Beef Meat Marbling

You ve likely seen it in a raw steak before.

Beef meat marbling.

Marbling intramuscular fat is the intermingling or dispersion of fat within the lean. These two factors are indicators of the beef s tenderness. Graders evaluate the amount and distribution of marbling in the ribeye muscle at the cut surface after the carcass has been ribbed between the 12th and 13th ribs. Marbling intramuscular fat is the intermingling or dispersion of fat within the lean.

We have been taught to think that beef tenderness is caused by marbling the visible fat streaks in beef. Cattle that are raised on grain will have more marbling than grass fed beef. Beef carcass quality grading is based on 1 degree of marbling and 2 degree of maturity. Beef that is given a higher grade is usually from younger cattle and has more fat marbling.

Marbling is what gives beef its flavor juiciness and tenderness. In the restaurant world the most desirable types like kobe and wagyu beef have a high frequency and even distribution of fine marbling. It sometimes looks like fine white lines running through your steak. I know you may be thinking that fat is bad and you want a lean steak not fatty.

Well marbling refers to the white flecks of intramuscular fat in each cut of meat. The fat makes the meat softer and easier to chew as there is simply less muscle fibre and collagen per unit volume of meat. Beef marbling is the small flecks of fat interspersed within beef between the muscle fibers. An inferior form of marbling it features larger less evenly distributed flecks of fat which can negatively affect the cooking and eating experiences.

Usda s agricultural marketing service ams employs 200 highly skilled beef graders who sometimes with the help of electronic monitoring evaluate several factors that determine the grade including the amount and distribution of marbling. This is fairly intuitive since you can imagine how difficult it would be to get fat by eating grass. It impacts the tenderness moistness and overall flavor and has become one of the most well known elements of steak evaluation. Marbling is fat so it is largely determined by the diet of the animal and to a certain degree the breed of cattle.

Beef carcass quality grading is based on 1 degree of marbling and 2 degree of maturity. These fine flecks melt during cooking adding juiciness and tenderness throughout the meat. The beef grading system developed by the united states department of agriculture is a voluntary grading system based on the meat s maturity and level of fat marbling. Marbling adds a lot of flavor and can be one indicator of how good the beef is.

The lean muscle has a high frequency of thin evenly distributed flecks of fat.