Recently I was contacted by someone from Grass Roots Farmers’ Cooperative who wanted to give me some meat to review. Who am I to say no to meat? So while I did receive this meat for free I will give you an honest review of the meat I received and the Co-op in general. If you don’t want to read this whole post and just want the summary: Grass Roots Farmers’ Cooperative is a great place to get some high quality, responsibly raised beef, pork, and chicken. They produce some awesome meat and the concept behind the co-op is pretty innovative.
But trust me, you want to read this full review because I am going to give you a chance to win $100 worth of meat for yourself from Grass Roots.
Disclosure: Grass Roots Farmers Cooperative gave me the meat I am reviewing. I will give an honest review though.
First off, let’s talk a bit about the Grass Roots Farmers’ Cooperative. In its simplest form this co-op is a group of 9 farms in Arkansas that produce grass fed beef, pasture raised chickens, and forested pork. They have very high standards for how they raise and process the animals that goes well beyond anything I have ever seen. If you are interested you can read all about their practices here. That is one thing I really like about this co-op: their transparency. When you get your meat from Grass Roots you will know how the animals are raised, what farm they came from, what it ate, who processed it, what it cost to raise, how many square feet of pasture the animal had access to, the number of animals processed on that day, and a ton of other info like that.
All in all I am very impressed with how Grass Roots is set up and the information they share with the customer and how they run their operation. These farmers are dedicated to responsibly raising, processing, and selling their animals. If you are looking for some great grass fed meat definitely give them a try.
Now, on to the important stuff. How was the meat?
Grass Roots sent me a $150 gift code to buy meat and here is all that I got:
2 16 oz Ribeye Steaks ($38.42)
2 16 oz Skirt Steaks ($20.74)
2 14 oz Sirloin Steaks ($18.76)
1 Whole Chicken 4 lbs ($17.25)
1 12 oz Pack of Bacon ($12.06)
1 Pound Jowl Bacon ($10.30)
1 Pound Breakfast Link Sausage ($8.55)
1 Pound Polish Sausage ($9.13)
2 Pounds Center Cut Pork Chops ($19.44)
Here is a quick video I did unboxing all this meat so you can see how it is packaged:
My total including shipping was $154.65. All in all that is about 15 1/2 pounds of meat so you are looking at around $10 per pound. Yeah, that is more than you will spend on meat at the grocery store or Costco but $10 per pound for some high quality grass fed beef and pasture raised chicken is a great price. This is also less than you would spend at a place like Whole Foods (you can’t always trust Whole Foods when it comes to their meat). All in all I was very happy with the amount of meat I got for $154.65. Realistically for my family (me, my wife, and three children 6, 3, and 1) we are probably looking at 12 dinners and some sausage and bacon to go with breakfast. So it is more expensive than a couple boxes of mac and cheese but still very reasonable considering the quality of the meat.
Grass Roots cuts out a few levels of middlemen and storage facilities so they can offer a better, less expensive product than many of their competitors.
I haven’t eaten the pork chops or the bacon but here is what I thought of some of the other meat:
Grass Fed Ribeye Steaks and Sirloin Steaks
Overall I was very pleased with the marbling of these steaks. Many times grass fed beef is lacking in the marbling department. Generally speaking more marbling = more flavor. Also some grass fed beef can also taste like a hay bale depending on what kind of grass it has been eating. These steaks had a great beefy flavor that was different than what you get from the grocery store. The flavor was a bit more mineraly but in a good way. If you were to taste these steaks side by side with a standard steak you would know that these were very high quality steaks that had a unique, good flavor.
If I had one gripe about these steaks it is that one of them wasn’t cut evenly as you can see in the picture below. One side was thinner than the other which can make for uneven cooking. As you can see above I was able to overcome this but if you aren’t careful when cooking you could end up with part of the steak overcooked. Not sure if this is indicative of all their steaks or just this one.
Overall these were excellent steaks. Very juicy, and very delicious with a flavor that is unlike anything you will find at the grocery store. It is one of the better grass fed steaks I have eaten.
Whole Chicken
Let’s face it… most grocery store chickens that come from big factory farms have very little flavor. The chicken from Grass Roots was one of the items I was most excited to try. Their chickens live in open air schooners (basically very large cages) that are moved daily to fresh pastures. They forage for grasses, bugs, seeds, worms, and whatever else they can find and that diet is supplemented with some grain. Since the food the animals eat directly affects the flavor of the meat this forage diet gives these chickens an excellent flavor.
I wanted to do a side by side comparison of this chicken to a standard chicken. As you can see below there is a definite difference in the appearance of the two. The one on the left is a regular chicken from Costco and the one on the right is from Grass Roots. There is a distinct color and size difference as you can see. The regular chicken is pumped full of water and salt and has a very pale color but the Grass Roots chicken has no added water and is a much darker color.
I spatchcocked the chickens, gave them a basic bbq rub and threw them on the Weber Kettle to smoke at 375. The Grass Roots chicken was smaller so I put it on 30 minutes after the regular chicken.
After smoking for about 80 minutes or so this is what they looked like. The Grass Roots bird is on the left in the picture below. You can see they are a bit closer in size after cooking. This is because a lot of the water evaporated from the regular bird so it shrunk a bit more. It looks like it is burnt but trust me, it isn’t. Just a nice crispy skin.
I served these chickens to my family and my parents and everyone greatly preferred the Grass Roots bird. When I was growing up we raised chickens on our farm and my parents said this chicken reminded them of those chickens. The meat had a much richer flavor than the regular chicken. I will be ordering more of these chickens in the future. Probably one of the best tasting chickens I have ever eaten.
The chicken cost about $4.25 per pound. I believe the Costco chicken was around $2 per pound and whole chickens at my local grocery store are usually $3-4 per pound. I have no problem paying $4.25 per pound for a chicken that is this much better than a regular chicken. I don’t know if I would use a chicken like this to cook in a crockpot and shred for buffalo chicken sandwiches or anything like that but if I were roasting or smoking a chicken without a bunch of other flavors covering up the meat I would go for one of these.
Skirt Steak and Polish Sausage
I made the skirt steak into carne asada and while it was delicious I don’t know if I tasted much difference than a regular skirt steak since it was covered in such a bold marinade. Everything about it was delicious though. And the polish sausage were some of the best sausages I have ever eaten. The grind of the meat was finer than most similar sausages but I think it worked for this sausage. I generally prefer a coarser grind but these were very juicy and flavorful.
I still have some pork chops and jowl bacon sitting in the freezer but if the other meat was any indication I am sure it will be excellent.
Overall I would say I was very impressed with Grass Roots Cooperative and the quality of their meat. If you are big into grass fed beef it will be hard to find a better source than Grass Roots. Since the meat comes from a small group of farms I am assuming it will be very consistent which is important when it comes to grass fed beef since the taste can vary greatly from ranch to ranch. But I think the chicken is where Grass Roots really shines. The taste difference compared to a regular chicken isn’t even close. It will probably be the best chicken you have eaten.
And don’t just take my word for it. Here are a couple other reviews of Grass Roots Co-op:
Now, let’s give away $100 worth of meat from Grass Roots Cooperative.
Grass Roots Cooperative wants to give one lucky winner $100 worth of meat. That should be plenty for at least a couple weeks worth of meals if you play it right. Chickens are $17.25 each, a pound of polish sausage is $9.13, ribeyes are $19.21 per pound, ground beef is $8.66 per pound. So with $100 you will be able to get a pretty decent haul of meat.
Here is how you can enter:
- Follow Complete Carnivore in Instagram
- Like this post and tag a friend in the comments
- Follow Grass Roots Cooperative on Instagram
Just three simple steps and you will be entered to win. I will pick a winner on April 7th so you have just over a week.
And while you are at it:
- Follow Complete Carnivore on Facebook
- Like and share this post on Facebook.
- Visit Grass Roots Cooperative and sign up for their newsletter. While you are there fill up your cart and use code NEWYOU50 to get $50 off your first order. With $50 off it is kind of like everyone is a winner!
I will notify the winner and all I ask of you is that you take a picture of yourself with your winning box of meat for Grass Roots Cooperative to share.
Good luck! I know you will love this meat. And don’t forget to visit Grass Roots Cooperative and use code NEWYOU50 to get $50 off your first order.
