Beef from Argentina is considered to be the “gold standard” for quality and consistency of quality because is has traditionally been raised and taken to a high degree of finish-i.e.; flavor, tenderness and healthy fats-on a “chain” of annual forages-not grass alone.

This chain, when combined with a five year rotation of alfalfa (a perennial, not an annual) provided a sustainable and renewable base of soil fertility that enabled the Argentines to produce export quality beef for their population and European markets while avoiding the use of expensive, imported, soil-destroying commercial chemical fertilizers.

The alfalfa, as part of the forage chain, was grazed carefully and intelligently while sending it’s roots deep into the sub-soil and “fixing” nitrogen from the atmosphere in it’s root nodules where it became available to the soil and nourished successive “links” of annual forages in the chain.

Much of this sustainable, animal-based agriculture has been forsaken by Argentina in the last 5-8 years in favor of non-sustainable cropping of monocultures for export. However, a few grass-based, enlightened producers remain; one of them is our friend and consultant Dr. Anibal Pordomingo in Santa Rosa, Argentina.