their stuff. And so ironically you might you you buy a pack of beef from a a small grass-fed producer that's doing everything right and it might just say ground beef on it. Um, and then the package you buy in the store that says grass-fed, you know, likely, you know, finished out its life in a feed lot and is nothing like what you think versus the one that actually is everything like you think is just a, you know, a very plain kind of mellow packaging. And the reason is is that farmer does not have the resources behind him or the cost basis to get paperwork approved from the USDA. Um, versus that massive company most definitely does. and you know, they're selling you know millions and millions of pounds and you know the premium to get that done is extraordinary that small producer just doesn't have the resources to get that labeling done even though he's really doing it how that label was designed to be it just rigorous to get labels through USDA now as we've discussed the quality of our food really matters for our health but one aspect that we don't talk much about is actually our mental health now I recently did an episode with Dr. Georgia Eid discussing this very topic of how diet affects how we think and how we feel every single day. But food is just one part because I know a lot of us right now we're dealing with anxiety and stress maybe from finances or something personal in your life. And that's exactly what happened to me less than a year ago. And from the outside it probably looked like I was handling things perfectly. The travel, the podcast, the new launches. But honestly, I wasn't sleeping and I was drowning in overwhelm. And when I lost my father, suddenly the wheels just came off. I couldn't perfect my way out of that grief. And seeking therapy was a turning point for me. And that's why I'm so proud to have Better Help as a sponsor of today's episode. Now, my therapist didn't just listen. They gave me actual tools to help me navigate the fog. We worked through cognitive reframing to help me let go of the what-ifs and the guilt surrounding my dad's passing. And on the days when the anxiety felt really physical, they taught me the grounding techniques to find that calming feeling. And they helped me realize that the world doesn't end if I'm not perfect every single day. And if you're feeling overwhelmed or stuck in a dark season, I can't recommend them enough. 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So what do they feed cows? Because you told me that they just feed them the cheapest, not even food products ever. What are they actually feeding cows? Right. So least cost rationing is the idea that you feed the animals a ration that is the absolute least cost to get um kind of a marginal gain. And so it's all a spreadsheet equation to them. So there might be feed ingredients they could include that would speed up the animals rate of growth um or improve its overall health, but it might not do it enough to overcome the cost of the ingredient. And so of course the basis of um all uh livestock raised in the United States core ration is going to be genetically modified corn and soybeans. That's going to be the base hands down. Um or um and then you're going to have ethanol byproduct. So um dried distiller grains and um extracts that come from the fuel making process when they make biodiesel or um ethanol which is um gasoline by corn basically produces a lot of byproducts. And so they'll feed those. Um, they might use distilling byproducts too from like beer or other things. That's less common. They'll also use just anything and everything that comes through from like a waste process. So uh, you know, that might be like waste fat. That might be candy that's expired. That might be pizza crust that's gone bad that they shred up or it might be, you know, in in one somewhat infamous incident uh that I was made aware of um when I was uh talking to another producer was bragging about knowing just how many um tons of salad dressing could be fed to a beef animal before it died. Um, so so they uh, they get uh all kinds of uh ingredients and things that are are dumped and are you know, basically they're expired or for whatever reason it it's a waste product and that they can obtain for extremely cheap and you know, they've got you know spreadsheets calculators and nutritionists that'll figure out okay how much candy can we put into the diet because it's it's free or nearly free. How much waste salad dressing can we put into you know, a beef cattle was not designed to eat candy or waste salad dressing or pizza crust for that matter and so it takes a toll on the animal but again from the industry standpoint is okay as long as it doesn't kill it outright and it it doesn't kill it and it can kind of still fatten um, you know, in this time frame then it's a win if it costs us less and so yeah, your your your beef is is almost certainly you know, fattened on uh, you know, genetically modified corn, soybean, and junk food of some nature. And so that's not the picture most people have when they're, you know, making their purchases, but that is the the basis of, you know, lease cost rationing, which is definitely the industry standard in terms of, you know, if they get an opportunity to bring something in, they're going to to bring down the cost.

Got it. Okay. This sounds very depressing about beef, but I'm going to put a link for people so that they can find your farm because you're in the US and you ship to everywhere in the US as well, I believe. Yeah. And then also for other links because people are going to say, "Well, just tell me what else I can buy." And also, if you cannot buy or afford the best in the beef, just buy the cheapest possible, but just know exactly what David is saying. That's what you're actually buying, if that's the cheapest that you can buy. But we're also going to talk about how to make an awesome steak with cheap cuts at the end after we talk about the foods. So, let's move on to the next one, which is eggs. This is absolutely shocking. What percentage of pasture-raised eggs are actually pasture-raised? Well, um, by the legal definition, um, which is super vague, it just they just have to have a certain amount of, um, door space basically in their house. They don't ever have to go out in it. And beyond and and then after the door, there has to be a certain size of area. By those definitions, all pasture-raised eggs are pasture-raised. Uh, when it mean when you actually ask, okay, uh, how many of those actually go out on the pasture? Virtually none. Statistically, you know, probably well less than 5% ever go outside. Um, pasture-raised eggs overwhelmingly um are raised by a few companies. And the model is is a house has 25,000 to 50,000 birds in it. It's got a few hind doors cut in the side. These birds are raised indoors. They they don't see the sun when they're growing up. They they spend their entire lives inside and then they're transported to these other houses, dumped there in the dark. And most of them won't ever find the door. you know, they they're living, you know, they've got their nest box, they've got their feed, they've got their water, and they're not ever used to going outside. So, a lot of them even just seeing the sun. They're kind of like scared of it anyway. They don't know what's going on. And so, they're living in a confinement house the same way they were. There are just a few exit doors that they could hypothetically access. And so, that is how pasture-raised um birds, you know, branded birds are actually being raised. And people have this idea that they're all out on pasture and you know it's this beautiful and this wonderful thing and the case is is most of them never even see the sun let alone you know a green idyllic pasture and the areas right outside the doors get degraded really quickly because that 5% 3% of hens that do go out there they don't go particularly far and continual access to livestock on a pasture basis is going to destroy it. So the only way to maintain good, healthy, vital pasture is to have the livestock be there, graze it, and then leave. The land needs a recovery period. If you leave them there continually, they're just going to degrade it. And that's exactly what happens around these houses is is directly around them. It gets extremely degraded. Further away, it's lush and growing pasture, but the birds never make it that far. And most of them, you know, never even make it outside. And so it's a big misnomer. There's actually a a petition being put forward to the USDA and FDA right now to um basically make the agendure standards to say that in order to be labeled pasture, the bird needs to spend at least 50% of its life on vegetative pasture. and that there's getting a lot of industry push back, a tremendous amount because that rule change would wreak havoc with their model of these, you know, confinement houses and only a few of them ever making it outside. And so there there's tremendous amount of push back. They do not want that um regulation change at all um because it would really decimate their kind of you know they're they're really good they've got a great deal going on because the their cost basis is just is virtually the same as when they were you know just confining the hens in. It costs very little to add a few doors uh especially when and nobody uses them. And so that's how the birds are being raised. Ironically, um, Vital and some others were getting were actually not even opening the doors a lot of times, um, they had a in the little clause and asterisk or whatever, even when the pasture standards, it says for the health of the birds, you can basically keep the door closed. The idea behind it was no doubt, you know, like extremely inclement weather, right? You don't want to open those doors on like a hurricane or, you know, like 2 ft of snow outside. Um, but what they were using that for was that the the concern was bird flu. And so in the name of preventing bird flu um from infecting their birds, which which one were ridiculous and how they were trying to prevent it, but they were just leaving the door shut because it's much easier uh to not even have to worry about any birds going outside and to they they were raising a tremendous number of birds that could never even go outside on any circumstances. uh under you know pasture-raised labeling premium you know wonderful pictures of five chickens out on pasture and you know none of the birds could had ever even seen the sun or walked outside once um because all the doors were shut in the name of saving them from bird flu. So, uh, you know, that was a kind of a big kfluffle of late among others was a realization of like what those standards really meant and what they were allowed to do within the technicalities of that versus when people are buying those pasturized eggs and they're seeing the pictures, right, that those companies might show and they're seeing the birds on pasture and their idea is again idyllic, you know, a breeze blowing across the the prairie and the the heads of grass, you know, blowing in the wind and the chickens, you know, pecking at an insect and they're going, you know, that's the picture and that's not the reality behind it. And so, um, again, it's the tremendous, tremendous market for premium eggs. And a lot of people are increasingly becoming aware of and wanting to support, you know, more pasture-raised regenerative agriculture. But that's a really good example of greenwashing where most people are buying those eggs and expecting something different and they're getting the same the same egg at the end of the day as if they had bought a much cheaper one. Um, but in you know packaging that's uh, you know, not as flashy. And so what they're really getting is fancy packaging and a good branding story as opposed to a superior product, which is a real shame because, you know, a lot of people are spending, you know, their hard-earned dollars trying to make a difference. And again, it's it's not accomplishing what they think it is either for their family's health or for, you know, the production model in agriculture at large.

So let's be clear, is Vital Farms really pasteurized eggs? No. I mean, not by by the legal standards, yes. By my by what I would consider pasture raised and I think what people have in mind no most of those birds are never on pasture so okay so that's very clear so that people can understand Vital Farms which everyone talks about is very good and all these pasture raised eggs is actually not pasture raised are people paying double or triple the prices for eggs when it's as good as caged or freerange eggs that's yeah they are so mind-blowing David mind-blowing the technical difference between a cage-free a freerange and a pasture-raised chicken at sometimes is is nothing. There there might be actually zero. You know, when those doors were shut to the save the birds from bird flu there there was no difference between those three models, but there's a tremendous difference in the pricing uh between those three models.

Do you think that most people buy meat and eggs that they're being scammed? Most probably are. At least they are not not technically again like these companies, you know, I know all the legal ease, but in terms of the customer expectation versus what they're receiving. Yes, they they think they are buying one thing, they're getting another. Technically, they are getting what they're paying for. Uh, but it's not what they think they're paying for. Mhm. Okay. So, um, in terms of the eggs, buying caged or freerange eggs is as good as buying partial save dollars or just buy eggs from a farmer that you know like David.

Okay. Let's move on to vegetarianfed chickens are a scam. Why? Uh, well, for starters, because chickens are omnivores, which means that they're designed to eat both animal protein products and grains, right? So, they have a balanced gut um that's designed for that uh in much in the same way, very similar to humans in terms of their digestive abilities. They actually have a a um a special organ that they can grind grains in, which is really cool. They swallow rocks and um they can grind some grains, but they're designed to eat animal protein as well. And so they want to have u insects in particular in the diet which is not uh vegetarian fed. The idea that you know the vegetarian fed is like some sort of like superior idea. Um, what it does mean is they're not feeding them animal byproducts. So they're not like giving them pig fat or something. Um, but you know the irony is is a truly pasture-raised bird is most definitely not vegetarian fed because if they're really out on pasture they are hunting um every day. They're out there. They're going to be eating insects. They're going to be eating like small mammals, like they're going to be going after the tiny life that lives out in a pasture. Um, and because their guts are designed to digest that, they will very actively go after it. And so, yeah, that there's a always laugh seeing walking through the store and you through the the egg aisle. Uh, cuz I I'm addicted anytime we're at the store. I was like, Mariah's always like, "What are you doing?" You're like, "You're not going to buy anything here." Like, "We raise it all." I was like, "No, but I got to go see, you know, what what new labeling is is going on." And so I run over there. It's always kind of fun and a chuckle to be like, "Ah, you know, they're like pasture-raised, vegetarian fed." I was like, "Well, one of those, you know, it's like those are juxtaposed items, aka bullshit." Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. So, um, that's uh that's right. And so, it's funny. Um, but yeah, chickens aren't designed to be vegetarian fed. They need animal protein in the diet. In the same way that it's it's very difficult to balance our own diets um on plants alone, not impossible, but extremely difficult. Um, the same way for the chicken, they they need some animal protein in the diet and so that they thrive when they really are in a pasture-raised setting and they can get that from the fields. And so when that's withheld from them, they're going to struggle a lot more.

So um next one, chicken, they are bathed in chlorine. Why is that bad? Well, I mean, chlorine is rarely given as a health supplement, right? So, let's start there. You know, I don't think you I find it unlikely that you've ever gone any place or and I certainly haven't where they were like, you know, I think what you really need in your diet is just a little more chlorine. You know, take this tablet twice a day and it's going to clear up XYZ. I don't think so. Um, and so um w with chicken um processing the USDA has standards for basically micro biological reduction and all that to say is they do test um to see how many um bacteria how many other things are in the meat and you have to reduce the number to a certain threshold right and so that's the USDA standards and so what USDA has been doing is reducing that threshold lower and lower and lower. And you might think like on its surface you're like, "Yes, like that's exactly, you know, that's that's great. You know, our food is getting safer and safer and safer." But there's multiple things at play. One of which is is that there is no um affordable way to discern what exactly you are lowering. And so you're just measuring all microbiological activity, be it positive or negative. And so um that's one thing. And the other thing is is that in order to reduce that level systematically to the the level that they're now requiring requires chemical intervention. And so um serious chemical intervention. And so you're fairly limited by what you can do to comply with USDA standards. And if you can't comply with USDA standards, then you can't sell your meat. And so the easiest way to do that is to soak the chickens in a water bath that contains chlorine or chlorine and um some other chemical concoctions. The idea being that that is going to um by soaking it into the meat then if you test it quick enough afterwards um, you know, it'll pass those new extremely low thresholds. And so um people think that's a good thing. It's actually been systematically removing the independent processors out of the game because it's requiring increasingly dangerous chemicals to comply or really onerous steps. And so industry-wide soaking in chlorine bath, which those chickens definitely soak up a ton of water doing that, that's why it's also the companies like it because they're get to sell that water when that meat sucks it up. they're selling by the pound and so you know, they're they're getting chlorine water is a lot cheaper than chicken to raise and you know, they're getting to sell a certain percentage of that with the chicken. If you read your label on your chicken it'll say you know includes you know not more or less than x% water. Um, and so sometimes that number can be fairly substantial. So there's that aspect of it. And then um, you know, on our own farm in our chicken processing um, we're not going to soak them in chlorine. And so we use um basically hydrogen peroxide which um and vinegar both of which you hydrogen peroxide just dissipates. It's literally just hydrogen um it's the other component of water and vinegar again which is natural but it's a lot harder to hit those compliance levels using those um ingredients. But again, we feel really strongly on it because we don't want harm harsh chemicals in the meat. And so, um, it requires us to jump through a lot of other hoops. Thankfully, raising them on pasture already reduces the, um, the the biological count the nasty biologicals in the meat um, by orders of magnitude. So, that helps us a lot less that we have to get killed. But th those USDA requirements manifest themselves in chicken that's soaked in chemicals that you would never I mean you would never get some meat and be like I should just marinade this in and in and chlorine and you know some other chemicals you know that have skull and crossbones on the label you know like no one ever thought that and yet the requirements that this biological levels be reduced means that that's exactly what's happening and so it's it's kind of a sad example of unforeseen consequences right and to, you know, by the government standards, you know, the guys on the spreadsheet are like, "Hey, you know, like if we we, you know, progress means we're going to get this even lower. We're driving this like the only way to um completely like free something, you know, to eliminate all biologicals is just to kill all the life in it and to nuke it completely, right? And so you can just like cook it to an insane level and do like a um, you know, heating it to extreme levels. Yes, it will kill every, you know, all biological life, good and bad, in the meat. It's also going to denature all the proteins and reduce, you know, the the nutritional value to nothing, but it's clean. And so that's that's the downside. And people don't realize that it sounds good to say, oh, we're going to reduce, you know, the biological count meat.

The truth is, is like all organisms are going to have biologicals. Your skin has biologicals, good and bad, right? Your guts, your intestine, all of those things. And most of them aren't nasty at all.

And so when you, you know, require systematically lower levels, um, it, the result has really been to put a lot of small-level poultry processing facilities out of business or to greatly, um, increase the amount of effort it takes to comply with owners' regulations that aren't in, they're not improving safety. They are reducing the number of independent small poultry processors and consolidating it to these massive, um, processors that can comply because they have no qualms about the harshness of the chemicals required to hit those levels.

Now, as we've discussed so far, optimal health is more than just what you eat. It's actually what your body can absorb. Think of it this way: If you aren't prepared to eat it, you probably shouldn't put it on your skin because most commercial brands are loaded with ingredients you probably don't want. Things like synthetic chemicals, parabens, and microplastics. Now, they don't just strip away your skin's natural microbiome. They actively disrupt your hormones because your skin is your largest organ, not a filter for toxins.

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I just want people to know that this is a big deal. Chlorine is a disinfectant, and as you said, you don't want to buy something that is bathed in chlorine. Um, and also the water coming out of it, it's inflammatory. So, if somebody has a hormone issue, they want to heal, and they're having, they're buying this chicken that has been bathed in chlorine, that's going to affect their own health. So, they also need to bear this in mind: Know your farmer, and know where you're getting your meat from.

Um, next one is dairy. So, in every dairy, they put RBST in it. What is that? Uh, human chorionic growth hormone. And so, um, which exactly what it sounds. So, in humans, RBST is growth hormone. It, it encourages growth. Um, and so it was discovered, um, I believe sometime in the '60s or '70s, that, uh, and now it begs the question of who thought of this, um, exactly, but someone at some point was like, "Huh, this hormone, um, and it produces growth in humans. I wonder what would happen if we fed it to beef cattle or dairy cattle." And so they did. And the result, as they found, was it dramatically increases, um, milk yield. And so, ironically, really, what it's doing is it's just forcing more water into the milk. And so, uh, because milk is extremely high percentage water, the dairy cows will give more. It's illegal to add water to milk after the cows are milked. It is not illegal to give the cows things that, you know, increases the percent of milk of water in the milk prior to milking. And so it was discovered that the RBST could really increase milk yield, which is to say it would, um, force the cows' bodies to put way more water into the milk. And so when you milk them, then even though everything's more diluted, it didn't matter. They're selling milk by the volume, not the nutrient content.

And so it was eventually banned. Um, it's not legal in the United States now to feed RBST to dairy cows. It is still extremely common. It's readily available, and the, you can't really test for it in the milk. Um, extremely difficult, and they're not testing for it. And so, um, a lot of conventional dairies, not all, certainly not all, but a lot of conventional dairies are still using it or sneaking some into the ration because it's very hard to make a living in the dairy business. And on, on the large-scale dairy industry, the farmers are not getting paid very much at all for that milk. And so every cent counts. And again, a lot of unforeseen consequences because it's so easy to put that in, and because it bumps the volume of the milk, and they're paid by the volume of the milk, then, um, it, it is very common to have that added, um, illegally, so you know, to improve their bottom line. And so it's an unfortunate reality, but yes, uh, there's a pretty good chance that buying milk from the grocery store, uh, is going to have human growth hormone in it, uh, from cattle.

Now, you know, all the tests have said and shown, you know, even when the industry was doing it at large, they were like, "Oh, we did five tests and it didn't seem like it was really causing people to grow anymore." They're like, "Huh, it doesn't, you know, downstream doesn't seem to have too many effects." Um, that's not particularly comforting. Uh, you know, a few effects is a few too many, um, when it comes to, you know, adding human growth hormone to food. Um, but, uh, that was their result. But yeah, it is really kind of unsettling to think about, and it is a lot more common than people think. This could be the reason why that people gain weight when they have dairy because there's growth hormone in it. I can't tell you the number of people that say, "I have dairy, milk, yogurt, cottage cheese," well, not really butter, but all these different dairies, and they put on weight, and they, they take it away, they don't put, they, they lose weight.

Is it the same as raw dairy? Uh, it just all depend, again, it all depends on the farmer. Normally, um, raw dairy is, depending on your state, is either highly illegal or readily available and everything in between. And so you have states like Pennsylvania or California, um, where raw milk is pretty much, you know, in some states, you can just buy it on the grocery store shelf, um, which is really wild. And then you have other states that it is like hardcore illegal, and the only way to get around that is to say that you're like selling it for pets only, and then people have to buy it, or they have to actually buy a part of the cow and say that they're, you know, they're just getting their share of ownership. Like there's a lot of hoops to jump through in some states, and a, and a lot of pressure to reduce it.

At the end of the day, uh, raw milk is just milk that has not been pasteurized. In the pasteurization process is just heating it, um, internally to, um, denature, um, any bacteria that's growing in it. It also denatures some proteins. And again, and when you're talking about a biological culture, like with yogurt and things, that's pasteurized milk that then killed all the biologicals, and then they have to add it back in and stir it in. And so in raw milk, you actually have all those probiotic elements because it has not been pasteurized. So the upside is you're getting all those good things. Um, it's cool because with raw dairy, you're going to have, um, it doesn't spoil, it just ferments. And so, um, you know, pasteurized milk from the grocery store, like eventually that the milk is going to, people say sour. It, it really goes rancid. Um, and when it does, you know, it hits you hard, right? Um, your raw milk isn't going to, it will get an off smell. It will sour, is what it will do. Um, because it's going to ferment. So, it's going to start turning itself into yogurt and cheese if you leave it long enough. Um, and you might not like the smell of that production, but it's a completely different smell. And safety-wise, it is just fine. You know, you can let it ferment for a really long time. Sometimes we give it to the livestock, and we'll leave it, you know, at room temperature for days, and it will start making cheese, and it's cool, and you crack it open, and it smells like cheese making, and you pour it out, and they love it. Um, so it, again, it's all in perspective. The, the upside to it is all those good, you know, biological activity, all the probiotics are there, and they're outcompeting any sort of bad bacteria, so that it, you know, is a, a wonderfully great product. If the milk is produced or contaminated in some way, that's where problems can happen, right? If you have contamination in the milk, you, and you didn't, you know, pasteurize it, then, you know, you can, um, potentially get sick or at least give yourself some, you know, gut temporary gut imbalance that will, you know, be uncomfortable, right? And so that's the downside and the risk.

Um, pasteurization was, um, put into place as standard protocol in this country at a time where it was really common to feed dairy cattle like an exclusive diet of like waste brewer's products. So like the blue milk, um, kind of stuff you can read about, um, which is literally just feeding again, animals waste products, and it, it turned the milk blue. It, it was extremely unhealthy, like, uh, animal conditions that were being raised in was really dirty, parlors were dirty, sanitation was not fully understood. And so it makes sense at the time when it was implemented. Things are a lot different now when you're talking about an animal out on, you know, if you're talking about a grazing dairy, right, where the animals on pasture, bacteria levels are going to be tremendously lower anyway. Um, everything's going to be healthier. You take, um, safe protocols when it comes to, you clean your dairy equipment every day, you prevent contamination, then raw milk can be a wonderful thing. If it comes from a really nasty, you know, dairy that's not doing any of those precautions and feeding a lot of grain, which is going to dramatically increase the bad bacteria ratio, um, in that animal and in the environment at large, then yeah, you know, you could get a nasty strain, and it wouldn't be good. So again, it, I know your farmer, do your homework on if this is something that you want to, you know, do or not. The benefits can be really tremendous. Um, drinking, you know, real raw milk, you can get some real probiotic benefits. You can taste milk with a fat level of what it used to be, um, which is going to be a lot creamier. It's going to have a lot more nutrients in it. All those things.

Well, David, my audience likes raw milk. And they're going to be thinking, I love raw milk. I'm not, you don't have to talk about this dirtiness or like the sterilization. And I think that most people on this channel, at least, they really prefer the raw milk over, um, pasteurization and the pasteurized dairy. Uh, and that goes into knowing your farmer and knowing your story, because if people are wondering, well, why should I buy this grass-fed beef, these eggs, this dairy, and all these things from farmers like you? Well, you're rooted in a perfect story to explain why this is so important. What is your story pertaining to your wife and how the food that you're eating right now has changed your, your life and your family's life?

Oh, absolutely. So, you know, early on, I grew up on the family farm, and we were, um, not super conventional. We were already doing some kind of outside-of-the-box things. My dad was already, you know, into rotational grazing of cattle, um, because he understood there was an ecological benefit, and that benefited the cows as well. And so, I grew up in that. When I decided I wanted to be a farmer, I, um, really dive, really deep into the ecology side of things and the animal health side, because I was like, "Wow, if we, you know, work with natural cycles in such a way that we grow more grass and have healthier animals, then that's an opportunity for me to make a living here, right? I can generate some extra income to survive on, 'cause farming is a very difficult, um, endeavor to make a living in." And so that was my main drive. And so we were producing this like pasture-raised stuff. And again, I was, um, moving away from chemicals. I didn't want chemical interventions because it costs money. And I was like, "Well, how, what, what could we do instead?" And so we started getting sheep and goats to handle our weeds instead of using, um, expensive herbicide. And so we're, we're working in this kind of organic regenerative system. Um, but our, my mindset was all like cost-based and like, "Can I produce, you know, value-added product from the land?" I didn't, it was there, and the stuff I was reading, and the people I was interacting with were talking about, you know, the fact that healthy soil does grow more healthy plants, which can produce even more healthy livestock, and, and for me, that's just where it stopped. And so we were farming that way, uh, my wife and I, and before we were married, myself, and, you know, in this, you know, kind of idyllic pasture-raised setting, and yet we were still just getting all of our meat, whatever was cheapest, everything just from the grocery store, processed food, the whole nine yards. I had no thought process of that last step, which is that, that a healthy, nutrient-rich animal is going to produce nutrients that our bodies need for our own health. And so that was just a disconnect. It seems impossible. It existed. My wife and I got married. We got married quite young. We wanted a big family. Uh, and so we were really excited about that. And then it came out that, um, after a doctor's visit and some things that they were, they basically said that my wife, in all likelihood, would never have children, and, uh, because of some health issues she was having. And that was, uh, that was a really big, um, kind of shock to our world, 'cause we, we wanted a big family. We, you know, we had all these plans and dreams, and reality just collided with this. And the, the treatment options they gave us were just totally unviable. Uh, we were just scraping by. We did not have the money for what they were suggesting at all. And so, you know, we walked out of that very discouraged. Um, but it was kind of, uh, the Lord kind of brought that to us at just the right time, because we had a lot of people in our sphere that, uh, were doing everything we were doing, but also talking about how the healthy soil, healthy plants, healthy animals means healthy people. And so we radically changed our own diet. We, we cut out, um, you know, the processed foods. Um, we started buying, ironically, we, we couldn't just instantly get some from our own farm because you had to figure out the processing side of things. So, we started buying pasture-raised meats and truly pasture-raised eggs and, um, you know, these nutrient-rich items from farmers that we knew that were doing it already, and our friends in this kind of farming, regenerative farming world, and we radically changed our diet. And, um, you know, the Lord blessed it. Uh, we had, uh, Judah, uh, about nine months after we, uh, we radically changed our diet. And say, my, my wife's health issues resolved themselves, um, with that diet change. I felt a lot better, um, as well. For her, it, it just completely, you know, changed things, and we had our first, and followed pretty quickly by our second. Today, we have six, um, wonderful children. And so, uh, yeah, and that's just a tremendous, tremendous blessing, um, there. And so again, it, it changed our family and our whole trajectory of our lives, you know, changing the way we ate, um, and that really made us passionate about it. And so that's when we decided, um, when we were going through that journey of changing the way we ate, we're like, "You know, we're already raising it this way. Like, one, we wanted to eat it ourselves from our own farm, and two, is like, we, we found as we were looking for that was really difficult in our area to get food that was raised the way we wanted it to be raised." And so that's what we set out to do. And when we started Fed from the Farm, is we wanted something without asterisks. We, we wanted something where people didn't have to like, kind of dive into the nitty-gritty details to find out, and they can, but we, we didn't want something that was like branded one way and actually wasn't the other, because we were motivated by wanting this nutrient-rich food for our families because we understood the profound difference it could make in the health and even the trajectory of having a family at all. Right? And so that was our motivation and our driving factor. You know, we got to experience that firsthand, and we wanted to bless other families as well, um, in addition to our own. And so, and it lined up also with our, you know, our desire and feeling in terms of stewardship for the land, in terms of, you know, the long-term view of, are we leaving a landscape and a resource base that is better for the next generation or that's degraded? And so when, when you work with natural cycles through regenerative agriculture, and you're managing for the health of the soil, and you're managing for the health of the grass, you know, increased soil health is going to grow more forage. And when you raise that forage in such a way that you reinvest a lot of it back into the soil as mulch, and then keep a healthy root, you're going to grow more soil, which is going to grow more grass, which is then going to produce even more healthy livestock, which then produces even more healthy food, which supports even more thriving families in this wonderful, you know, beneficial snowball effect, right? And so that's kind of our view, our vision, and what, you know, is driving us, even as we make even, you know, longer-term investments on our own farm, um, planting orchards, putting, you know, really things that are not going to take effect for, you know, generations into play. Thinking from a really long-term perspective in terms of what is the legacy that we're going to leave behind, and what is the trajectory that we're setting up, not just for our own family, but for the families that depend on us, um, for their food.

That is amazing. If anyone wants to know the benefits of pasture-raised real food, there you go. There is the benefits. Uh, people really have to understand what real food does to their health. And if you want to look after your health, invest your dollars in good quality food and support farmers that are doing the hard work like David.

Moving on, the tick invasion. Have you seen, I've seen on X on Twitter, um, recently that there has been a lot of lone star ticks, and you're saying that you have seen them as well. Well, I'll ask you the question. Have you seen them around your area?

Yeah. Oh, yeah. There, there are lone star ticks in the area. There have been for several years. Um, and so, and definitely seeing them with a higher frequency. Like, there's no question that the, the ticks are on the move, and that, you know, the frequency at which one would see them is increasing. Um, so no question about that, whatever. You know, I've seen videos myself of people like finding like boxes of these ticks, and, you know, that's pretty wild. I've never seen any myself. I've never known someone that's found any. Uh, that's not to say it's not happening. Uh, if it is, that is extremely nefarious. You know, lone star ticks can carry alpha-gal, that is a really nasty, um, really, really nasty tick-borne disease, among others. You know, there's other tick varieties that carry, you know, Lyme disease, Rocky Mountain spotted fever, um, and those can be really devastating as well. And so, you know, ticks are nasty. They're kind of scary because you can't see them, right? Or it's difficult to see them. They get attached without you realizing it. Um, I think, uh, for me, like the worst thing about it is it has this like adverse effect of like, um, wanting people to be kind of afraid of the outdoors, not wanting people. The effect is that people are more afraid and more cautious about the outdoors, or if they go, then, you know, they're using some, you know, trying to having to use harsher chemicals or something to try to keep the ticks at bay. Is this horrible dichotomy?

Um, you know, for us on the farm, you know, we're definitely concerned about it. We check on it. Um, the livestock, we haven't seen any really increased numbers on them. As long as they're healthy, it seems to, um, keep the ticks at bay. The chickens, of course, we have a lot of chickens on the farm, and the hens love to hunt all those kinds of things, and so they do a very, very good job of keeping, um, tick populations at bay, um, as well as a tremendous amount of wildlife. So, we've got a lot of bird species, um, on the farm of various kinds, and they're going to eat, um, a tremendous number of these things, and so that helps us again, using natural cycles, because we're not killing, using chemicals to kill off, we're not using insecticides, right? And so we have a tremendous amount of biological life in our soil and in our plants. What that means is there are some negative ones. There's definitely ticks. There's definitely, you know, some mosquitoes. There's some flies, you know. Um, but it also means there's tons of other beneficial insects that help the grass. But it means that there's a, a readily available diet of insects for a tremendously increased bird population, which then eats ticks and eats all those things. When you, you, when you chemically intervene, you kill most of all the insects, sometimes except the very worst ones. And what it does is it wipes out the diet for your wildlife that was eating them already. And so when that happens, uh, then your, your beneficial wildlife that was eating the ticks or any deleterious insect, their populations dramatically drop because they no longer have any food. And you've temporarily chemically, you know, reduced the population of whatever it is you're after. That seems great. A couple months down the road, you no longer have the beneficial wildlife to handle the population, and you now have an exploding, um, level of these bad bugs. The few that survived are now replicating, and when there's nothing's eating them, and it gets out of control. And so that's kind of the negative cycle of that on our own farm managing. You know, I, I always like to say, like, a regenerative farmer wakes up every day, um, trying to cultivate life. And, you know, the saying is, a conventional farmer wakes up every day with something to kill. Whether be, be it a weed, an insect, a bug. You know, you gotta, you got to kill something in order to survive. And, you know, from a regenerative standpoint, we're trying to cultivate life. I don't like the ticks. I really appreciate having the chickens on our farm to, um, you know, help control those populations, as well as those, you know, wildlife populations that are going to naturally, um, eat them. But it is a concern, and there's no question the lone star ticks are increasing, you know, their range, that, and they are carrying alpha-gal. You know, you know, there's small things you can do, you know, for personally, I take a lot of garlic. So insect-biting insects don't like garlic. I don't like the smell of garlic, and if you take enough of it, you will start to have a smell of garlic, and so that can help. That's a small thing that, that's my quirky farmer thing that, uh, we do. Our, I want to stay away from you. I know. Yeah, that's right. It's good that we're doing this video interview. Um, or, you know, you might have to deal with, uh, you might have to deal with the garlic smell. Yeah. So, you know, there's things, but I mean, I would rather not eat excessive amounts of garlic, too, you know. So, I, I wish they weren't in the area, but you got to adapt to a certain level. Hopefully, there isn't something more nefarious going on. Um, if there is, I hope they get to the bottom of it, but we haven't seen anything on our end that would suggest that besides, you know, videos from other people.

Well, I wanted to ask with the alpha-gal, um, so people get a reaction or they get allergic to red meat. They can't eat red meat anymore. Um, do you think that could be that it's a bigger agenda to control people eating red meat, people eating less red meat?

It is a really interesting coincidence, and sometimes, you know, correlation does not mean causation, but sometimes it can be, uh, it is kind of fascinating. You know, there is probably pretty strong evidence that some of the tick-borne diseases we're dealing with were originally lab-created, particularly Lyme disease. I think that one's probably, um, moving away from the conspiracy theory side of things to just the, um, kind of acknowledged reality sphere. And so, uh, definitely alpha-gal has not gotten to that level of any sort of an acknowledgement that, yeah, this was created. Uh, it's really, really weird that that disease would have a, you know, would create an allergic reaction to that protein, right? And that that would then reduce. And because there is a huge push, um, by some elements, um, you know, uh, some social, some, you know, kind of, um, some governmental, some, there, there's an ideology that says that animal agriculture is bad and evil, and that animals always degrade landscapes, and they, that is a, it, it manifests itself both as an ideology, um, also as kind of a political drive in some cases, and also potentially, you know, uh, taking matters even more seriously and trying to push that. It's like, if we can't convince you not to eat it, then we'll make you allergic to it. Uh, it's possible. It, the, it's really weird that that would be such a powerful agenda, and that this would all of a sudden come, and that it would be combined with a tick that is pretty widespread, and that is really aggressive. Um, especially when it hasn't, you always wonder when stuff shows up that hasn't historically been around, right? So alpha-gal is pretty new. The lone star tick has been around for a long time, and it's just like, okay, how did it obtain this, um, and simultaneously, uh, you know, anytime you put some focus on like, um, animal husbandry, right? You can improve certain characteristics in an animal by selection process. It, it seems curious that the lone star tick would gain alpha-gal syndrome and, um, through what I can categorize as nothing else, through some sort of mad tick, um, you know, breeding pro, it seemed to have gained characteristics that could only come from selection for like really aggressiveness, um, that doesn't otherwise seem to benefit the tick. And so that's really wild, and it raises some really serious questions. Um, but yeah, there, there's an element, a strong element, and certainly a very well-financed element that believes that, you know, animals are evil, and that, you know, or raising them for agriculture is evil, that they're always going to degrade landscapes. The truth is, is that livestock can degrade landscapes if managed incorrectly. However, if you manage them with regenerative principles, um, they can be the single greatest tool to restoring degraded landscapes ever, like bar none, in terms of, you know, uh, whether it is building soil or pulling carbon from the atmosphere, um, you know, like carbon, whether whatever your opinion of carbon in the area is, carbon in the soil is amazing. And just managing livestock correctly, um, in regenerative principles can just fundamentally change a landscape in terms of, you know, the amount of water that's stored inside the soil, which then brings more water. If you look at, you can look into like desertification of certain regions and then like the reverse of that. So, like, you can just Google, you know, like holistic management international desert, and there's side-by-side photos of regenerative, of management that HMI was a part of, and they're not the only group doing it, certainly, but they've got some really cool documentation over time of like places out in the desert that it's like, one side of the fence is still desert, and one side of the fence they have, where they started was all desert, and 30 years later is like knee-high grass and verdant forage. They were using livestock to do that because, you know, originally massive grazing herds of livestock were what created the prairies in the United States, were what created, um, the vast fertile lands of Africa. Um, and to, you know, manage livestock, and also can tremendously, tremendously benefit the landscape if managed correctly with natural processes. If they're managed incorrectly, like anything, it will short-circuit the process and can cause degradation, right? Um, and so you've, it's all in how they're managed. But there is an ideology that says, no, absolutely not. The irony of the, you know, that is, uh, that ideology that's like, you know, like basically livestock are killing the planet, you know, or whatever, is that there's actually less livestock now, um, certainly cattle, than there was even a couple hundred years ago when you look at bovines in general. So there are more cows, but buffalo and several other species are also bovines, and there was like orders of magnitude more of them and gazelle around like 200 years ago. And so this, this idyllic, you know, past that they're trying to to reach to that we somehow killed with cows. The irony is, is no, we need more grazing livestock, managed correctly, is the only way that we're going to, you know, reverse, you know, the widespread desertification that is happening in certain environments. And the double irony of these people that are pushing this kind of like plant and soy-based, you know, all no animal protein, we're going to, you know, do it all in the lab, is that that, that model of agriculture is actually what is degrading soils and poisoning, you know, the water reservoirs with the chemicals that's required to grow those kinds of things. And so the irony is, is they're actually going to war against what could, you know, reverse these problems using the tools that has the pariting the tools as the salvation that are actually, you know, the one of the base causes of that degradation. So it's wild. Um, I don't think it can definitively be said that, you know, alpha-gal was made in a lab or that these ticks were selectively bred to spread it, but it seems really wild that that would happen by chance at just this time.

Yes. So, that's, that's where my question was coming from because it's very odd that you get a red meat allergy and you can never eat red meat again, but you can eat other, you know, eggs, fish, etc., etc., which is very odd and quite fascinating, red meat. So, um, from an evolution perspective, red meat and meat was the ones that made the human brain bigger and smarter, and red meat is the thing that makes you smart. And I think they don't want that, but who knows?

Let's end on a positive note. How do you make an awesome steak with cheap cuts?

Okay, there you go. So, the key is cutting against the grain. And so, um, your more expensive cuts are going to be from muscles. So, like your fillet or your ribeye are going to be from muscles that get less use in the animal. Okay? And so, that's the first thing that makes them so tender. Um, and the second thing, though, is that when those steaks are cut, they're cut against the grain. And so, muscle fibers have long, are have a long side, and that they're like laid like this, right? Because the way muscles work is those fibers contract, and they move our joints. And so those fibers, though, when you go to chew them in meat, um, are really, really chewy. And so a fillet is cut like this, and so that creates really short muscle fibers on a muscle that was already not used very much, which is what makes it so tender. Same with ribeye. It's cut against the grain. There's no other way to cut those steaks, um, because of how they're long and narrow, and so it works out. A lot of cheaper steaks, though, are a lot more square in nature. And so then you start talking of things like Denver steaks or, um, culotte steaks, or even sirloin steaks are, are going to be kind of a more of a roundish or a square muscle. And then, and when you're getting that muscle, um, cut, a lot of times you can get really long muscle fibers. And if, if the fibers are laid like this on your plate, um, if you, uh, cut with those fibers, which is actually easier with your knife to do, and then put that in your mouth, the experience is going to be terrible. You're going to be like, "I'm eating leather." And instead, if you just spend a minute kind of looking at your steak, or if you're cutting your steak yourself, looking at it to see which way those grains are flowing, and then cutting against them, you can make a very tender steak out of a cut of meat that you know, if cut the opposite way, you would have sworn was just shoe leather.

And so my wife and I, uh, we're not, uh, yeah, ironically, we've got this meat business or whatever. Like, we never like eat fillet or even ribeye. Like, we're always eating like the really low-quality cuts that like people don't order or eat, or the ones with like the broken seal. What's the low-quality cuts that you eat? Like, what's the names?

Oh, yeah. So for us, like, if I want steaks, we're going to eat, and I say low-quality, I'd say lesser-known steaks. If you know how to handle them, they're great. So Denver's, uh, we're going to eat a lot of Denver's, like culotte steaks when we eat steaks, or, you know, a sirloin tip. Um, much less common, uh, steaks, and certainly not ones known for tenderness at all, u, necessarily. But again, when you, we just take them out, and on our own plate, it's like, okay, when I cut the steak, I'm going to make sure I'm cutting against the grain, and then when I cut it again on my plate, I'm going to make sure that my knife is cutting against those grains. And, you know, you, when you do that, you can end up with something, um, done correctly, that's just tremendously, um, tender. And so my wife and I had some culotte steaks the other day, and we were really, really enjoying them, and she had me cut them all up, and we were, we were doing something with them, and she's like, "Man, this is super tender." She's like, "I didn't know the steak was was normally this tender." And I was like, "Well," I was like, "If you cut it the opposite way," I was like, "You would have like been like, got the first piece and been like, 'This is terrible.'" So, you know, I just, for grins, you know, cut one the, the other way, and it's like, try this. I was like, you know, so again, knowing how to cut against the grain and training your eye to see that, um, can, um, dramatically, um, improve the eating experience of any of your meat that you're going to be eating, but also allow you to take advantage of a lot of otherwise, you know, much less expensive cuts to really enjoy that steak experience on budget. So, it's definitely something to to look for and to train your eye to see. Um, it takes some time, but once you get a hand for it, uh, then you won't ever miss it again.

Amazing. We've just saved people so much money and not buying the ribeye every single time. David, thank you so much for your time. All your links are going to be in the description. Fed from the Farm is your beautiful farm. People can order everything from you. Let's help people out and let's help their health out. Thank you so much for your time.

Oh, thank you. It was great talking with you. I hope you enjoyed this episode. Check out this one with Dr. Kbury. It is all about how to reverse insulin resistance and why you should eat butter.