Theola Walden Baker <[log in to unmask]> writes:

> Penning--that is, limiting the
> cows' ability to roam (and besides making huge operations
> manageable)--further promotes weight gain and fat infiltration/marbleization
> of the meat.  Tender, juicy beef is the result.  (The required hanging/aging
> after slaughter also promotes tenderization by allowing microbial breakdown
> of the products of rigor mortis. You can't imagine how tough and nearly
> inedible beef can be unless it's penned before slaughter and hung
> afterwards. You might as well try to chew a boot.)

This really interested me.  Do you know more about the hanging and
aging process? I guess it is surprising to me that meat hung for days
on end doesn't grow some kind of harmful bacteria.  Is it because the
meat is considered a "live food" or has the enzymes that prevent
bacteria growth?  I remember hearing that frozen meat, once thawed,
will decompose but fresh meat will not.

By the way, (I am the one who was overjoyed to find a local grassfed
beef producer) they don't use antiboitics or hormones.  I imagine that
they don't pen the animals either, if they are free range (?)  But I
am just a city kid, I have no idea.  I DO know the meat I bought is
*delicious*.  I don't find the taste that different from the organic
(grain fed) meat I was used to, actually, and the beef was slaughtered
in the spring, after eating hay all winter.

Jana