Are Grass-Fed, Wine-Drunk Cows the Next Beef Trend?

Most chefs pair a beef dish with a nice glass of red wine. Some Canadian ranchers are making it easy on cooks and diners — they're putting the wine right into the meat itself.

Last November, Jandince Ravndahl of Canada's Sezmu Meats started feeding her cows one liter of red wine a day, the equivalent of about one glass for humans. Ravndahl claims the cattle enjoy eating the red wine mixed into their feed, and that the resulting beef tastes more tender, almost like it's self-marinated. "Once they have it [red wine], they're happy to have it again," Ravndahl told the Vancouver Sun. "They moo at one another a little more and seem more relaxed." Well, sure. All those moos are probably because bovines are pretty buzzed.

Ravndahl's grass-fed, wine-drunk beef is taking off among the culinary elite, with prominent chefs like Ned Bell ordering the meat. And while red wine and grass-fed beef are two great tastes that undoubtedly taste great together, wine-fed beef threatens all the recent progress made in the sustainable meat movement.

Most American cattle are raised on concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs), where they're fed a dubious mixture of corn, antibiotics, soy, and even ground-up cow bits. But cows' natural diet consists of grazing on grass, a diet that many sustainable-minded ranchers are embracing with grass-fed, hormone- and antibiotic-free beef. I can't condone feeding cows wine, just like I can't support feeding them corn, pharmaceuticals, or anything else that's not a part of their traditional diet. To pump cattle full of wine or any other unnatural foods runs counter to the tenets of sustainably raising meat.

There are some scientists who are working on uncovering whether or not feeding cows wine could have health or planetary benefits. For example, one researcher hypothesizes that giving cows wine may reduce their methane emissions. Livestock produce about 18 percent of the world's global greenhouse gas emissions, with one cow burping up 26 to 53 gallons of methane each day, according to Food Safety News. And another research team thinks the resveratrol in red wine might boost heart health in cows the same way it does in humans.

If these hypotheses prove to be true, I might have an easier time swallowing wine-fed beef. But right now, these potential benefits are merely speculative. Until firm research highlights huge environmental and healthy benefits for serving red wine to cows, I prefer that my meat stay sober.

Photo credit: brittgow via Flickr