Education Needed About LFTB
Lean, finely textured beef 'is meat' and a healthy form of protein,
according to a Texas A&M University expert.
Russell Cross, head of the department of animal science at Texas A&M, said lean, finely textured beef (LFTB) is nutritious, and a production process he approved while serving as administrator of the USDA Food Safety Inspection Service (FSIS) in 1993.
"The simplest way to describe this is that it is meat; it's beef," he said. "The protein content is similar to what is [found] in a steak. This product is no different than meat; that's the reason USDA calls it meat."
Cross said much misinformation has been reported and discussed in various media. That's why it is important that the facts be told about the production of LFTB, which comes from traditional carcass-harvesting methods, he said.
Describing the process, Cross said carcasses are chilled 24-36 hours, then broken down into parts called primal cuts. These primals are put into vacuum-sealed bags and sent to retail stores, where they are cut into steaks and roasts. The trimmings taken from this process are frozen and shipped in 60-pound (lb.) boxes to processing plants that generate ground hamburger meat.
"These trimmings have pieces of lean still attached to them," Cross explained. "It is valuable; it's meat," he said, adding there is no difference in taste. LFTB is generated through a process of centrifugation that separates the lean from the fat, "resulting in a very nutritious and very safe product."
Every time an animal is harvested, 12-15 lb. of this product is generated and used in ground beef, Cross said. "It's been used for more than 20 years."
From a beef industry perspective, this adds value to the carcass, Cross said.
"We try to harvest every single aspect of the animal during the process," he said. "This 12 to 15 pounds would be that amount of protein not on the market. The fact we are going through this exercise of removing it from the market has caused the price of lean trimmings to go up over 15%. That's going to cause the price of ground beef to go up, and we all know who is going to pay for that — the consumer."
He said the Southwest just came off the worst drought in its history, losing more than 35% of the cows in Texas alone.
"We are going to have a shortage of protein and this is just adding to that shortage," Cross said. "This is going to cause the price of a lot of our products to go up."
Cross said he and faculty members, as well as those who serve in dual roles with the Texas AgriLife Extension Service and Texas AgriLife Research, will continue to educate consumers on the facts of LFTB.
"We have people who are very knowledgeable about this product both on the quality side and the food safety side," he said. "We will do what we always do — we will collect the right data and get it out to the public and to the industry so they can use it. We will make it a priority to get the real facts out to the public."
Editor's Note: An audio interview with Cross is available at http://agrilife.org/today/files/2012/03/leanfinelytexturedbeef.mp3.
