In this 100‑hour self‑experiment, Victor Justin Rhodes (Speaker A) attempts to live solely on lamb sourced from his own St. Croix sheep farm. He documents each meal—lamb chops, ribs, burgers, broth, and occasional beef—while tracking time (12 h, 24 h, 48 h, 96 h, 101 h). The video interweaves practical cooking details (use of beef tallow, broth preparation, electrolyte water, SodaStream soda) with farm‑raising information (grass‑fed, unsprayed hay, pasture rotation, waterers, shelter, manure composting). Rhodes reflects on the ethics of killing animals, emphasizing attachment to the livestock, humane harvest, and the emotional weight of “butcher day.” He also shares nutritional observations: lamb’s high fat content, its suitability for a carnivore‑style “Lion’s Diet,” and personal health context (juvenile rheumatoid arthritis diagnosis). The narrative includes dialogue with Rebecca, who provides commentary on the diet’s monotony, animal handling, and food preferences. By the end, Rhodes acknowledges the limits of a lamb‑only diet, supplements with beef and burgers, and concludes with mixed feelings about the experiment’s sustainability and personal satisfaction.
Chapters
This is an entire lamb from a recent harvest on our farm. So in this video, I'm going to attempt to survive for 100 hours on only lamb from my farm. Lunch, dinner, 24 hours. Lunch, dinner, 48 hours. Lunch— what's this? Lamb rib, 48, 72. Oh, so close. One lamb can almost feed me 100% for 5 days. I got more lamb from our farm, lamb chops, to mix it up a little bit. That gets me to 96 hours. Then we'll sleep going well beyond 100 hours. This is so flat already. I like— do I even need to pat these into burgers? Ready to go. A little variety off the bat. Loin chops, teeny tiny. This little lamb was from an unfortunate mishap on our farm. Smoking this stuff today. And the only other thing I'm gonna have is salt and minerals in my electrolyte water. You think I can do it?
Yeah.
Would you want to do it? No. Well, I think I must be hungry. That's way too much for lunch. That'll probably do me for or two. It begins, 12:38. Don't anybody feel sorry for me yet? So good. Hey Rebecca, you think I can do this?
Yeah.
What do you think about me and my crazy diet? Sometimes you have some of the most discipline I know. I'm going to save bones so I can make a lamb broth. Whoa! Dinner, much the same as lunch. If we could all get on board on a really simple diet like this, life would be so much easier, wouldn't it?
Yeah, but it would be also so dull.
Yeah, that's a good point.
Just brown food.
It does get old sometimes. Supper. I guess I technically am cheating. Oh my, we're gonna use beef tallow to cook it in. Did you just roll your eyes at me? I did. Do that again for the people. I have a deeper appreciation for you guys. You're my energy, my medicine, everything for 5 days. And let's see, the one we harvested was about yay big, definitely not ready. Then I would say that one would have fed me 100% for 10 days. The third bigger one would feed me for 15 days. 2 lambs a month, I would need to grow 24 lambs. That's a good bit, but that would be all I would need. Are there 20-something of you? There's gonna be like 10 moms in this before it's done, and they can have 2, 4 babies, so we could be getting pretty close. But of course I'm not gonna eat 100% lamb the rest of my life. I miss my beef. I give them some alfalfa. Will you guys let me pet you now? What about you? Can I grab you? Oh look, I'll pet this little one. This must be Belle's because she's more calm. Mamas, babies. Sometimes when people are visiting, especially fond of animals, they'll say, oh, are Are these the ones you're gonna eat? Pointing to the mamas? No, we don't eat the mamas. We eat their babies. But we let you grow up a little bit, don't we? I'm a big advocate of getting attached to the animals you're gonna kill. It's the utmost respect. You treat them better. I should be the one that feels the pain on harvest day. I want it to be so quick and humane they don't even know it's coming. And the pain needs to be on me. Tear needs to come from my eyes because they're making the ultimate sacrifice to sustain me. 24 hours a lamivore. I'm surviving so far. It's not that hard yet. Their lunch, my lunch. My lunch. I need some lamb broth, so I'm gonna go ahead and cook some of this bonier stuff. The secret to eating just one thing for so long is to be really hungry when you eat. So only 2 meals a day. The secret to just 2 meals a day— some good broth in the morning. Put a little bit of water in there. I think 300 for 3 hours will do it. The lamb looks good. Oh no, it's, it's still kind of tough. Yeah, that's gonna have to go in longer. Hopefully these ribs All right, yeah, that's, that's good. Okay, that's good. And we're gonna get some bones. That is a plate of salty ribs. The thing about lamb is it's fatty, like it's fattier than beef. I don't think there's a cut on it that I need to supplement fat for. Is it the perfect food? It's 9 o'clock, started this at 2 o'clock. If that's not fall-off-the-bone, I don't know what's gonna do it. Big test, we need to get these bones off. It's pretty delicate. Mm, so soft. That's gonna be several meals for me made all at once. Now all the bones have been collecting, plus I reckon this was a meat stock. Go ahead and get that in there. Just fill it up with water. Now this will do the work for us. Tomorrow morning, midday, we could have us our first lamb broth. That one? Boy, it's not very tame, is it? Not yet. Oh, good.
When I do the trainer, I take her on the road and then I let her run, and then she'll be moving with the whole thing.
What are you training her for?
Because she's going to be a mom.
Why did you choose her as a mom?
I don't know.
You practice walking her?
She doesn't like walking.
Does she ever let go and start walking? No. There you go. Now she's going. Do you have a special attachment to this one?
Yeah. And we don't have that many brown ones.
What do you like about this one?
It's colorful.
Do you have a special attachment to this one over the other ones?
Well, they're all babies and they're really cute. I'm gonna carry her.
Where are you going, back?
Nope, up there. And then I'm gonna let her run home. It's like carrying a baby.
Yeah, he thought Winnie was her mom. Do you like to eat lamb? No.
You don't even like to eat lamb? Yeah, well, it's okay.
You don't like Greek Thursday night?
Oh, I like it.
Pita bread?
Yeah, it's not my favorite meal, but it's not your favorite.
Yeah, but you like it.
Yeah, it's like medium, not the best but not the worst. How do you feel on Butcher Day?
Sad. How do you get through that?
I don't know.
Are you okay with it?
Yeah.
Are you gonna butcher one day?
Yeah, but I don't know. I don't think I'm gonna be lambs because I don't like that very much.
You don't like that? What do you like? What will you butcher?
Chicken. I love chicken.
Okay. Beef?
Yeah, beef.
Pork?
Probably not.
I don't like pork. Is it because you are friends with the lamb?
No.
Or you still don't like the taste?
I'll probably mostly have chicken and beef because I love chicken.
Okay, we're going back.
She always figures out how to get home.
All right, I've survived 48 hours on lamb. Doing good so far. Halfway done. Let's get some broth that's been going all night. We're gonna let it keep going into this evening. Let's just get some invite us over to lunch. Mucho sauce. When you haven't eaten in almost, what, 16 hours, this feels very coffee-esque. Nice. Sip on that while I do some work. Rebecca is feeling under the weather. I had to make her a ribeye, caramelized onions. I could eat that every day for the rest of my life until then. Lamb broth, which is very good when you're very hungry. I am gonna have some.
I don't like lamb broth, so I have to laugh at that.
You want to sip? Why'd you put your nose up to it? It's weird. I don't think you've tasted this. It might have been a bad batch. There's no bad food, only bad recipes, says my buddy Zane. You know what the other trick is? There's no bad food, just full bellies. You gotta be hungry. Is yours ready? If it's 135, it's ready. Pull it out. Okay, okay, boss. Pull out the meal that I can't eat. Smell it, almost touch it, and give it to you. In the meantime, I'll heat up my lamb ribs. Very sad of a meal tonight. Preheated that in the oven, reheated some lamb leg. I mean, it's good, but with Rebecca down and Taco Tuesday— made refried beans, beans. What is that? Oh, had to boil her some water. The wood boiler went out. Taco meat, Mexican rice, salsa, guacamole. That's for another day. That's gonna be a major struggle for a caregiver who is on a restrictive diet. You still gotta make everybody else's meal. You're touching it, you're smelling it. Maybe in this case I should have eaten first, but I had to take care of everybody. We're running late. I'll stop whining as soon as I get my belly full. I am in my pajamas. I'll be honest, I feel like crap. I have some sort of virus or something. And plus, I'm at the end of my rope with eating lamb. If I just think about eating that stew one more time, it's probably because I'm sick. No thanks. Why am I in this? Just because I want to drink some soda water, and you're not supposed to drink carbonated water without food. How about we heat it up just a little bit while we fix the carbonator? This stuff is the game changer. It gets me through. Makayla Peterson talks about this. She's an advocate for the Lion's Diet. She's Lifestyle Lion's Diet. When I was 7, I was diagnosed with juvenile rheumatoid arthritis. This is the SodaStream. We're just gonna make Straight up soda water. Normally I put a little bit of lemon juice in there, zero carbs, and some salt and make it an electrolyte. I'm not on top of things or I would have these already in the fridge cold. I never read the instructions, so I hope I'm doing it right. Did get carbonated, so must be doing it right. Push this button till I hear it click. What's that? Okay. There's a little gas tank back in there that, I don't know, it's good for like 60 drinks. Hear that fizz? It's just something different. There, have a look at a little treat. A normal person might not call that a treat, but somebody who eats carnivore strict and doesn't eat any other liquid besides water and broth is going to call this a treat. We're calling it. Too tired to be standing here. Out of salt. Jacobson to the rescue. Hey, you guys were supposed to turn off the TV during this, but I like that crunch, that salt flake crunch. I like that. Half warm, half cold, a little weird. All right, how many more days? Tomorrow lunch will be 96 hours, so tomorrow's supper— I mean, a big old ribeye, 2 beef patties. This is my winter setup for raising these lambs. It's pretty simple actually. Hay feeder, unsprayed hay. These guys are 100% grass-fed. The big reason we started raising our own lamb is because it's hard to find it 100% grass-fed, and if you do find it, it's very expensive. And even more so, it's hard to find lamb that hasn't been chemically treated to just maintain its life. These guys are naturally hardy. Skittish but hardy. Hey, relax, I'm not gonna eat you yet. See that one? That's a mama right there. That's one of our prized possessions. She probably weighs 100 pounds, maybe eats— lamb, 3-4% of their body weight, so she's eating maybe 3-4 pounds of hay a day. Super affordable. In the growing season, we rotate them every day through our pasture. See that hay they're not eating? Some hay gets missed, and that ends up being their deep bedding to absorb these cute little— yes, I said cute— cute little milk duddy-looking turds. And that keeps it fresh and nice. It's very pleasant out here. A shelter. Give them a shelter. Doesn't need any walls. They've got thick hair. These are hair sheep. These are St. Croix sheep. Open to the south for sure so it can get the sun. A high roof so we can get in here with a tractor and get this material out. The combo of the hay, manure, turns into rich compost that then we can haul out to the field. A 50-gallon waterer, that way they can get into it, even the littlest one, and get some water. That's it. Oh man, not feeling well, but I'm excited. I don't care, I'm gonna eat. We got something different today. This should have been 100 hours and 30 minutes. Also cooked some burgers. Lamb just wasn't enough, just wasn't enough. I mean, that's I survived, but it wasn't completely satisfied like beef can be. Strange. Welcome back to my life. 101 hours later, ribeye, 2 burger patties, 25% fat. I could do that once a day for the rest of my life. I hope you understand, there's one more thing we need to do. The internet's gonna be outraged. I hope you understand, premium lamb leg. It's probably because I'm sick. You can hear it in my voice. I'm thankful that round fed me like 3 times, but enough is enough. And don't get me wrong, lamb's a wonderful thing. Winnie! I could so totally sustain and thrive on it. I imagine it's good to have, right? I survived. Was I the happiest? I don't know. Here, in lieu of Winnie— oh, here she is.
