Why And How We Age Our Meat
Let’s start with why everyone isn't aging their meats the same way Herd & Grace does. The real reason is cost, commodity, and profits.
The longer you age meat, the more time the natural enzymes have to break down and tenderize the individual cuts. This breakdown causes the proteins to dehydrate, leading to a loss of water weight. As meat is almost always sold by the pound, this loss of water weight means there’s simply less meat to sell.
Water loss is compounded by the fact that after aging, parts of the cut must be trimmed away, exposing the newly aged meat beneath it.
On the other hand, aging and dehydration also lead to concentrated flavor and better texture. At Herd & Grace, we’ve decided a higher quality cut is worth the time, effort, and expense.
The Herd & Grace aging process is a careful combination of time, temperature, and environment. First, we start with the best meat we can find. We source cattle from the idyllic pastures of Australia and Tasmania where they have incredibly clean air alongside acres of pasture to roam. Then age it for the perfect amount of time to produce the kind of quality we strive for.
Because there’s no real efficient way to transport whole carcasses overseas, we start the aging process just after the cattle is broken down into sub-primal cuts, then start the aging process in USDA-inspected vacuum-sealed packages before shipping them to the States. Being thoughtful to the environment and in efforts to reduce our carbon footprint we send our product on already chartered passenger flights to cut carbon consumption.
Our grass-fed and grass-finished Cape Grim line responds especially well to this aging process and produces remarkably flavorful and tender steaks. We recommend coming by our local LA shop or ordering online to try it out yourself and taste the difference aging can make.