Ranch Foods Direct is dedicated to principles, making our world a better place by offering products imbued with values. The tag line on the Ranch Foods Direct (RFD) logo is “Good Food That’s Good For You” because the RFD Mission is to build community around local food, promoting a…
Pasture to Plate Protocol
- Our cattle are managed in an environmentally regenerative manner.
- Good animal husbandry reduces stress and prevents disease, making it possible to eliminate sub-therapeutic antibiotics.
- No growth promoting steroids, hormones, or feed additives are used in our feeding program, resulting in more tender and flavorful beef.
- Our cattle are generally younger than commodity cattle, resulting in more tender beef with less connective tissue, eliminating the mechanical and chemical tenderization necessary with commodity beef.
- Animals are slaughtered on-site where they are raised, in a humane, slow and safe manner.
- Linking more directly with our customers minimizes the distance from pasture to plate..
- We are proud our meats are from animals Born and Raised in the USA.
- We age our beef for two to three weeks to achieve optimal tenderness and flavor.
All animals at Callicrate Cattle Company are born, raised and harvested in the United States. There are no performance enhancing drugs, including subtherapeutic antibiotics, hormones, steroids, or beta-agonists used in the feeding program.
Humane Treatment and Handling of Animals
Callicrate Cattle Company follows the direction of Temple Grandin’s “Recommended Animal Handling Guidelines and Audit Guide for Cattle, Pigs, and Sheep.” A USDA approved and inspected processing unit (Establishment # EST. 40432M) following the Humane Methods of Slaughter Act 1978 provides on-site slaughter. In 2011, in partnership with the Socially Responsible Ag Project (SRAP), Callicrate developed the mobile meat processing unit which received a US Department of Agriculture grant of inspection. With on-site processing, animals on the Callicrate ranch are walked or moved a very short distance to slaughter, avoiding the travel stress of trucking. USDA/FSIS monitors and audits humane treatment and handling of animals and food safety inspections before, during and after slaughter.
Living and Raising Conditions
Callicrate Cattle Company follows the rigorous Living, Raising and Raising Conditions guidelines as created by Mike Callicrate and recommended by Humane Farm Animal Care Standards, January 2014. Callicrate Cattle Company goes beyond the standards for humane care, spacious outdoor living conditions, nutrition, and humane slaughter.
Raising conditions from birth to harvest begin with calves remaining with their mothers for about six months, followed by a low stress weaning process where cows are removed and calves remain in their familiar environment consuming high roughage, low grain diets including vitamins and mineral supplements. After weaning, the calves are grown on the high roughage diet to heavier feeder weights and then transitioned to lower roughage, higher barley diets until they reach their finished weight. Diets are designed to fit the ruminant’s ability to digest without the use of antibiotics commonly used in the higher grain diets of industrial type cattle feeding operations.
Callicrate Cattle Company Beef Bone Broth
Callicrate beef and pork are available for purchase from our own Ranch Foods Direct retail stores and online.
Be sure to check out our special Callicrate Cattle Company Beef Bone Broth. Making broth from our bones before we pyrolyze them into bonechar makes a wonderful healthy bone broth and utilizes the animal to the largest extent possible.