Organic chicken

[bharminder]

I desire more variety of meats in my diet. I eat different types of seafood(shellfish, fish), and grass fed beef. And other than eggs, that's it. I'd like to eat other meats.

Would it be a good idea to sometimes eat organic chicken (grain fed, possibly free range) to increase variety or would the disadvantages from the grain fed chicken outweigh the variety factor in terms of health benefits?


Should I just up the beef intake?

[TylerDurden]

Avoid the chicken.

[yuli]

bison, lamb, deer ... are all delicious and fairly easy to get...better then chicken

[kurite]

What about pork?

[bharminder]

Hmm where can I get all that , deer, etc? Bison from northstarbison., not too much grass fed meat in the local supermarkets. Haven't tried many of the farmers markets though...


Pork isn't my ideal choice, thanks for the suggestion.


I was planning to order some organ meats from northsrarbison, maybe I can get some steaks too..

Preferably I'd like fresh meat, and though I can order fresh online, the shipping cost is more than I want to pay since I 'd only theoretically order a little bit of fresh at a time.

[yuli]

I have never even ordered meat yet, I don't want a huge amount of frozen meat really, I don't even want to eat frozen meat that often...but I don't usually shop at supermarkets either (except when they have wild fish)...
I shop at...
- a health food store that has a local meats section (they always stock my fav. grass-fed beef, livers and lamb)
- various butchers (they will often have bison and lamb), just call them and ask what they have and when, they can even order for you
- farmers markets (they often have deer), again some of them you can call and ask them to order something specific for you

Bison, deer and lamb are all common animals to farm here in Canada, in the US I am sure its the exact same thing 

[bharminder]

I see, my health food store only has grass fed beef. Their "pasture - rasied lamb" comes from Strauss which on their website states grain-finished. No grass fed or organic organs either...

Do butchers get grass fed stuff? I went to this one Byrds Meats store and they didn't have anything close to grass fed. I remember seeing a frozen rabbit from China..

I guess I'll try the farmers market.

What about ordering ground up frozen meats? I don't really want to do that ...

[yuli]

Do butchers get grass fed stuff?

There are like millions of butchers, and they are all different, so you actually have to search out all the butchers in your area and call them and ask. It takes a while but once you find your sources you can just call ahead of time before you shop or have them order stuff for you.
It may be cheaper if you find the same thing at farmers market though as a pose to butchers. Either way you have to do research its annoying but worth it 

[bharminder]

Ok ill try that. I did try that a few months back without much luck....but I wasn't totally determined ...I called up a few places and no luck with grass fed.


I need some help with this because I find myself eating foods like bread and pasturized butter, etc. because I dunno what else to eat besides fish or beef

[KD]

chicken are natural grain/seed eaters. Granted the chicken itself is somewhat unnatural in much the same way as beef. either way as long as the chicken gets access to pasture, and therefore sunlight and ominovry (bugs and things) its perfectly healthy, and necessary for them to eat some grain. so while chickens might be less healthy in some respects than wild animals or purely grass-fed beef, its likely healthier than grain-fed beef and processed food. Chickens also supply bacterias not present in otehr animals which are attributed certain healing properties by certain gurus .

what is the hangup with the food choices? is it nutritional questioning or boredom? lots of folks actually eschew fish and seafood, so you are ahead of their curve at least. Health food stores and WF tend to have a variety of other things to choose from, albeit as you say not necessarily 100% grain free. Just got to pick the healthiest alternatives which might include freezing. I can say that i you are worried about parasites (from other thread) you probably don't want to be mixing alot of wild type foods (fish) with bread or starch often. I think chicken is fine to add personally, but I don't see it spicing up your diet much if that is what you are looking for. tastes like sweaty paper. I kind of dig it.

[the PresiDenT]

bison, lamb, deer ... are all delicious and fairly easy to get...better then chicken

in the winter the grassfed animals i buy have to eat grains/hay (in canada). how bad is this for me/is there a way around it besides freezing meat, which i dont do

[yuli]

in the winter the grassfed animals i buy have to eat grains/hay (in canada). how bad is this for me/is there a way around it besides freezing meat, which i dont do

hay is not grain its grass (so any grass-fed animal has to be fed hay in winter if it wont be fed grain), and there are some farmers which will feed only hay all winter too (thats more rare) 
Lots are hay fed and supplemented with grains in the winter (I'd actually rather eat the hay-fed grain supplemented one then frozen stuff everyday)...
Yesterday I had some fresh ground bison and it was amazing...today I tried some previously frozen ground bison and it tasted like shitty catfood, I couldn't even finish it...my cats seemed to like it though... lol

[the PresiDenT]

hay is not grain its grass (so any grass-fed animal has to be fed hay in winter if it wont be fed grain), and there are some farmers which will feed only hay all winter too (thats more rare) 
Lots are hay fed and supplemented with grains in the winter (I'd actually rather eat the hay-fed grain supplemented one then frozen stuff everyday)...
Yesterday I had some fresh ground bison and it was amazing...today I tried some previously frozen ground bison and it tasted like shitty catfood, I couldn't even finish it...my cats seemed to like it though... lol

ya i feed all the stuff i dont want to my dog too, my family feeds her shit frozen "wet" food from some retard, when i insist on raw meat like me. But i did not know hay was grass, makes sense though. THE MORE YOU KNOW (cheesy exit theme)

[bharminder]

It's boredom and a desire for nutritional and palate variety.  I've started to get more deep sea fish (like blue marlin....that's deep sea right?)  and no issues with worms in the fish. Also, clams are giving me a ton of energy.


The Whole Foods has mostly grain fed meats around here, even in the summer.  Though I suppose that grass fed and grain finished lamb would be better than organic chicken(not pastured)

chicken are natural grain/seed eaters. Granted the chicken itself is somewhat unnatural in much the same way as beef. either way as long as the chicken gets access to pasture, and therefore sunlight and ominovry (bugs and things) its perfectly healthy, and necessary for them to eat some grain. so while chickens might be less healthy in some respects than wild animals or purely grass-fed beef, its likely healthier than grain-fed beef and processed food. Chickens also supply bacterias not present in otehr animals which are attributed certain healing properties by certain gurus .

what is the hangup with the food choices? is it nutritional questioning or boredom? lots of folks actually eschew fish and seafood, so you are ahead of their curve at least. Health food stores and WF tend to have a variety of other things to choose from, albeit as you say not necessarily 100% grain free. Just got to pick the healthiest alternatives which might include freezing. I can say that i you are worried about parasites (from other thread) you probably don't want to be mixing alot of wild type foods (fish) with bread or starch often. I think chicken is fine to add personally, but I don't see it spicing up your diet much if that is what you are looking for. tastes like sweaty paper. I kind of dig it.

[bharminder]

Against the advice of some people I tried the organic chicken. I got 2 whole organic chickens in one package. They were fed 100% grains, uncooked



I ate it 3 days in a row, about 1 - 1/2 pounds each day. AFter first night, I had some mild stomach rumbling, no concern by

 me. 2nd night, I ate more, same slight rumbling- no big deal. On the 4th morning after eating it again the 3rd time at night,

very bad stomach and intestinal pains and cramping. Chills, felt very cold. Went to relieve myself very often, like every 40

minutes.



It seemed like it was getting worse, so I remember reading on Mercola.com if you get salmonella and are healthy to drink

plenty of fluids, electrolytes, and take a high quality probiotic in large amounts(30% of the bottle every hour). I felt better a

lot better after the first dose. I'm hoping symptoms don' return once I run out of this probiotic.


Is this salmonella or some kind of bacterial overload? Was it from the grainfed organic chicken? Either way I'm not going to risk eating it again. What are thoughts, thanks



Bobby

[KD]

Hey Bobby,

no one can definitively tell you what is going on. I can say from my own experience it took me awhile to not get these kind of symptoms eating raw chicken and sometimes they were pretty severe, but your response seems like the right move considering. I don't eat chicken very often anymore but have had it here and there recently and coincidentally I had maybe .5 lb last night. No problems yet to report but I have a feeling that if the issue was 100% its 'unhealthy' diet, I would have more sensitivities/symptoms today then when I first tried it ~2 years ago.  I get the Bell&Evans brand from WF which I believe is partly pastured and fed organic grains.

[bharminder]

Thanks. I think that is a good brand, air chilled, low or no salmonella counts in one study.

Thankfully I did not have to go to the hospital. I will stay away from factory farmed chicken for now. The beef and lamb, and fish treats me well.

[bharminder]

edit: the mercola recommendation was 1/8th of a bottle of high quality probiotic supplement, not 1/3rd

[Sully]

Hey Bobby.

I usually avoid chicken even organic. For a few reasons.

-I prefer the taste of other meats. Especially bison and wild game.

-Chickens are dipped in hot water or wax to help remove feathers. So the skin is heated to a degree.

-Chickens like cows have been modified quite a bit through selective breeding and works of modern technology.

-Most chickens are fed predominantly grains, no matter what their label is (free range, organic etc.)


Better options for birds in stores..

Try duck (i see that in some places frozen) without skin (because it is dipped in hot water to help remove feathers also , unless you kill it yourself)

Just use and alternative fat source instead of skin. Marrow bones, suet etc.


It is also my guess, that the combination of a high grain diet and poor handling can make chicken very risky to eat. I rarely, if ever eat it. I had it fully raw maybe twice in my life.

It is also bland in my opinion. If you can get free range chickens never fed a piece of dom. grain, that would be good. I would imagine it would have more flavor too, and a more yellowish fat.

Chickens are meant to have some grain (very little), but not much. They eat mainly insects and grasses etc in the wild.