Organic, Grass-Fed, and Natural - What Food Labels DON'T Tell You (Natalie Kovarik) | Ep 346 - Wits & Weights | Fat Loss, Nutrition, & Strength Training for Lifters

Episode Transcript
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Philip Pape (00:01):
If you've been spending extra money on organic
produce, grass-fed meat andnatural products, thinking
they're better for your healthand physique goals, but you're
wondering if you're just gettingripped off by fancy marketing.
This episode is for you.
Today, my guest a rancher fromNebraska who actually produces
the beef you buy is going toreveal what those labels really

(00:22):
mean.
You'll learn how to shopsmarter for whole, nutritious
foods while avoiding deceptivemarketing, saving you money and
stress while still hitting yourmacro and micro goals.
Welcome to Wits and Weights,the show that helps you build a
strong, healthy physique usingevidence, engineering and

(00:44):
efficiency.
I'm your host, philip Pape, andtoday we're talking about food
labels and what they actuallymean when you're shopping for
your health and performancegoals.
But we're coming at it from adifferent angle, because my
guest today is Natalie Kovarek.
She's co-host of the wildlypopular Discover Ag podcast.
Go, give that a follow.
Natalie is a fourth generationcattle rancher in Nebraska and

(01:07):
she's built a massive communityby telling the truth about food
production.
So I hope you're going to learnsomething new today, especially
from kind of an industryinsider, and learn what food
labels mean for your grocerybudget, how to distinguish the
marketing from the realdifferences in food quality and
how to get the best nutritionwithout overspending or even
overthinking.

(01:27):
So, whether you're trying tohit protein goals, whether
you're trying to fuel yourtraining or you just want to eat
well and not get taken for aride and not get suckered by the
fear mongers on social media,let's be honest listen up,
because I think you'll become asmarter shopper after today's
conversation.
Natalie, welcome to the show.

Natalie Kovarik (01:44):
Thank you, I am so excited to be here.

Yeah, and I'm excited too, and really I want
to hit right in on the marketingside of this, because you are
behind the scenes in theindustry producing food and
there's a long chain of eventsbefore it gets to the shelf.
And of course I joke with mydaughters because I talk to them
about how our food actuallycomes from animals, right, and

(02:07):
they don't want to hear it,right, because we're so used to
just going to a grocery storeand buying a package.
So when you think of all themarketing, like the terms, what
gets under your skin the most ona daily basis?

Yeah, we are starting it off heavy, but I'm
glad you started here becausethis is actually something that
we continually talk over on thepodcast, because I do think it
is forefront of a kind of aproblem, an issue, a concern,
just kind of like a barrier forpeople shopping right now.
Right Is understanding allthose different labels, and I
always say that, unfortunately,food labels started in a really,

(02:38):
really good place, like theymake sense, right, we are now
removed from where our food isgrown.
You know, we used to have anuncle, a cousin, someone, a
grandpa, someone that was on afarm and you were familiar with
it, and now we're not.
And so it made sense that wewere like, okay, let's give
tools to the people in thegrocery store to help them make
the best choice, but those tools, I feel like, aren't tools
anymore, they're just likemarketing, greenwashing to the

(03:02):
extreme almost.
And you know, the one thatprobably gets under my skin the
most is the GMO, non GMO one.
And that's not because I'magainst.
You know, consumers, peopleshopping, being able to
understand which one is, whatfood maybe is coming from a GMO
and choosing not to buy that.
I hate the non GMO labelbecause there's only only 11

(03:23):
GMOs used right now, and sobasically, they're putting that
label on everything that isn't aGMO.
So, for example, like tomatoes,there are no GMO tomatoes.
You don't need to look for anon-GMO tomato.
You need to spend your time inthe grocery store, you don't
need to stress over it, youdon't need to spend dollars
looking for that label, but wedo because we think the absence
of it means you know thepresence of it, and so I just

(03:46):
get really frustrated with theGMO label as one example.

You mentioned.
It's funny you said thatbecause I was thinking about how
candy all says fat free, youknow.

Carol (03:53):
Yeah.

Like it's like a duh, but yeah.

Yeah, so free water.
You know, I mean it's like wecould go to the extreme on, like
greenwashing marketers and itjust gets, you know, gets under
my skin.

So explain the term greenwashing.

Yeah.
So greenwashing, I mean I guessI don't know like the technical
term for it, but the way we useit on the podcast or the way I
guess I see like layman's use ita lot is basically they are
putting you know words that makeyou feel good, words that you
associate with like positivity,whether that's like
environmental you know where youthink you're purchasing a food
that is like better for theplanet and so you're willing to
spend that premium dollar on it.

(04:26):
Maybe it's greenwashing around,like where animal welfare
habits or practices, so anywayit's like a positive feeling
through marketing that actuallylike isn't tied back to any
tangible like monitoring ormaybe results or anything at the
forefront of it.
It's just you've beengreenwashed to think that like
your dollar is going tosomething better when it's
really not.

Okay, and that's a good distinction to make,
because I can think of all theconfusing terms that have
evolved over the years.
I grew up in the 80s, grew updrinking whole milk.
Eventually I started drinkingskim milk.
Don't know what I was thinking.
I'm back to whole milk.

No but the moms of the 80s went through a hard
time with like butter and dairyand milk.
They got off a little track.

They went to margarine and everything else,
snack wells.
But you see, because even todayit gets way more nuanced and
complicated, like on milk whereyou'll see it's non-organic milk
but we don't use hormones withcows, right?
And you're like what do I makesense of all this?
And when I think of terms likeorganic or natural, you know
grass-fed versus conventional.
And I think of terms likeorganic or natural, you know
grass-fed versus conventionaland I know that's a whole thing.

(05:25):
People think it's like thisbinary and it really is.
It's the whole life cycle, thecows, you know production cycle.
What terms do make sense?
And you use the term liketested or validated or something
like that, and what are justtotal puffery?

Yeah, organic is one I'll start there that is
backed, it is monitored.
Organic is one I'll start therethat is backed, it is monitored
, it is federally regulated.
All of that so there is anorganization to vet process.
I mean there's still likeorganic fraud.
You know that's like kind ofcoming to surface for a lot of
conversations, but for the mostpart, like organic is a
regulated body.
So that is one.
Let's see.
All natural is not one.
A lot of people will look forthat label but it really isn't

(06:01):
regulated anywhere.
So if you're getting like allnatural beef or all natural I
don't know chicken, I feel likeI haven't ever seen it on like
fruit, so it's probably going tobe in your proteins.
That's a greenwashing one.
Grass finished is one you couldlook for.
Grass fed can be kind of abuseda little bit in greenwash, just
because I guess it's a littlebit of a tangent.
But getting into as you talkedabout, like conventional beef.

(06:22):
First, you know, grass fed andgrass finished, there is a
little bit of.
I think people aren't aware thateven grain finished animals are
out at pasture for about twothirds of their life and so some
people will consider it becausethey're getting grass that
entire time before they'refinished those last couple.
It's like, usually about fourto six months, that they'll get
the grain finishing.
Obviously, they're gettinggrass fed for the first two

(06:44):
thirds of their life.
So you can have that grass fedlabel and have it be abused a
little bit because the animaltechnically was grass fed and
even when they're getting grainat the end, like in a finishing
feedlot system, they're stillgetting grass.
They're getting like foragesmixed in with the grain.
So technically they are grassfed.
So that's one that's a littlebit abused.
It that's one that's a littlebit abused.

(07:06):
It's like if you really want afull you know, complete
beginning to end animal that wasonly fed grass as their sole
diet, you need to look for grassto finish.
That would one that would beregulated.
I'm trying to think of a fewmore here.
Going to the dairy you broughtup, like the hormones, rbst is a
big one that people kind ofhave some issues concerns over,
and that is actually anotherfrustrating one, because RBST is
not currently used in the dairyindustry anymore but you still

(07:27):
see that label everywhere andyou see consumers looking for it
because again we feel like ifit's not there, we must be
getting a cow treated with it.
But it is not.
The dairy industry does not useRBST anymore, so that's another
label that I wouldn't look for.
I wouldn't pay extra for beworried about if it's not on
your milk.

Cool so then, at the end of the day, how does
somebody figure this out?
Yeah, that's like the milliondollar question, right, or
should they?
Or should they not overthink it?
I mean, you know the personthat's listening is like, well
what?

I'm so confused more than I started.
No, I agree, here's my littlelike it is, which I'm sure a lot
of your listeners do, right, Imean, you, you're in a very
active lifestyle.
You guys are tuning in, aresome of my favorite people to
talk to, because you do careabout your food.
You want to know where it comesfrom, like you know you're my
people, so I imagine a lot ofyou do, if that's you and you

(08:15):
also carry a little bit more ofthe financial, economic
component to your pocketbook.
Shop direct, right?
So we are in an amazing time insociety where you could type in
you live in Missouri, st Louistype in St Louis beef near me,

(08:38):
direct to consumer rancher,anything, some of those keywords
, and I guarantee you a plethoraof websites will pop up where
you can shop directly from arancher.
Anything, some of thosekeywords, and I guarantee you a
plethora of websites will pop upwhere you can shop directly
from a rancher to get yourproteins.
And even if you don't find onelocally, there are so many
online that ship nationwide now.
So you know we have options infront of us to be able to go
directly to the rancher, thefarmer.
When it comes to producefarmer's market things like that

(09:01):
, where you can ask the rancherdirectly, they're not going to
be putting those greenwashinglabels on a lot of their
products.
It's going to be prettystraightforward here's how I
raise the beef, here's how Iraise the fruits and vegetables,
and you can get thatinformation straight from them.
Otherwise, if you're like, okay, that's not an option for me
financially or that sounds liketoo much work.
I'm a nine to five worker and Ihit the grocery store on the

(09:24):
way home Like some of theseextra steps are not going to be
conducive to my lifestyle.
I do give the advice that forthe most part, what you're
getting in the grocery store,one product to the next, is not
going to be very different andwhen it comes to like the health
component of your lifestyle,you know we could get into
talking like organicstrawberries versus non-organic

(09:44):
strawberries.
Right From a nutritionalstandpoint, they're still going
to do the same good to your body.
Beef, even same they are.
I was actually kind of excited.
I want to get this scientist onthe podcast because there has
been some debate over ifgrass-finished beef is more
nutritionally.
You know better for you thanthe grain-finished beef Right
now studies are showing thatit's negligible.
It's very minute the difference.

(10:05):
So again, even when you're inthe protein section looking one
package versus the other, justpick the one that either you
like, that it looks like, or theone that fits your dollar,
whatever it is, because for themost part, when you're in the
grocery store there's not goingto be those premium products
that are really worth paying theextra for.
Just get what fits your bill,what sounds good, what you want
to feed your family extra forJust get what fits your bill,

(10:25):
what sounds good, what you wantto feed your family.

And that's why I'm glad you're on right, because 80
, 90% of the industry is sayingsomething very different from
that, with very little to noevidence.
Or I'll say a lot of cherrypicking, of rat studies or
something like that.
I just did an episode aboutinflammation, talking about how
the majority of our inflammationdoesn't even come from food.
It comes from our dietarypattern perhaps, but it's more
from our lifestyle.
And you know, seed oils getvilified right, certain types of
animal products and sources ofthose products.

(10:52):
Of course you have the red meat, cancer research, which is
completely, you know, conflatedand misrepresented.
So I'm totally on board withyou.
I love the de-stressing youjust gave the audience.
When you're like look, go withyour budget, be flexible, think

(11:13):
about your goals, what do youlike?
I have clients who overthinkstuff all the time.
I'm like what do you like?
What's just tasty to you, whatdo you enjoy?
Now let's reverse engineer fromthat and see if it all makes
sense.
So thank you for that.
Let's go to the financialargument.
You said, okay, you're on thego, you don't have a lot of
money If you had to go the otherextreme and feed your family, I
don't know what would be reallylow amount 50 bucks a week or
something, or a hundred bucks aweek.
What would you buy with thatkind of budget?

Yeah, I would stick to Whole Foods I can.
I feel like you're going to getyour best bang for your buck.
I mean, you know it'sinteresting.
I had this conversation on thepodcast recently about the
cereal aisle, right, I think itwas when we were talking about
food dyes or something, and wewere talking about how I'm like
I cereals like $10 a box, likeyou know, I mean you can get
like 799 cereal and I'm like mysons go if I buy cereal and it's

(11:57):
our household, my teenage sonwho is now off at college, but
I'm like he would go through abox of cereal and like three
bowls, you know.
So it's interesting theconversation of like fast food,
more convenient food, and how itfeels to us more affordable
than when we go, you know, shopthe outer perimeters and whole
foods.
But you know, I really believe,especially for everyone tuning
in who is, like you know, sofocused and cares about, you

(12:19):
know, the health of their body,whole foods is what you're going
to want to shop.
And again, whether that is, youknow, not the non-organic
berries, so that you're notpaying that extra amount, and
the grocery store beef that is,you know, the most conventional
grain finish.
There is that in my opinion,that and I would.
I would guess you would havethe same opinion, but that's
going to be more healthy foryour body than it is If you got

(12:42):
the organic processed granolabars or you got you know
whatever again greenwashed itemit is we are made to feel like
is better for our body.
I truly believe in a wholefoods diet and if you can figure
out how to make that fit yourbudget, I think you're doing
pretty darn good.

Yeah, I agree with that, and that is an argument
made that somehow whole foodscost too much money.
But it's an excuse, right?
And when you do the actualthought experiment and go to the
grocery store and shop plus,you know I see people wasting
food all the time, right, isn'tthat?
A big issue is food waste noteven leftovers, like those
things, yeah.

Crazy.
We've talked about food waste ahandful of times on the podcast
and the statistics around itare really really alarming.
Of one, you know theenvironmental damage we do with
landfills and food waste and howmuch we produce.
You know farmers are producingand how much of the percentage
that gets waste.
Yeah, it's really wild.
We actually talk about thatquite a bit when we guest on
other podcasts that want to talkabout, like cattle and the

(13:33):
climate and, like you know,carbon footprint and methane and
all those questions and it'slike if we actually focused as a
nation on food waste, we woulddo way more for the environment
than you would ever do as anindividual.
You know, maybe meatlessMondays or whatever wild thing
it is that you feel like is, youknow, saving the planet.
It's like if food waste is notjust nationwide but globally,

(13:53):
it's a really huge issue.

Yeah, I've seen that You're right.
It's like in a pie chart.
It's a huge chunk of theequation right and even just
locally as an individual rightWasting food, like not eating
leftovers.
I've seen people leave halftheir food in a restaurant.
It kind of rankles me becausewe're just very frugal about
that stuff.

Yeah, we talked about that last week on the
podcast because there was a reelthat popped off that was
talking about European food andhow it's better for you than
American food, and so we kind ofgot into like the nuance of
like no-transcript, the middleof nowhere in Nebraska.

(14:52):
But when I do, I'm like Iusually don't finish my meal.
It is impossible in the servingsize that we give here in the
United States I can't finish myplate.

Yeah, we see that as a mark of excellent service,
like look how great these, theseportions are Right.

Yeah.

Yeah, so when we think about our listeners who
are are concerned about theirperformance and their health and
their macros and trying to likeprotein is foundational and of
course, we love our animal basedproducts for that, I know some
some listeners are veganvegetarian.
I'm sorry it gets harder.
I have a good friend, that's avegetarian.

So I I'm not.
Just just because I'm aCalabrian doesn't mean I stand
for food choice.
So totally.

I agree, a hundred percent, yeah, and I just I'm
just saying sorry, cause it doesget harder.
It gets harder for that, and soyou have people trying to hit
150 grams of protein, thinkingthat it's so expensive to buy
their meat, and that's where thequality differences in meat are
important.
So maybe we can dig that, diginto that one more level deep,
both with meat and dairy, whichare two of the best sources of
protein, before you startgetting into plant-based

(15:58):
proteins or whey protein orsomething.
So maybe talk about the.
Are there any nutritionaldifferences?
You alluded to the fact thatgrass versus grain fed, maybe
not Anything else, both meat anddairy.

Yeah, so starting in meat, that is what
study shows.
Right now there is a scientistout of he's, out of Utah, I
believe.
His name is like Stefan VanFleet.
I think I actually really wantto get him on the podcast so for
everyone tuning in.
Maybe that will come in thenext month or so because he.
So up until this point we had abunch of studies that showed
that there was no differences atleast in the larger macro

(16:31):
components of grain finishedversus grass finished beef.
There is a difference in theomega ratio and that's pretty
much what the sole nutritionaldifference was standing on, and
I think it's the threes,actually not the sixes.
Sometimes I get those mixed up,but one of them is higher and
so that was pretty much the soledifference.
But there were researchersbeing led by this Stefan that

(16:52):
were kind of trying to take it alayer deeper and say, okay,
well, is there a difference, youknow, in the vitamin component,
in the you know, I don't knowall sorts of the different
micronutrients that would comeinto beef and really look at
like a layer deeper of like whatyou know?
Aren't we seeing from the bigpicture between the two and
actually just listen to him on apodcast coming out and saying
that after he's done all thatresearch looking for and I think

(17:13):
he was actually kind of maybehoping it would show and I think
he was actually kind of maybehoping it would show and I think
he was not biased by any means.
But I definitely think leadinginto it there was a lot of hype
from the community that wouldshow that difference to support
that like grass fed is going tobe nutritionally better for you.
But he said that a lot of thegrain finished products were
just as good as grass finishedand what actually made the
difference was the quality offorage for the animal when it

(17:35):
came to those grain finishedfeeding.
So if they were getting you hada rancher who was maybe
finishing with grain, but it wasreally high quality grain that
he was finishing with you, wouldhe saw that rank as high as the
grass finish, like thereweren't the differences in the
micro.
So from a health standpoint,again, there is not going to be
really different or there isn'tstudies right now to show really

(17:55):
a difference in buying one orthe other.
They do taste different.
So if by chance, you like grassfinish, that would be an option
to choose it.
Most people actually prefer thegrain finish because of the
marbling.
So usually not people aren'tlike choosing grass finish for
the for the taste.
The difference between I cankind of go a layer deeper for
everyone, because there is goingto be a difference from like
the animal being raised portionof it and that could be an

(18:17):
argument for wanting to choosegrass finish, if you like that
cycle for the animal better thanthe conventional grain finish.
Whether it's grain finish orgrass finish, like I said a
little bit earlier, the firstportion of their lives are
exactly the same.
They look exactly the same.
There is no difference.
They are going to be cow and acalf that is raised out on grass
pasture, like my ranch.

(18:37):
It's called a cow-calfoperation.
That is the legal jargon termyou use in the ranching industry
.
You're a cow-calf ranch andthat's when you see those pairs,
those babies and those mamastogether out on grass.
The babies are eating grass andmilk.
That's their diet and the mamasare getting grass foraging
whatever the rancher has out inthe fields at that time.
So that is the same grassfinished, grain finish for about

(18:59):
two thirds of their life.
If you're a grass finishedanimal, that obviously stays the
same.
You're going to be it can.
The one difference or assumptionpeople make is that the animal
is always going to be out onpasture, like outdoors.
You could still be an indooranimal and finished or sorry,
being fed forage diet, a grassdiet, and still be considered
grass grass-fed, because thegrass-fed label is a diet only

(19:19):
label.
It has nothing to do with thesurroundings or anything.
So you could be indoor, outdoor, whatever, as long as you're
getting grass for your diet,you're considered a grass-fed
animal.
So for that grass-fed,grass-finished animal they could
be indoor, outdoor, butbasically their entire life
they're getting that solelygrass forage diet, the
conventional grain finish animalright at the end of their life.

(19:43):
It's for usually about four tosix months.
That's when they enter thefeedlot system and that is when
they're going to be pushed.
Their weight's going to bepushed a little bit more because
the grain is introduced intothe diet.
Like I said, that is along withgrasses still, so it's not like
they're getting just grain.
Like I said, that is along withgrasses still so it's not like
they're getting just grain.
There's studies out of I thinkit was Oklahoma state that say

(20:05):
that at the end of a grainfinished animal's life, the
grain only accounts for about 7%total of their diet.
So I think that kind of putsinto perspective like, even
though the animal got grain atthe end of the life, it is still
a very small amount becauseagain they're out on pasture
getting that forage and theycontinue to get that along with
the grain.
So that's the big difference.
The feedlot would buy theanimal from a rancher like me,
finish them out and then theprocessor would buy that animal

(20:26):
from the feedlot and then itgets harvested.
So that last four to six monthsis definitely a different
setting for an animal in thefeedlot, which some people you
know from an animal welfarestandpoint maybe they have an
issue with, and that would be areason to buy that grass finish,
grass fed, grass finish label.

Okay, great.
So there's three big takeawaysfor me, at least, one being what
you just ended on thevalue-based decision.
And I actually had someone onthe show quite a while ago.
She's vegan and you knowvehemently so, to the point
where she used to be what shecalled a militant vegan, and
then she had sort of reformedherself in her approach with
people about it, and we had agreat conversation about that,
how your morals and your valueshave to come into the choices

(21:06):
you make.
So nobody's going to judge youfor that and you want to be
informed.
The other two that I came upwith were the taste, of course,
like you said.
I mean, I agree, grass-fed,it's just leaner, a little bit
drier.
Right, it doesn't have themarbling, it is what it is.
So you're making trade-offs andthen the grain quality of
grain-fed cattle being different, let me guess the only way you

(21:27):
know that is we shop direct.

Yeah, I actually haven't ever been asked
that before, but yeah it wouldbe because and even then you'd'd
be, obviously you're hoping you, you know, are shopping from a
rancher that's you know, beingtruthful and honest with you,
but you're basically takingtheir word for it.
But yeah, it's gonna be.
I mean because it doesn'tnecessarily from again the
conversation that I listened toof the scientist and again would
love to have him on so that Ican ask him some of these

(21:51):
questions but it's not even thedifferent types, because lot of,
especially regionally, a lot ofyou know, different parts of
the United States are going touse the same kinds of grains to
finish out the different animals.
So it's not going tonecessarily be the different
types, but it would be like thesoil that they're grown in and
that quality you know, whetherthey were under a drought or
stress or some of those thingsthat again, like you, it would

(22:13):
be really hard to even know thedifference from if you weren't,
like in the lab, scientificallytesting it.

really hard to even know the difference from if you
weren't, like in the lab,scientifically testing it.

Right, which everybody's doing.
I know, yeah, right, exactly.
Another step that consumers cando for their food.
Do a show, yeah, yes, file thatonto the 0.1% overthinking
department.

And at the end of the day I mean for those
listening, I know I know youknow this as well as like,
having a diverse diet is one ofthe highest correlating factors
with health outcomes andperformance.
Like, if you just havediversity in your diet, plants
and animals, you almost don'thave to think about this stuff
If you eat what you like and fityour macros and get the
nutrients you need.
Would you agree with that?

Yeah, absolutely.
It's funny because people arealways asking me like what I
supplement with all thesedifferent things.
And I do take, like, a beefliver pill for my daily
multivitamin, beef liver pillfor my daily multivitamin, but I
don't stress too much aboutsupplementation because I'm like
I feel like I get a fairlydecent diet and I think you
should be trying to get itthrough your foods, if you can
over supplementation anyway.

So I want to ask you about that beef liver pill,
because for a while I took beefliver pills that had added B12
and my B12 was like through theroof.
I realized I didn't really needit.
If you eat a lot of meat, thathappened to my sister.

Yeah, they went in and she's like this is they
were cause she had her whitecells elevated too and they were
like these are showing throughsupplementation.
She's like I'm notsupplementing with a B vitamin
and she didn't even think, likeshe didn't even take the time to
think that like the B vitamincoming from the beef liver, and
they're like, okay, well, youeither have cancer or you're
supplementing.
So like which one is it, youknow?
And finally she figured out itwas the beef liver that she was

(23:37):
taking too, that like shot her Bvitamins up.

And was it just just the beef liver by itself?
Cause they have some where theyadd B12 to the beef liver.

Oh, I, you know , I don't know, I did not ask
for that.

I don't know.
And so then the other questionhere is there are organ beef,
organ pills.
Do you have thoughts on one orthe other?
If people are looking to justadd those extra bit of nutrients
, they might be missing if theydon't eat organ meat.

I don't.
I mean I think that yeah, no, Idon't.
I guess I don't have enough.
I wouldn't have enoughscientific background to state
right now, to promote or stateone over the other.

So no, and sadly, I think most of the science
that's out there, as sparse asit is, probably come from more
from the carnivore communitywhen it comes to the organ meat,
and so you have to really beskeptical about that.
So then, what about?
So then we have dairy and eggs,and of course the eggs are a
little different thing, butdairy is there a downstream
effect as well in the dairy?

Yep so.
So my podcast co-host, whosadly couldn't be here this day,
is actually a dairy farmer fromNew Mexico, so I am not a dairy
expert.
The first time I actually saw adairy cow was at Her Dairy, so
a funny little thing.
I think everyone assumes thatwhen you're in the ag industry
you know you are an expert oneverything.
It's like I went 34 years of mylife growing up on a ranch,
working on a ranch, living on aranch, being a rancher, and

(24:49):
never saw a dairy cow.
But I have learned an extensiveamount from her because she is
incredibly knowledgeable in thedairy industry.
She, her because she isincredibly knowledgeable in the
dairy industry.
She's a dairy farmer and she'salso an environmental scientist
in the dairy community, so she'sjust really a wealth of
knowledge when it comes to, youknow, dairy from the production
side, but also dairy from, like,the environmental and
sustainability side.
And the interesting part of herstory is she actually grew up

(25:10):
drinking raw milk for like the20, I don't know 24, 25 years of
her life and then she gotpregnant with her first daughter
and, through differentconversations with her medical
provider and different researchshe did, she ended up stepping
away from raw milk and justdrinking conventional milk on
the grocery shelf.
And that is her advice to.

(25:32):
When people ask her about milk,if they should do raw milk or
if they should look for organicor what they should be looking
for when it comes to labels onthe milk, she always says that
as a dairy farmer herself, shegoes for the cheapest
conventional milk on the grocerystore.
She says that dairy quality hasnever been higher than it
currently is.
Right now.
The checks and balances thedairy industry have are pretty

(25:52):
insane.
Same goes for the beef industry.
There's a lot of checks andbalances to make sure that the
product you guys are getting onthe grocery store shelf are
really safe.
And she will tout that fordairy and say that the milk on
the grocery store she says shewill put and her milk does go to
conventional supply chain andshe said she would put her milk
up against any other dairy inthe US.
I'm feeling very confident inthe quality of it.

(26:13):
They have some very rigoroustesting on it, standards they
have to meet and so the milkyou're getting on the grocery
store is not only safe for you,but again, there isn't much of a
difference unless you want togo for that organic label.
I'm not super clear on what thedifference would be.
I think it is grass fed onlyfor organic and there might be
some regulation around pastureamount of time, whether the

(26:37):
cause.
Dairy cows are going to be anindoor more of a CAFO animal for
the most part, and so I thinkthat on the organic side of
dairy there's some of those.
But again, the organic label ismeasured so that at least would
be one that you know you'regetting something that is being
regulated instead of greenwashed, like we talked about at the
beginning.

The organic thing is interesting, right, because I
feel like there's a lot of it'sout of fear or just to be safe
kind of mentality.
I know we fed our kids organicmilk when they were little and
then eventually just went toconventional, but thinking just
in case, you know, we don't knowwhat's in there.
Is there hormones that couldaffect their development?
You just don't know.
And I agree, milk is fantastic,as well as Fairlife, and

(27:17):
there's competitors to Fairlifenow doing the filtered milk,
which is a wonderful additionfor our space where we're trying
to get even more protein.
And I've heard you talk aboutit on the show.
Do you drink it yourself?

Yeah, fairlife is actually what I buy for my
family.
Yeah, I've never had raw milk,I've never ventured into that
part, but yeah, that's what Ibuy for my family is Fair Life
you mentioned this justtriggered my mind.
It's a little bit of a tangent,but I think it'd probably be
something that your consumers ornot consumers your listeners
would want to hear abouthormones, chicken industry.
We actually interviewed thefounder of Pasture Bird and had

(27:51):
a pretty in-depth conversationwith him about regulation, kind
of the same thing greenwashing,labeling in the poultry industry
.
So if you guys are curiousabout that, you could hop over
and listen to that interview wedid with him.
But it's pretty wild when itcomes to eggs and chicken.
When it comes to labels andwhat to look for, a lot of them
are kind of misleading and alittle trickery is going on

(28:14):
there.
He stated I'm pretty sure itwas cage free is not one you'd
want to look for.
It's pasture raised is going tobe the best label you could get
.
Cage free obviously meansthey're not in a cage but they
don't need outdoor access.
And then there's another onethat I can't think off the top
of my head.
I know he talked about it inthe interview.

Carol (28:32):
Yeah, vegetarian fed is obviously not one, or maybe it's
pasture Gosh.

I should listen to our own episode and have
tuned up, because there's freerange and pasture raised and one
of those is greenwashing,because it means that the owners
have to provide outdoor accessfor the chickens, but they're
not required to actually go out,they don't have to leave, they
just have to have like a threefoot hole in the wall or
something and that classifies asthat meeting that standard.

(29:06):
And the chicken may have nevereven left outside, but because
they have that access, itqualifies.
So there is one label that youwant to look for.
Otherwise, again, all the otherones are going to be the same
eggs, kind of the same thing.
It's trickery, but there are nohormones.
That's where I started thisconversation.
It's outlawed and it's illegalto do hormones in chicken.
So when you're paying for that,like no, no hormones, label it.

(29:29):
It's across the board.

Yeah, what's with the anti-chicken crowd?
I've seen that like, likechickens horrible, it's toxic,
it's poison, it's like come on,I'm sorry, it's just raised.

I think visually it's just hard to see
how chickens are raised there.
And so the difference between,like, the poultry industry and
also the pork industry isthey're vertically integrated.
So like, for example, what thatmeans is Tyson very common
chicken name in the chickenindustry they actually own the
bird from beginning to end.
So it's vertically integratedand the farmer is just

(30:01):
contracted by Tyson and you'retalking, you know, I think you
harvest chickens at like sixweeks, like it's a very short
lifestyle.
So you're getting a very smallanimal which is obviously
different than beef and you canput a lot of them, you know, in
one space.
And so I think it's hard forpeople to kind of to know that
vertically integrated model andkind of see the chickens close
together verse.
You know, I'm lucky enough tobe a rancher and what I get to

(30:23):
share is, you know, a few cowson a beautiful open green
pasture right and so, visually,while they're both, you know,
when it comes to animal welfare,the chicken industry is doing
their due diligence to make surethat there's space and you know
quality of the barns and all ofthose things.
I think just from like, just asgeneral humans from us, an
imagery standpoint, like it'seasier to digest a cow out of
pasture than it is like thechicken in the chicken barn.

I could see that we have chickens.
We have what?
Do?
We have 14 chickens in thebackyard here and don't
juxtapose food chickenconversation with those.
Are our pets Cause cause to ourgirls?
They're actually pets.
Yeah, you know, I like the eggsthat we get from them too,
because we give them all ourleftovers and that's another
thing.
You notice a difference goingto the grocery stores Like, yeah

(31:11):
, yeah, they're.
They're effectively pastureraised carnivore.
You know omnivore diet.
We give them mealworms andeverything.
They're these deep orange,thick yolks versus very pale
colored yolks you usually see inthe grocery store.
And I think, if I'm to guesslogically from everything you
said, I would think the pastureraised maybe is the label, cause
it's the one that's always waymore expensive.
Yeah, but you never know.

Yeah, the interesting.
He actually talked about thistoo in the interview.
The sad thing now is even goingto the yolk color.
There are companies that willput dye into the oh my God of
course they will.
It's called like xanthophyll, Ithink, to give that rich egg
yolk color.
So now you can't even reallyuse that as like a quality
standard assessment for chicken.
So again it goes to like if youtruly care that much, try and

(31:54):
find someone that you can sourceyour birds from or your eggs
from.
Otherwise, just go in and pickwhatever egg carton you want,
because you're pretty muchgetting the same product in the
grocery store.

And eggs can be easier to find.
I mean, we live in a farm townhere in Connecticut, believe it
or not.
Yeah, we do have farm farmareas here.
I'm not on a farm but and youcould drive around and see egg
stands everywhere, at least thistime of year.
Of course, the winter it alldries up because the production
gets down.
So, okay, let's segue back tocarbs produce.
We talked a little bit aboutthe organic.

(32:24):
There are these lists that havebeen out there, like the dirty
dozen, and folks are trying toget there.
Yeah, go ahead.

Well, I was going to say I'm glad you
brought that up, because that isa difference too with organic.
That, I think, is like aforefront of a lot of consumers
and probably listeners, is likethe glyphosate conversation, you
know.
So I said earlier like oh, it'syeah.
Yep, so I was like earlier.
If you you know the organicstrawberry versus the
conventional strawberry, youknow nutritionally no difference
.
Like, just eat the strawberry,you're going to be getting the

(32:51):
same nutritional value.
There are differences when itcomes to organic, because
organic is obviously not allowedto be used the glyphosate,
which is a very common herbicidein the agriculture industry.
I think the interesting thingabout that is a lot of people
assume that no pesticidesherbicides, you know are used in

(33:12):
the organic sector, but theyare.
They're just organic approvedones.
And so I think there's a lot ofnuanced conversation around
from different people of like,okay, yes, organic is not using
glyphosate, but they're stillusing, you know, I think copper
sulfate is one, for example andso they're still using different
herbicides, pesticides, justnot the conventionally approved

(33:33):
one.
So I think that is an importantpart of the conversation.
We're actually having twodifferent conversations on our
podcast interviews that arecoming out in July.
One is with a scientist out ofFlorida who is pro glyphosate.
He has studied it, he hasresearched it, he it's actually
a GMO and glyphosateconversation and he is very pro

(33:53):
for it from his academicstanding.
And then we're actually doingthe opposite of the conversation
.
We're bringing on anotherresearcher who is very anti
glyphosate and we're having thetwo.
We're not putting them togetherbecause he actually said he
would come on with her but shedidn't want to come on with him
and we didn't kind of want tomake, you know, like a negative
app, you know, just tension oryou know, do that to anyone who

(34:14):
is uncomfortable.
So they are going to be separateepisodes, but we wanted to give
the space for that proconversation of glyphosate and
whether you need to be afraidfrom it, afraid of it when,
either environmentally ornutritionally I think that's
what probably most peopleselfishly care about is like you
know what's the glyphosatedoing inside of my body, maybe a
little bit more than likewhat's glyphosate do to the
environment.
So we wanted to have the spaceto have hold both of those

(34:36):
conversations and keep them asscientific and fact-based as we
could.
So if that is something youcare about more is like the
glyphosate.
Should I avoid that?
Do I need to avoid that?
Do I need to avoid that?
What's that mean for me?
Those would also be two reallygood interviews we're having on
our podcast to come up, becausethey are the experts who have
studied them and they obviouslyhave very different opinions
about it, so they should be tworeally really good episodes.

We haven't released them yet, but I love how you're
throwing down the episodes, sojust and this is good because so
I just started following yourshow.
It's it's the kind of podcastthat you wouldn't necessarily
know that you want to listen tountil you realize what it's
about it, depending on youraudience, Right, and so so my
audience.
I think you guys would like itfrom a food production supply

(35:16):
and the science behind all thatperspective, especially the
nuances you just talked about,because and again, if I'm
talking too much about my ownstories, let me know, but this
is so relatable to this is oats,right?
Again, our girls are 11 and 13.
When they were little, wewanted them to feed them oatmeal
and around that time came outthat the big study where they
looked at the glyphosate contentin a ton of brands of oats and

(35:38):
they found that like only one ortwo organic brands from like
Whole Foods had trace amounts,you know, undetectable amounts,
and the rest had all the way upto levels exceeding the
recommendation, the governmentrecommendation.
And so it raises the questionokay, do I care?
Like you said, even if you doconsume it, we know lots of
things.

(35:58):
Lots of foreign products andchemicals enter our body and we
can detoxify them with our liverand the dosage makes the poison
.
And so what right?
It's like all the processedfood we can consume.
On the other hand, you know, isit truly bad for you?
And you said there are otherthings, like the environment,
beyond that scope.
What would you do personally,Like, do you care about that?

You know, tara and I, my co-host Tara and I we
have this conversation a lotthat I think one of the great
things about being in theagriculture industry is you have
, I think of the great thingsabout being in the agriculture
industry is you have, I think, atrust in the agriculture
industry that you don't ifyou're removed from it just
because you know we don't raisewheat, we don't raise oats, we
don't.
You know, we don't actuallyeven farm.
We were like pretty much alivestock only operation.

(36:41):
Sometimes you'll have a lot ofranchers who own livestock but
also farm, but we don't.
So I don't have any experiencepersonally, even buying
glyphosate, ordering glyphosate,spraying it.
I have never handled any ofthose chemicals but I know
people who do.
I have a lot of friends thatare farmers.
I'm in Nebraska, I am in thecorn state, so there's a lot of
farmers I know, whether they'reraising soybeans or corn or

(37:03):
wheat or oats or whatever it isthat have handled, they do use
those herbicides and pesticidescorn or wheat or oats or
whatever it is that have handled.
Right, they do use thoseherbicides and pesticides,
fungicides, like all thedifferent sides in the
agriculture industry, and I knowthat they wouldn't do that or
eat that food or that.
You know they wouldn't do thatto their crops and then turn
around and eat that food too,right.
And so I think we inherentlyhave a little bit more trust for

(37:24):
the system than people who arecompletely removed, that have
never met a farmer or talked tothem.
So no, I, at this point, frommy research that I've done and
you know the choices I make forour family I don't choose to try
and avoid glyphosate.
I don't pay attention to thedirty dozen because for me the
dirty dozen is a little bit ofgreenwashing and misleading too,
Like yes, they rank, I think isit 10 or 12?

(37:46):
Whatever the top, let's say 10,top 10, you know vegetables,
fruit to avoid because they havethe most glyphosate on them,
but all they're doing is liketelling you foods that have
glyphosate on them.
They're not comparing it toagain, as you mentioned, like
the points, the amounts that arefederally acceptable, regulated
, and all of them fall below it.
So it doesn't really tell youanything Like it tells you that

(38:06):
glyphosate is present, but ifthey were to like carry on, you
know, do a comma and then finishout the sentence, it would be
like but at no doses that areactually, you know, deemed to be
currently harmful to, you know,a human right now.
So I don't pay attention to it.
I don't buy anything organic, Ibuy conventional.
I'm also so in the again, Ialluded to this earlier, but I
am in central Nebraska.
I ranch outside of a town of2000 people.

(38:29):
We have two tiny little grocerystores that I shop at.
I am an hour and a half from aTarget.
I am an hour and a half from aWalmart.
I am an hour and a half from aHy-Vee which is like our you
know a nicer grocery store Sam'sClub.
I am three hours from a WholeFoods.
I am three hours from a Costco.
So what is available to me isgoing to be a little bit
different than a listener thatis at, you know, in the heart of

(38:50):
a big city that maybe has moreoptions.
Like if I had a robust farmer'smarket to go to, I would
absolutely go and shop at theyou know, the farmer's market if
I, if I could, like.
I believe food is medicine andI love supporting farmers and
ranchers, and I think you getsome really high quality produce
at farmer's market that youcan't get in the grocery store.
And I'm going to explain thatasterisk, because it is nothing

(39:12):
to do with the product itself.
It's actually to do with thetransportation.

Carol (39:17):
Before I started working with Philip, I had been trying
to lose weight and was reallystruggling with consistency, but
from the very beginning, philiptook the time to listen to me
and understand my goals.
From the very beginning, philiptook the time to listen to me
and understand my goals.
He taught me the importance offueling my body with the right
foods to optimize my training inthe gym, and I lost 20 pounds.
More importantly, I gainedself-confidence.

(39:39):
What sets Philip apart is thepersonal connection.
He supported and encouraged meevery step of the way.
So if you're looking for acoach who cares about your
journey as much as you do, Ihighly recommend Philip Pape.

So when you pick a fruit, let's say
blueberries, you're halting theprocess right there and then you
have to cold storage that andtransport it how many miles from
California to the littlegrocery store in Nebraska and we
have done a great job as anation to, you know, allow us to
eat out of season and allow me,a Nebraska resident, to eat

(40:17):
fruits that are not grownregionally, locally in my area.
But when we halt that you knowpicking process, by the time in
that transportation process itgets to my little grocery store
it is going to be different thanif I picked it and it was, you
know, picked it at a you pick inCalifornia, or picked it and it
went, you know to you know 100miles to the next California

(40:38):
grocery store.
So there are differences inproduce when it comes to that
because of the transportation,not because of the farmer at the
beginning.
So if I could go to a farmer'smarket and get some of those
amazing fresh yesterday pickstuff, I would.
I just I don't have the meansto be a super picky shopper in
our little grocery store and andeven if I did, like I said, I'm
not worried about some of thosethings because I'm in the

(41:00):
agriculture industry and I trustour farmers and ranchers are
doing the best job they canevery single day with the tools
that we currently have.

Yeah Long tangent, sorry I can every single day
with the tools that we currentlyhave.
Yeah, long tangent, sorry, no,no, no, I'm just letting it.
I'm trying to teach myself notto gut react when I do
interviews.
So I like the process and Imean what strikes me.
There is again the big messagehere is no one should feel
judged or overly restricted intheir ability to get good

(41:26):
quality food, quality being whatyou can afford.
That is mostly whole foods, Imean, that's, that's kind of the
message.
And then all this other stuffis just the gravy on top, based
on, like you said, freshness.
Right, not so much the qualityof the product, but the
freshness of it, based on yourgoals and everything else.
When you were talking about theglyph, why do I keep saying it

(41:46):
wrong Glyphosate.

Yeah, no, nailed it.

I was thinking about how seed oils, for example
, gets vilified.
And yet when you look atoutcomes, if you just look at
outcomes of longitudinal ormeta-analysis studies over
decades and decades which wehave from like the Mediterranean
diet, for example, it's clearthat, for example, reducing
saturated fats and replacing theCETLs actually improves some

(42:09):
people's outcome.
And again, I'm not supportingone or the other, I'm just
saying the glyphosate, if Idon't know what kind of studies
have been done, but I suspectthat again, if it's a small part
of a bigger diet, it's probablynot going to have any impact.

Yeah, yeah.
So glyphosate is interesting.
Again, we're going to dive intothis with our quote unquote
experts because, again, I'm nota glyphosate expert, but I know
enough that there's only onegoverning body, and I'm pretty
sure it's the AIRC, which is thesame governing body, that kind
of talks about meat being acancer right, which we know
isn't.
I don't know straightforwardcancer right, which we know
isn't I don't knowstraightforward.
You know there's some twistingof that presentation.
So I, you know I have sometrust issues to begin with from
that body.
But everyone else, like the gosh, I should have written them

(42:49):
down there's, I don't know, ama,like all the different
organizations that are the E.
There's one in Europe, likeglyphosate is actually, you know
, okayed in Europe to be used aswell, like all of the governing
bodies have said that throughall the scientific study
currently, you know, showing forglyphosate that it is, it is
safe for human consumption at.
Again, you're talking doses,poison, right, so there's all

(43:11):
the lethal dose, certain amountsto pay attention to.
Oh, shoot, there was one morething I was going to say.
I just lost my, my train ofthought.
Shoot, well, it'll come back.

No, it's okay, and's okay.
And my brain's going ontangents as well as we speak,
because I just heard an episodeof Dr Gabriel Lyons.
Yeah, yeah, she had Dr DavidThurfield on.
He's a long time USDA scientistand he's the one who challenged
the WHO's classification of redmeat as a carcinogen.
Yes, and his whole position isthat our whole history of

(43:40):
nutritional epidemiology isflawed in terms of its attempt
to show causation with all thisstuff, and so much policy has
been driven by small groups offairly biased scientists who
have used small subsets of dataoften flawed, but even if it's
not, it's small to make thesebig conclusions.
So I think I like your messageof my point that the default

(44:01):
position should be don't beafraid of like all the food out
there, but be informed andunderstand why you're making the
choices.
You are Right.

Yeah, no, I love that I had someone say once
um, like, tell me what you careabout and then I'll tell you
how to shop, because there'sjust so many different things to
pay attention to.
And so, like you mentionedearlier, like that vegan
vegetarian, they're going to,you know, have really strong
animal welfare stances thatmaybe someone else wouldn't care
for and that would choose themto pick something else.
And I think there are so manydifferent things when it comes

(44:29):
to the food system that you dohave different.
I mean, thankfully we do have,you know, we can go to the
grocery store and there are aton of different options, you
know, to fit the choices thatare important to you.
But, yeah, the overall messageis, like you know, as America,
we do have a safe food system.
I think we're starting tointertwine safe and healthy and
those are completely separatethings.
So, like we have a safe foodsystem, do we have a healthy

(44:49):
food system?
No, we don't have a healthyfood system, right?
So, going back to some of theconversation of seed oils and
ultra processed foods, right,like you're not getting, you
know, even though people love tosay you're getting poison, you
know, in the food.
It's like we're losing point ofactually what the word poison
means.
Right, they're safe foods, butthey're not healthy for you, and
we're intermixing thoseconversations.

(45:10):
So, when you go to the grocerystore, the food in there is safe
, it is being regulated, thereare checks and balances.
You are getting food that issafe to consume.
There are going to be differentoptions to choose from from a
health standpoint and that'swhere, as you said, doing some
of that informed research sothat you're not falling for that
greenwashing and you'respending your dollar on a true

(45:31):
premium product to get theactual different when it comes
to the health standpoint, thereare differences there.
I don't want to say therearen't, but at the end of the
day, I am a firm believer wehave a very safe food system.

Awesome.
Yeah, no, and that is a gooddistinction.
And when you say healthy, Iknow you.
Earlier you said dietconsisting mostly of whole foods
.
I think most would agree.
I would agree it gets youhealthy.
Like it's the dietary pattern.
You can have some Snickers andPop-Tarts in there, as long as
it's mostly whole foods.
I think that's some peopledon't grasp.

(46:07):
It's like that and trying to gothe opposite extreme.
I don't know what you think,but like orthorexia or like
obsession with totally cleaneating, where you're literally
moralizing everything else, canbe destructive too.
I know there's a few peoplethat can maybe live that way,
and I don't know what are yourthoughts on clean eating.

Yeah, yeah, no for sure, especially with social
media.
You know, when you're gettinglike what I eat in a day and all
these different you knowinfluencers and the.
You know the, the, the foodthey're consuming.
Yeah, it's a pretty I would.
We've actually covered on thepodcast.
It was a while ago but we hadthis conversation of, you know,
food elitism, as you said, likefood ortho, or was it ortho?
Yeah, thank you.

(46:43):
Basically, a lot of eatingdisorders, you know, can be
stemmed from social media andgetting too over consumed by
different diets.
So, no, I'm a pretty firmbeliever whole foods, everything
in moderation.
Like you'll catch me, you knowstill having some goldfish.
You know I'll buy my kids somegoldfish.
I'm not super concerned aboutit Because for the most part,
they're getting like a reallygood breakfast, right, they're
getting, you know, a lot of, Imean, as a rancher, obviously,

(47:06):
like animal protein is theforefront of our plate almost
every single meal, every singleday.
So, like, I feel like I amgiving, you know, a really solid
foundation of a whole food dietfor myself and my family.
And then, yeah, I don't stressover food dyes, like we had that
conversation of.
Like should they be removed?
Sure, like, remove them fromthe you know, all the different
foods that they're in.
It doesn't really matter to mebecause the amount that I'm

(47:26):
giving my family like I'm notconcerned about them Same with,
like you know, differentadditives and preservatives and
things like that.
It's like if you're having amost whole food diet, then when
you have some of those differentthings you know, like you said,
our bodies are built to process, detox and get rid of things.
So everything in moderation.
It's all about the whole foods,in my opinion.

Isn't it funny?
That's what your grandma saidright Everything in moderation
and eat a diverse diet, just eata bunch of different foods, a
lot of colors on your plate.
A lot of those things actuallystill hold up All right.
So I guess the last thing is isthere any other myth?
As a rancher who sees behindthe scenes of the food supply
that's either costing peoplemoney or angst, or just don't

(48:07):
worry about it, people, is therea myth that we haven't covered?

No, but I will give a friendly little reminder,
or at least not something thatcomes to mind.
I'm sure there's a lot of myths.
I will give a little lastfriendly minute reminder for
everyone that words like factoryfarms are used and we can, you
know, get into large scaleproduction agriculture, and I
think there's a lot of, again,imagery on social media and fear
mongering around like big scaleagriculture.

(48:32):
And it's true.
Right, there are, you know, aspectrum of different sizes of
farms and ranches in theindustry.
But bigger doesn't always meanbad, like yes, maybe in some
instances a big operation isn'tdoing a good job and they are
bad, but just because somethinghas grown in scale doesn't mean
it is bad in any industry, andthat rings true of the food

(48:52):
industry.
So I just don't want people tobe fearful of the agriculture
industry.
I want them to remind them that, no matter the size, there is a
family, there is a personbehind it.
We just did an episode not toolong ago where we were talking
to a strawberry farmer and everysingle strawberry in the
grocery store is handpicked andhand planted.
There is actually no mechanizedmachine to use for strawberries

(49:15):
, so they're behind that vat ofstrawberries, whether it was
conventional, organic or smallscale or large scale.
There was a person who pickedand planted it.
Asparagus is the same way.
It needs to be hand cut Like.
So there, there are peoplebehind your food and I think
it's easy to lose sight of thatwith some of the things going
around around social media andsome of the organizations and,

(49:36):
you know, activists that want tokind of make you lose sight of
that and feel like if it's bigit must be terrible and bad.
But there are families raisingyour food and again, you know
we're we're lucky enough to bein in America where we have safe
food, and then we get to getinto the nuanced conversation of
how you know, what extrapremium do I want to pay for
when it comes to, you know, someof the extra things?

Yeah, that's a privilege.
Yeah for sure.
I agree we should be gratefuland going.
Connecting back to the earlierstory about food doesn't just
come from a grocery store.
It comes from people that madeit happen, working with animals
and crops and lots of labor andlots of chain along the way.
And if you extrapolated allthat work and guessed how much a
food would cost, it would befar beyond what we're lucky to

(50:21):
be able to pay for it.
And I know that's not comfortto people who live paycheck to
paycheck and inflation.
I mean, I know how much itcosts to go to the grocery store
a month.
It's well over a thousanddollars now.
You know, years ago it was like600 bucks for a family of four,
or 500 bucks.
Now it's like 1200, 1500, butthat's not their fault, that's
the economy.
So anyway, this has beenawesome.

(50:42):
I love the nuance and theflexibility that you're giving
people and I encourage people tocheck out your show.
So, besides the podcast,natalie, where else do you want
them to find you?

Yep.
So, as you said, probablytuning in your podcast person.
So our podcast would be thebest place where every Thursday
it's Discover Ag and our coverphoto is two girls head to toe
in denim we're in denim tuxedos,I'm holding a chicken and my
co-host is holding a hot dog.
So that is how you know youfound the right podcast.
It's a very one of a kind coverart for you.

(51:13):
But beyond that, if you'reinterested in the beef industry
and what it's like to be arancher, or you want to know
more about the beef industry andwhat it is like where your beef
is coming from, you can followme personally at Natalie Kvorik.
I'm on a few different socialmedia platforms and all of them
are under my name, and then youcan also follow Discover Ag on
social media, and we're onYouTube as well.

(51:34):
So in case you know someonethat listens or watches on
YouTube instead of listens,we're present there too.

Very nice.
I'll put those all in the shownotes.
Thanks again, Allie, it's, it'sbeen awesome.
I learned a ton myself.
It also I hopefully, hopefullyreduces some of the stress for
people when they're going to thegrocery store this week.
So thank you.

Yeah, no, thank you.

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Organic, Grass-Fed, and Natural - What Food Labels DON'T Tell You (Natalie Kovarik) | Ep 346

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Organic, Grass-Fed, and Natural - What Food Labels DON'T Tell You (Natalie Kovarik) | Ep 346