They’ve got beef
Meatheads are having a cow over Kobe steak. What’s the real thing? And is it really so great?
KOBE beef has some in the food world sizzling.
In his new book, “Real Food/Fake Food,” Larry Olmsted purports to expose rampant fraud in food labeling — including at a top city steakhouse.
A chapter on mislabeled beef singles out famed Meatpacking District steakhouse Old Homestead’s “Kobe burger.” Olmsted has a point: The burger is really “American Wagyu,” a cheaper cross-blend that comes from Wagyu cattle — the same uniquely fatty strain used in Kobe beef — that were raised in Idaho, not Kobe, Japan.
But, in numerous interviews to promote the book, Olmsted went on to allege that none of the meat
that Old Homestead sells, including its famous steaks, is Kobe. That’s true — but not in a meaningful sense.
Old Homestead steaks are Kobe as the term is understood by New York diners: a pure, top-grade (A5+) Wagyu steak, a delicacy that’s both singularly tasty and offputtingly oily. The A5 grade is awarded by the Japanese gov- ernment for the finest Wagyu blend based on marbling, texture, fat content and muscle characteristics, and commands a restaurant price of $25 to $30 per ounce — whether the cattle hailed from Kobe or elsewhere in Japan.
Leading chefs and beef experts say that the finest Wagyu from other parts of the country is just as good, if not better, though the Kobe geographic area has rigid technical rules for cattle-raising — which do not include those mythical massages and beer diets — and slaughterhouse procedures.
“Beef from other parts of Japan can be better,” says 3-Michelin-star chef Eric Ripert. His Le Bernardin offers A5 Wagyu from Kagoshima and Miyazaki, while Old Home- stead buys from Gunma.
So Olmsted, who didn’t respond to request for comment, is wrong to portray Old Homestead’s steaks as on par with a Milli Vanilli bait-and-switch. At restaurants around the city, Japanese “Kobe” isn’t usually from Kobe, a fact known to just about any beef lover who gets out of the house.
“I don’t know why we have this peculiar fixation with Kobe beef,” says Mark Schatzker, author of “Steak: One Man’s Search for the World’s Tastiest Piece of Beef ” (Penguin 2011). “In Japan, they say, ‘What’s the big deal? We have great beef from many regions’ ” — just as American pinot noir from Washington, Oregon and even New York can rival those from California. Schatzker said he once did a side-by-side tasting of Wagyu from Kobe and Matsusaka, in central Japan, and found only “subtle differences,” which he couldn’t specify.
Olmsted also claims that pure Japanese Wagyu is rare in the US, when in fact it’s had the run of New York for more than a decade. You can find it at Porter House, BLT Steak, Uncle Jack’s and Charlie Palmer Steak, among others. The only local place that sells Kobe from Kobe is 212 Steakhouse, where it’s $25 an ounce — the same price as your typical nonKobe Wagyu.
So let Kobe be “Kobe” — as long as it tastes as good.