The Niman Ranch Cookbook | Bill Niman | Talks at Google

I have the pleasure to welcome Bill Nyman today at Google and Bill Nyman. We get back far, way back nine years ago when I came to the city and I used his first products in several restaurants in the city. Today he's on campus and I got a serve Nyman Ranch product today in my cafe at Cafe Euro on 2025. Garcia. So hopefully you're going to make it over there. We're going to have a shuttle service who's going to bring us all over there, which helps. Hopefully there will be more people showing up and then I will give the word to Bill right now. So welcome, Bill.

Thank you very much. First of all, I want to thank you people at Google for what you do. It's my generation. I remember as I graduated high school and the two most important gifts I received at that time were a portable Smith Corona and a Webster's Collegiate. They were very important tools in the process of working on school newspapers. I really understand what cut and paste means and thank you very much for making life a lot easier for me and my family and all the people we work with. So you guys have really done a great thing to increase productivity and help us move into the 22nd century, if you will, a little bit of history and then we'll go into some of the things that Niman Ranch does. And then I'm going to show you some pictures which really help to illustrate how we are differentiated from the rest of the world. And I'm going to help explain my message that I'm trying to deliver to the world today, which is I've evolved away from the day to day operations at Niman Ranch. I'm on my own particular mission to share some of the things that are happening in the animal food world. And hopefully you'll take away a couple messages from this and it'll help the animals as well as you guys in eating well and doing your best to contribute to the sustainability of the planet going forward. First of all, the book that you have there and one of the reasons we wrote the book, we were approached by a publisher, Ten Speed Press in Berkeley, and they wanted us to do a cookbook. And they primarily do cookbooks and they were interested in just sharing recipes and selling books. We looked at it as an opportunity really to try and clear up a lot of the confusion in the marketplace about what's natural, what's sustainable, what's a family farm, and basically what traditional farm and ranch looks like, which is our method. And that's what we do. We're now an alliance of over 500 family owned farms and ranches across the United States, primarily in the west or west of the Mississippi, where we raise beef, pork and lamb in a real natural and sustainable way. And I'll begin to explain it to you but there's a lot more detail in the book about how we do that and I won't get too granular, but I will show you some pictures and then I'm looking forward to Q and A afterwards. I'm interested to see what you you folks are thinking and what's important to you and when you make food buying decisions and when you decide where to eat and what to eat. So I'm really curious to hear that which will help me clarify the kind of things that I want to say to the public. I'm currently involved in a Pew foundation commission that's been going for a year and a half on really taking a look at what's happening in industrial animal food production. We're going to be making recommendations to the country and hopefully we can restore a more sensible and sustainable way of producing food and addressing animals well being as well as the people who are eating that food. So we prepared a little slideshow. I made a couple assumptions when I put this together that many of you have not been inside of conventional conventional means to me a modern livestock facility and you probably, maybe you've driven by down I5 and maybe you know what a large feedlot looks like for cattle. But what's happening in the worst imaginable situation for cattle doesn't compare in any way to what's happening to poultry, both for eggs and broiler chickens in the pig and hog industry as well as dairy. So I'm not going to show you too much about what's we're not going to. You've seen the feedlots. So I'm going to really try and share a couple of slides quickly about what it looks like inside of an Egg LA facility. I've been in places like this. These animals are in there for two years, their full life. Ten animals in a cage. That's it. That's the reality. If you're not buying cage free or free range eggs, that's the way the animal is living in a dairy. These animals will never be on pasture. They could be organic. Even so you have to think beyond organic. This is a conventional, we call it a conventional dairy. It's. You can't tell the scale but there may be thousands of animals on there. These animals no longer know how to care for their young. They have trouble Giving birth, they're just milking machines and they're used up very quickly. And in fact, much of the organic milk that we purchase today could come from an environment like this. Although they were fed organic grains. Pig. This is a pig nursery. This is the first stage of their life. After they've been weaned, they're getting a little larger. This is how they live. This is 95% of the pork you eat today. This is how. These are gestating sows. That means that they spend their entire life in this crate. This could be two or three years. These are very smart animals. They're like dogs. They can't turn around. They can barely lie down. This is their life, except when they go to have their young, which is in a different kind of crate. So, again, this is. It's not just in the US this is the prevailing paradigm in the world today. The good news is that, and some of you may have read about this, Smithfield, the largest pork producer in the world, has decided because there's a lot of pressure. There's been ballot initiatives in Florida as well as Arizona to outlaw this, and there will be one in California in the next election. So they saw the handwriting in the wall and respond to consumers and the public interest, and they said that we're going to phase out these called gestation stalls over the next 10 to 20 years. It's a step in the right direction, and it indicates that consumers really can influence the way animals are treated. And that really makes me feel good. But it's just a minor and small step in the right direction. Here's more of the same. This is typical what Niman Ranch are hog farms, which are primarily in the Corn Belt. So hogs thrive on corn and soybean. Now, what I'm trying to show is the difference on a family farm. This is a traditional farm. People are really concerned about their animals and they treat them with respect and dignity. And the animals respond very positively to that. And it also, quite frankly, has a really positive effect on the meat quality. So this is not possible in the slides I've shown you before. So here's a sow. It's inside the barn. Looks like could be wintertime. But this kind of relationship and loving care is something that lay people have a hard time understanding because you think, well, you're going to send the animal to slaughter anyway. So what difference does it make? It makes a huge difference. So we really need to begin to think about how we treat our farm animals in the same way that we treat our pets. So these animals really have a basic right not to be treated cruelly. And they have no protection, really. So anything can happen to these animals and does in the industrial setting. Here's inside of a barn. Here's your macho man here really has a relationship and loves his animals. And this is typical of our farmers. Again, 500 people like this centered in Iowa, but in the surrounding states as well. This is a group of market hogs that are in what we call a hoop building. So this is as close to confining animals in a small space that we use. Most of our animals are on pasture, weather permitting. And in fact, they do like to go out in the snow. This is in the middle of the winter in Iowa, and they stay warm in the nesting. The pork industry says that the animals want to be inside those crates because they don't want to get mosquito bites, they don't want to get sunburned, or they don't want to go outside and be cold. Well, here's a picture. This is actually a little excerpt of a large picture with a bunch of pigs romping out in the snow in the cold of winter in Iowa. So they don't need those concrete and steel buildings to keep them warm and safe. This is a picture in another one of our farms, sows and pastures. This is the antithesis of what you saw. This is what Niman Ranch is about. This is what traditional hog farmers are about. And in fact, 30 or 40 years ago, all the hogs in the United States were raised in this manner. So this is a sow with a litter. This happens to be in North Carolina, where we have a lot of Farms. There's 1,000 pigs in this pasture right now. This is just one close. I don't know if you can see along the top edge. It's cropped for the book. Most of these photos are in the book, incidentally. So this is the way. And this animal is exhibiting natural behavior. So to us, you can't call pork or any meat or animals natural. If they're being raised in a confinement building, as I showed you in the beginning, this is where they thrive and can realize all their natural and instinctive needs. Here's a picture in Iowa, Thornton, Iowa. Sow in pasture. These fields. Next year, that field will be in corn. So they're naturally. Part of being sustainable is that the animals spread the manure. They eat corn and soybean and drop their manure, which fertilizes this land. And then these portable houses are moved to her next pasture in the following years. There's a sow with a newborn litter. She does everything she needs to do. She doesn't need to be crated or caged. Here I am on the ranch that I live on. This is in Marin county we call the home ranch. It's where it all began. I'm with Paul Willis, who, he's the number one hog farmer and in fact that is his home that he was born in in the background there. So he's responsible for putting together a network of over 500 family owned hog farms all raised outdoors like that. And I focus more on the beef side. So here we are with Black Angus and Hereford cross cows and calves on pasture in Marin county, right on the ocean and as they say, happy cows with an ocean view. And the ranch I live on is really a microcosm of about 50 cattle ranches that are throughout the Northwest. And they all treat their animals the same way and including not using hormones or antibiotics. But more importantly, we treat the animals with respect and kindness. And they do respond. It's my wife who's an environmental lawyer, actually she wanted to be here, but she's in Washington D.C. was testifying in front of the Senate and the House on new animal legislation and animal cruelty laws that the Humane Society is trying to get enforced and apply to farm animals the same way that they do to pets. Here I am a couple days ago and this is the ranch in Bolinas. These are young cattle that were just weaned, 700 pound cattle. They'll eat grass for the rest of the year and then the following year, after about two years of age, they'll go into our feedlot where we'll grain finish them. Because we are about grain finishing, which to us is the frosting on the cake. And our customers sort of that gourmet, natural, antibiotic free and hormone free customers. So we're grass grown and grain finished. And I'll show you some pictures of that. This is the ranch that I live on again, same place. This is how we work our cattle. We don't use motorcycles. We really, again, it's part of the traditional way. And cattle respond very positively to that. This is just a contrast. This is one of our ranches that we work with. This is been a family I've been working with for about almost 20 years now. This is in eastern Oregon. I know when I first drove through this country I said, how can this ground sustain anything living? You know, the desert. But these are great cows. They're being driven up in March. Actually the woman walking, she was the Photographer for the book. Oh, that's what we got right there. That's Laurie Smith, who's the photographer. I was chronicling our journey as she was taking pictures for the book. So this was not staged. They're driving these mother cows up into the high country in March where they'll give birth to their calves. This is that family. So when we talk about sustainable, sustainable is about multi generations. So this is a great story. These people are very worldly and very sophisticated. This is my mentor, Ken Bentz Sr. This is one of his sons and another son. He has six sons. They're all college graduates. They know Google, I'm sure they depend on it as I do. They married sisters. They each have five children. They're all well behaved, highly educated. And to me, these people care for the land because they want to pass it on to their children in a better way and more productive way than they received it. And they are really living that. This is another ranch in Marin County, Cattle grazing in the springtime. The beauty of these cattle is they are converting naturally occurring forage grasses and other plants to food for really good, high quality food for human consumption. So if you're going to eat meat, you want to. And you need to understand that the animals that you are eating, they are what they eat. So you better make sure you know what they're eating because coming your way. So this is the beauty again. These animals are the intermediaries between soil, water and photosynthesis and this fiber which we can't survive on, but they thrive on. This is our feedlot in Idaho, which is one of the real differences between us and the industry is the scale. We have capacity here for 3,000 animals. Beginning feedlot today is 35,000. The Harris Ranch, which many of you pass, is 125,000. It's not the biggest, so it gives you an idea where the industry is going. So not only are we not creating an airborne nuisance for our neighbors, but we're providing an environment that animals can thrive on. And more importantly here, this land all around here is where the crops are grown that's fed to these animals and their manure goes out on that land. And it's really a sustainable resource. And our neighbors are happy because we're not stinking up the community. And this is actually the ration that the animals are eating. So it's a complete ration. It has a lot of barley, roughage, tritical hay, wheat, corn. So it's a complete food which in many ways mirrors what the animals would eat given the Opportunity to graze in a very rich pasture. It's not a straight corn diet which is typically fed in the corn growing region. Now we're just going to show some cattle that are, you know, this is a mother cow and her calf. They develop really strong relationships. They know joy. And really for us, it's important that the animals be able to have a part of being natural is being able to provide an environment where they can realize their instinctive needs. And they're really love each other. They know joy, happy, they feel good, they feel pain. So it's really important, and I think it's important for society to really understand that we have to accept that these animals are sentient beings. They're not just things that you can eat. There's more pictures of cow and calf, more of the same. This is again on my ranch in Bolinas. This is also in West Marin. It's my wife taking care of our orphans. More of the same. So again, we feel it's important to have relationship with their animals. This is not just some cosmic people out in coastal California. This is very typical of all the people we deal with, including the family. I show you. So they relate to their animals in the same way. And their animals are quiet and calm and respond that way, respond positively. Again, more views of our place than ocean view. And these are older cattle. This gives you an idea. These are young cattle called yearlings. So they were away from their mothers. They're turned out to grass. And they developed the necessary frame and muscle then to go into the grain finishing babies. Here this is a little story. This is what happens on a farm. It's not all easy. This cow a couple days ago gave birth and she won't accept her calf. So we have to confine her. So she doesn't understand that this calf is hers and she better take care of it. She's got good milk and she's really gentle. But she won't let the calf nurse unless we confine her like that. It's a long day on the farm and we have to milk the excess out of her too. Our dog. The calf and dog become good friends, so they have the dog. It's a Great Dane. To give you an idea of the scale of the calf after the calf will be two weeks old tomorrow. Now this is what it's about. One of the things we tried to do in the book and we actually insisted with the publisher is that we wanted to really show people animals. And we want to make sure that people understand that when they're Eating meat, this is something precious, and you need to take a life to create something like this. So I think people really need to make that connection. So what we feel is on the farming techniques we've used and the ranching techniques, it's kind of a harmonic convergence of all the wonderful methods and ways of treating feeding animals and feeding them and creating the best tasting pork and the best tasting beef. And I think if people have a more complete and comprehensive understanding that meat is precious, one, I'd like to see everybody eat it less often and eat smaller portions. I think that would be better for the world, it would be better for the individuals, and it would certainly mean that we would have fewer animals on the landscape, which is. Would be better for many reasons. Try to encourage people to use. This is pork. These are incidentally from the book. Obviously, there's recipes. So one of the things we really want to encourage people to do in their eating habits is to really think of the entire animal. Most people are familiar with steaks and burgers and bacon and ham and so on, but this is something that you can make much lower. But this is pork sugo. So it's just pieces of pork that were braised, added to polenta. And then I have some beef short ribs. These are just wonderful tasting things. So an animal is made up of all sorts of wonderful parts, and we really want to encourage people to use these parts. One, I think those of us who are a little bit older thrived on this because this is what you thought an animal was in the past. When people spend more time cooking and there's a lot more ritual on the table, people really, you know, mothers prepared meals all day long, and the result was slow cooked braised meat. So this is not a convenience food. It's delicious, it's affordable. I highly recommend you guys experiment in your homes with this kind of food. I imagine, Chef Mark, I'm sure you're doing some braises down here. I hope a lot.

Yeah.

Great simple dish. That's actually a recipe from Delfina, which is a restaurant in San Francisco. Here's just a London broil. You can buy this at Trader Joe's, Niman Ranch Beef, Trader Joe's and Grill, slice and serve. So one of the things that I would like to do is since again, I'm really anxious to hear what kind of things that you guys are thinking, and hopefully we'll have a bunch of questions, and I'd like to open it up for Q and A. I found a little information, but I think there are questions I'll go further into whatever those topics are. So do we have some questions or do I. Should I carry on? Yes. You had shown the cows that were, you said there were these organic label perhaps for their milk. How can we ensure that Correct. They're not living in that scenario. That's an interesting question, I think. Thank you for that. One of the takeaways that I really want to give you guys is that when you go to make a purchase, whether it's at a meat counter or supermarket or even in a restaurant, that you want to know where does this stuff come from and how was it raised? And the organic stuff is really tricky because. Especially in dairy, because you can raise. My feeling is that the organic and natural labels, they should really respond to what the public thinks those things look like. So when people see organic milk on the label, and correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe people think that there's this cow in a green pasture, they're eating grass, living a wonderful life, and they're providing us with a really wholesome, healthful product that doesn't have any man made compounds added to it or hormones to increase their production. Well, that is about as far from the truth as you can get. Most organic dairy, I wouldn't say most organic dairy, but some of the brands that you're buying. So really, I guess you could go to Google and look up Verizon and follow the chain and find out what they're doing or Strauss or We're really blessed here with a lot of great choices with local dairies. And we're kind of in the, I mean, there are two important food cities in the United States or metro areas and some people might say three. They would include New Orleans, but really it's New York and San Francisco. So we have a lot of positive choices. And really if you're at a supermarket any place, if they can't tell you how this stuff was raised, whether or not it's raised outdoors or it's raised indoors with organic grain, then you probably, I wouldn't buy it. I'd want to know everything about it. Was my pork raised in a barn? Was it raised outdoors? Was it fed antibiotics? You know, are you using. So there's a whole list of questions, all of which we talk about in the book. So I think it's really incumbent upon the consumers and they all be changed to ask those questions. And really you can hardly open up a newspaper or go online for any kind of communication today and not hear about a foodborne illness or some kind of Scandal, whether it's from China or from Jack in the Box. And quite frankly, all of us really need to do our own kind of quantitative and qualitative analysis on the risks we're taking for every thing we eat. And that's the position I've come to. So. And I think if people ask the questions often enough to at the meat case or to restaurateurs, you know, where's the stuff come from? How is it raised? They're going to have to learn how to respond to that, and they're going to have to give the right answers if they want to keep customers coming there. So, again, the organic thing, I guess you find a brand eventually that you feel you can trust and meets the attributes that you consider important, and then you support that. And I don't know down this part, I know Strauss Dairy certainly is one of them. Organic Valley on a national level is really the gold standard, and organic is not necessarily enough. I think we learned that with the big organic produce companies. And there's other choices you have to make local, whether it's local, whether it's sustainable, whether it's a family farm, whether it's industrial farm. And I assume many of you read Michael Pollan's book, involved in the public conversation about industrialized organic farming, and, you know, there's a place for that. And really, there's hundreds of millions of people in this country that need to be fed, and it can't all be done by small farmers down the road. But we hopefully we don't in the future, we won't have to make some of the compromises we're making today and what we eat and how we source it. Is that helpful? Yeah, certainly on meat, you'd want to know, you know, is this fed antibiotics? Was it fed hormones? Did it eat meat and bone? You know, bse, we have to worry about mad cow disease. You know, hopefully we've learned from the mistakes that were made in the UK and that mad cow disease is not going to come pop up and scare us and hurt us here. Another question. Yes, sir. On a larger scale, it seems like, you know, there is legislation that comes around and says, in order to put this leg on your food, The goalpost seems to get moved all the time, like low fat. You know, low fat now is not the same as low fat 10 years ago.

Right.

So how do you see that going down? It's like, it seems like people are following sort of the letter of the law, not necessarily the spirit of go. That's a very good point. And Certainly the industry, I mean, we've already seen a lot of erosion on the organic standards, especially in the dairy side and the poultry side. So I think it's a harbinger of things to come. And again, trying to fall back on. My dream would be to have a really wonderful, and maybe this is something that sidebar for Google. My dream would be to have a non profit foundation, non profit company of some sort or even for profit, create a label that would test, you know, it's some sort of testimonial or Good Housekeeping seal of approval for brand attributes that would be paid for by the consumer. So at the point of sale, as that sale was rung up, a nickel or a dime would go to this kind of third party verification outfit that would say, okay, this is not, you know, you have a whole bunch of attributes that they would attest to as opposed to what's happening today. Trade organizations that are funded by the producers themselves are endorsing brands. Well, that model is fundamentally flawed because the people who are providing their revenue stream for that endorsement are the same people that need to benefit from it and are therefore controlling kind of the ethos of that Good Housekeeping seal of approval. So let's have some really disinterested third person or third party out there certifying in detail, what does organic mean here, what does natural mean there? Fortunately, right now the usda, the Department of Agriculture is beginning to codify what natural means in the same way they did with organic. It's a good start what they did with organic. But we do have to be cognizant of erosion in those standards. But natural means nothing today. Then you have the whole continuum of Niman Ranch out here with the gold standard and somebody else out here was saying natural, which meets the federal definition of natural, which is only minimally processed, almost anything can meet that. But they're beginning to codify that. We've been very proactive in trying to influence the direction of that. And again, one of the things that besides being antibiotic free and hormone free, not fed man made compounds to stimulate growth or replace good animal husbandry, if you will, we felt that, and this is something that is now in the public register in this process, is that we felt that the definition of natural should really conform to what consumer, with the consumer's perception of what natural beef looks like, natural pork, natural dairy, natural poultry and so on. So we're hopeful that at least there's this dialogue going on right now and that natural will take on more meaning. But again, as consumers if you're going to eat, you've got to be really diligent about the brands you select, the kind of things you're eating. And you know, there's a lot of bad stuff out there. So I encourage you to do whatever you can and just continue to listen to the dialogue and conversations that are going on throughout the country on a daily basis. Not just in response to horror stories, but just in farm people talking and chefs talking. I mean, the fact that Google and large corporate cafeterias and catering are providing really great healthful food that addresses your well being as well as the well being of the animals to get, you know, that kind of partnership is really going to change, can really change the way animals are treated and foods produced in the country. So that's really important. And, and you're coming to this event and praising your chefs in the kitchen and really advocating for, hey, this is the kind of food. This is why we work at Google, because they have taken the extra step and are providing you guys with really a healthful and wholesome product. This is huge. And people who wants to go to work at Ford if they're not going to step up and serve that kind of food too? So it's going to be a very competitive marketplace. Excuse me here. I want to have a microphone so the people on the other end can hear.

So one of the other kinds of industrialization that we're seeing is that most of us are buying our meat at supermarkets instead of from independent butchers. Is this something else that you discuss in the book?

What are some of the other things that you're buying? Is that the question? I can hear your question.

Just the way that we typically buy meat, that most of us do not go to butcher shops where you have a relationship with a specific person, but just going to a meat counter in a large supermarket, and that's quite a change in the way that you think about buying meat. Quite a change in the way that you get information about it. I'm wondering if this is something else that you address in the book.

We do in a minor way. But again, there's somebody at that store that can answer the questions and if that question comes at them frequently enough, they're going to address it. I will say that the big retailers, from Walmart down to the more specialty stores that you see around Andronico's or Draegers, they are responding to the same kind of things. They listen. Everybody knows what's going on at Whole Foods. Everybody's looking at everybody else's. I don't know if you have, if there's corporate espionage going on at Google, but I assure you there are people that are looking at everything that's happening at Whole Foods in the business. And people from restaurant people visit restaurants. And it's a very small world today. So people are really traveling around and interacting and researching. And it's undeniable that Whole Foods has taken a lot of customers away from Albertsons and Kroger and Safeway, and they want to get them back. And in order to get them back, they're going to have to step up to the plate, provide the kind of choices that Whole Foods does. And in fact, they're doing that. The unfortunate consequences of that is Whole Foods wants to look more like Kroger and they're going in that direction, whereas Kroger is going in Whole Foods direction. But may not be unfortunate for us as consumers and for animals. But I'd certainly like to see the likes of Whole Foods take the highest possible moral ground and really be thought leaders in the same sense that you people here are thought leaders, because you can really change things. Yes, Cassandra? Yes. How do you see imports of food from other countries affecting the market both today and in the future? Do you see that as kind of putting the family farm that we've seen idealized here under pressure? Well, first of all, let me help characterize our family farm. These are professional farmers that really make a good living and support their families and multi generationally off their farm. So we're not talking about people who have gone to a farm for lifestyle, retired doctors and lawyers up the Hudson Valley growing rutabagas and tomatoes. We're talking about the real deal. So these people, hog farmers, grow corn and soybean. They happen to feed it to hogs instead of chickens or beef. So it's not like they're not lunatic fringe or small time producers. These are real bona fide farmers who do a lot of business. The question that Cassandra asks is very important. I personally believe that in one world and I have no issue with importing, but I do have an issue is I want to know if I don't want, maybe I feel good about New Zealand, what's coming in there. But I may be more apprehensive about something from a different country and I just want to know where it's from so that I can make a choice. Quite frankly, the law passed in Congress four or five years ago called country of origin labeling, and the Texas and Cattlemen have really prevented that law from going into effect because they buy a Lot of cattle from Mexico that end up in the food chain. So they were successful in keeping that law back now with the situation because of China kind of was a wake up call for all of us to understand that a lot of our food is really coming from outside the United States and we have the right to really know where that's coming from. And the stuff that we've experienced with China is not unique to China, incidentally. And apparently, interestingly enough, there's a lot of stuff that we export that has just as many problems. So this is a really global problem and China's taking a big hit on that right now and taking a lot of blame. But that has at least a wake up call that let's know where our stuff comes from. So we have the choice to make. I believe that something organic from Paraguay or Uruguay. I have a little more. I have a problem with the credibility of that versus something organic from Northern California. I may be naive, but I, I certainly would like to know where this stuff is coming so I can make what I consider an educated choice. So there you go. I mean, there's a reason New Zealand does a great job. It's a grass country. It's a grass based culture. They've been able to create an infrastructure that can safely and humanely process lamb and export it and convert grass to food for human consumption. That's the miracle of photosynthesis. And they do it well there and they do it cheaper than we do here. And for a whole number of reasons. And you know, to me it's a. Has a different flavor profile, but from an animal well being point of view and nutritional point of view, it's a good choice. Some of the choices aren't quite so good out there. Questions? Okay, how many of you. Okay, I already answered the question. No, go ahead. I was going to make something up just to keep the dialogue going. I haven't had time to look through the whole set of recipes yet, but it looked like you have pretty few recipes for the off cuts or offal or. You know, I really feel it's a pity that most people won't eat those parts of the meat for the awful. Yes, but I love them. Yes. Well, it's certainly in Europe and other countries, they're much more utilized. It's not necessary. I think there are chefs that are starting to use it more. It's very nutritious. Every pregnant woman should eat liver. It's high in iron and also very high in cholesterol and it's also very affordable. So, yeah, I Think it'd be interesting to see if people's dieting habits eventually migrate to those kind of things. I think there's more. Listen, the country is obsessed with food more and more today, and especially folks who have disposable income. Young people are, you know, you're going out to eat a lot and you're experiencing, especially in the Bay Area, all sorts of new and interesting things. And hopefully as a result of that, there'll be an interest in an understanding of both the nutritional and the value and the wonderful eating. It's not just about. Well, unfortunately, sweet breads come from formula veal. So the best ones, you have to be careful. That's delicious. But. But it's not politically or animal welfare. Correct. But there are a lot of great things. Yes. It's interesting hearing your targets for employees to get choice at their corporate offerings. Are you seeing much progress in any initiatives for public schools to help bolster their menus to make them more organic and healthy? So which probably I think very interesting. So the question is about, are we seeing as we're seeing interest at corporate catering, what's going on at the public school or private school level? I think it's more robust in private schools because it's a budgetary thing. But one of the things that we've certainly been involved with Chez Panisse foundation and what they've done in Berkeley and the other ones, they get a lot of ink on it. So in the public elementary and high schools, one of the problems is that these programs are successful as long as they have grant funding. And the challenge is to create something that's both nutritionally well balanced and affordable and addressing these sustainable issues, which are more expensive. There's a reason why Niman Ranch meat is more expensive. Because we don't have manure lagoons. We don't externalize our costs to the environment and to taxpayer. So when you buy Niman Ranch, you're paying all the real costs of that production. If you're buying something that's conventionally raised, which is most of the stuff today, the taxpayers in the community is being burdened with the environmental consequences and the community consequences of that method. Therefore, what seems like cheap food is really expensive. But that's the cheap food that the government buys and ends up distributing through our USDA programs to school lunch programs. Now, much of that stuff is there because nobody else would buy it either because of the condition of it or the flavor quality or whatever. But again, it's really cheap. And what's driving the decisions at the School lunch program is mostly driven by price, and this is certainly true in most corporate catering establishments as well, that it has to have a price point that works for that particular business or the schools. Now, what you do see, and hopefully it'll trickle down, is that the private schools, well, Harvard, Yale and Stanford, for example, compete to see who has the best. Cassandra even mentioned this, and I happen to be aware we serve Stanford and Yale. They're competing to see who has the best food. And included in that best is the sourcing and the sustainability of it and issues such as local and locale. That brings up something I really want to share with you. There's a lot of talk about local. One of the things that I'm really. I advocate for is a better understanding of local and locale. So there's a. Local is wonderful and should be supported whenever possible, especially in produce or dairy or poultry or beef. But the reality is that animals for food have a locale which they thrive in and where they belong. So raising beef cattle on a peninsula versus in the far west, or raising pigs where corn and soybean grows, that's the right locale for that. You don't ship corn and soybean to California to raise hogs. Here, you ship the meat. It's much more efficient in terms of energy consumption. The animals thrive there. It's really much more sustainable to have meats in the right locale. Animals in the right locale, as opposed to local. And what has happened in the United States is there's been a concentration of infrastructure which has followed the animals to the right locale, if you will. So from a food safety and an animal welfare, safe animal welfare side of processing and slaughtering the animals, it's the modern plants. Even though we support all the traditional agricultural methods on the farm and in a kitchen, between the farm and the plate and the table, we really kind of embrace the more modern technology, if you will, because those plants can do it safely. They actually do it more humanely, not because they believe in treating animals well, but because there's. The meat quality is just a lot better. The meat industry has finally acknowledged that, you know what, if you don't get animals all stirred up and crazy prior to slaughter, the meat quality is a lot better. So we want that to happen for a more altruistic reason, but the end result is the same. So we really use the bigger modern plants that are safe from a food safety point of view, because these guys have deep pockets and they don't want to have a situation. They don't want to. They genuinely don't want to poison people, but they also don't want to poison people from a liability point of view because they're self insured. That's just the practical reality of the situation. And they do a great job on slaughtering. So there's a reason. And those slaughterhouses are only located in a geography where cattle thrive or hogs thrive or poultry thrive. So that's why it's not spread out throughout the United States. Now, of course, one of the common themes that we hear today is that our food is everything on our plate is traveling 1,500 miles. Well, it still may be less energy consumptive to bring the pork from Iowa, where 25% of the pigs in the United States live, rather than bring the corn and soybean from Iowa to California to feed it. So we don't ship the pork. So basically the economic imperatives that operate in animal livestock operations, animal food, whether it's dairy or poultry or they drive towards an appropriate locale. So if you live in San Francisco or New York, the appropriate locale is not within 20 miles of your city necessarily. It's out there where professional farmers live, where the land is suitable, where it can absorb the nutrient, the manure that comes from these operations and the infrastructure to do it well and safely and humanely has followed. So that's a very important point. And the, you know, people today are in the marketplace. There's a couple of buzzwords that really resonate with consumers. Antibiotic free, hormone free, local. You know, if we could educate a consumer or somebody making a purchase on a label about the reality of all three of those would be great, but you can't. So people make a lot of purchasing decisions based on that. And there's another side of that story, especially on the locale and the use of antibiotics. But again, everything is driven by marketing today. So the local, the antibiotic free and the hormone free are really the key phrases in the meat. I think in chicken and free range and eggs, it's cage free. Well, there's a huge difference between cage free and that label works. But cage free does not mean they're roaming out in pasture, which is a whole other level of where you really want to get to if you can. Because if you've eaten an egg or any poultry that's been raised outdoors, it's unrecognizable next to a cage free or a battery caged raised egg. So those of you who have been blessed with barnyard chicken or eggs, you know what I'M talking about. And hopefully there will be more and more of that in the future. And I think if we begin asking those questions, when you make purchases and demanding it, quite frankly, by not accepting anything. But you're going to see a whole industry revitalized and can really restore a much more sensible and sustainable way of producing food. And that partnership begins with Chef Mark and the other two. Yeah. And you guys telling whoever's making the decisions at Google is that we love this and we value this and one of the reasons that we're here tastes great and happens to be raised in a healthful, humane, sustainable way. I hope you read the cookbook. It's an interesting. There's three parts to it. There's a. The story of Niman Ranch, the way we think it's supposed to be, including pictures of animals and farm people, as well as the middle section, some kind of useful information about what parts of the animal may help you make decisions on how to buy it and what to do and how to use things. And has some great recipes which are contributed by chefs who have used our stuff, do use our stuff throughout the country. And many of them are celebrities and others are just great chefs around the country. And they're our partners. And there are the guys who are supporting guys and women and chefs that are supporting traditional livestock husbandry and really making this something that can thrive and grow, change the way people eat. Great. It's about one o'.

Clock.

I encourage you guys to whoever can come over to Cafe Gyro. It sounds like Jeff, Mark was talking about some of the things he was serving today. And it sounds delicious. I know the guy can cook. I know he's got the right stuff, the building blocks for a great meal.

So, yeah, I got to talk about money a little bit today. I got some leg of lamb in from Bill and we cook it in. It's slow cooked in alfalfa hay. So it's kind of perfumed with what they actually eat. And it's gonna be really interesting to see how that came out. Looks pretty cool. And we have also pork. And so it's pretty heavy. We're always pretty heavy over there in Europe, but very protein driven. So looking forward to have some food.

Paired it up with some great wines. No wines. It might cut into productivity there.

Very good. So thank you for coming.

Thank you for what you did.