Why Kids Are the Most Honest Beef Critics (And What 'Grandma Steak' Says About Quality)

This week's Customer of the Week, Kathryn, sent in a devastating restaurant review courtesy of her 4-year-old granddaughter. It is one of the strongest cases I've heard yet for the proposition that grass-fed beef for kids changes their palate for life (and ruins steakhouses forever).

Full Disclosure: she sent this a few weeks ago when I was bragging about getting 40% Prime grades (and 100% Choice or higher) on a load of beef, but it was too good not to use eventually.

The review (from a 4-year-old, at a $35-a-steak steakhouse)

Woo Hoo 🎉. You got confirmation of what every customer already knows: Dirty Dog Farm beef is the best! I have another toddler story for you. My granddaughter (who just turned 4) was with us on a trip to FL for her birthday. My parents took us all out for dinner one night to a steakhouse. My carnivore toddler granddaughter was so excited to have steak for dinner. Now this place serves $30-$40 steaks and claims to have the best beef (I guarantee you it does not even compare to your beef).

Once served her little steak (kids meal size) she looked at the server and asked where the rest of her steak was lol.

Then she took a bite, spit it out and said nevermind. This is NOT like Grandma steak! Give me chicken instead!!!!

The poor server didn't know what to say 😂🤣

You have officially ruined a steakhouse's reputation with your amazing meat!!!

Kathryn

Obviously Kathryn and I are toddler steak story pen pals....

But this is a theme with our customers.

Kids LOVE our beef.

And I love hearing about it, because while they aren't all THIS hilariously quotable, their reviews mean the most to me. For a few reasons......

Why kids are the most honest critics of grass-fed beef

First, I am a parent.

I care about all of our customers, young, old and in between.

But kids are growing. They are building their bodies and setting the foundation for their lifelong health. Creating cells at an insane rate (I think about this whenever one of my girls gets a scratch or something and it disappears with Wolverine-like speed).

And as parents it's our job to give them and their bodies everything necessary for that process. To make sure that they've got the best stuff to work with.

(A brief rant about children's menus)

Which is why I DESPISE children's menus. I abhor the notion that kids should eat special little foods (which are typically fried in seed oils or made out of mystery meat). I have never understood why we do this in America instead of just....smaller portions.

But that's not the point. This steakhouse actually did do the "child-sized steak" thing and I'm just ranting in general.

The point is that good nutrition is especially important for our children. And every time a customer shares a story like this, and tells us that their kids are hooked on our amazing beef, I know we're doing our jobs right.

The other reason kid reviews hit different: kids don't lie

Adults can decide that they like our beef (or steakhouse beef or anything at all) for all kinds of reasons.....

Cool claims like being 100% Grass Fed or Dry-Aged, emotional connection to how we treat our animals and the land, hilarious emails, Jesse's Instagram rizz, etc.

All are valid reasons to love us and our beef. I'm just saying that adults have a complex calculus for why they like or don't like things.

But kids just tell you if it tastes good.

Kathryn's granddaughter doesn't know that steak is coming from a fancy steakhouse. This is a child whose entire frame of reference for "steak" is whatever Grandma is putting on the table at home.

She just knows what a steak looks like, and especially what a steak TASTES like. And what she was served ain't it.

(For the longer story on why "Grandma's steak" tastes so different in the first place, here's the difference between grass-fed and grass-finished beef, which is a bigger gap than most labels make it look.)

What we hear from other families

The testimonials we get regularly from customers tell us that:

• Suddenly their kids are asking for seconds
• Or falling in love with recipes their parents tried as they cook their way through some unfamiliar cuts in a Beef Share
• Formerly picky eaters are suddenly ravenous beef fans
• Toddlers are sending back inferior commodity beef

They just hit different.

Because they are pure, unbiased taste tests.

Those kids don't know all the details of our operation. They aren't trying to support a small farm. They aren't trying to win Customer of the Week.

So I get a pure, unbiased review.

And the satisfaction of knowing that all the kids (we've served 1,528 customers in the last year, mostly families) who grow up on Dirty Dog Farm beef have a lifetime reference point for what real, nourishing food should taste like.

Which is a job well done.....

How to give your kids the calibrated palate

Anyway.

Congratulations to Kathryn on the honor, and a special tip of the hat to her granddaughter, who has provided fodder for more than one of my emails over the years.

And if you would like to raise a child (or a grandchild, or just yourself) with the kind of calibrated palate that ruins commodity steakhouses forever (but ends dinner time arguments at home), all you have to do is....

Reserve a Half Beef Share with a free chest freezer here.

(Want the rest of the math on size, cuts, and how it all works? Here's a full primer on what a beef share is.)

P.S. Not sure what size is right for you? Take our Beef Share Quiz for a personal recommendation. Everyone loves a quiz.