Quote :

"Kobe beef (?????, Kobe Bifu?) refers to beef from the black Tajima-ushi breed of Wagyu cattle, raised according to strict tradition in Hyogo Prefecture, Japan. These practices may include a diet of saké and beer, and daily massages to relieve muscle stiffness, presumably resulting in tender meat. Kobe beef is also called "Kobe-niku" (???, "Kobe-niku"? lit. Kobe meat), "Kobe-gyu" (???, "Kobe-gyu"? lit Kobe cow) or "Kobe-ushi" (???, "Kobe-ushi"? lit Kobe cow) in Japanese. [1] Wagyu ("Japanese Cattle") are renowned for flavour, tenderness, and fatty well-marbled texture, qualities enhanced by the traditional (and well guarded) methods of raising Kobe beef. Kobe beef can be prepared as steak, sukiyaki, shabu shabu, sashimi, teppanyaki, ground hamburger patties and more. Due to the special feeding and growth regime, the prices are much higher than those of normal beef variants."

had some at The Steak House in treasure island on wedn. Im not much of a steak eater around these parts. but i tried 2 oz of japanese kobe beef, and i must say. twas very very good.

i was gonna try to make some here, but apparently its all in the cow and not really buying beef and prepping it. so how does one go about doing so?

at the restaurant its $15/oz , i want to be well below that

6/14/2008 11:03:35 AM

i'm not sure that any groceries around here sell wagyu beef

you can get it online, but even if you get a pack of striploins it's gonna be $150

6/14/2008 11:17:48 AM

you have to keep the calf suspended its whole life and not let it's feet touch the ground. they generally feed them berries and sweet grains.

this is off the of of my head

[Edited on June 14, 2008 at 11:33 AM. Reason : .]

6/14/2008 11:33:15 AM

i don't remembering hearing anything about suspension...it's beef, not veal, and you want thick, marbled meat. they do feed the cows beer and sake at certain times of the year, though, and often massage them with straw pads to encourage marbling.

6/14/2008 11:36:35 AM

Many people hate Kobe, especially with all the talk in the media last summer concerning the trade of kobe but it is by far the best.

6/14/2008 11:40:57 AM

get that shit out of the lounge

6/14/2008 11:44:18 AM

white girls love it?

6/14/2008 11:51:00 AM

just buy some grass fed and enjoy

6/14/2008 11:51:24 AM

Quote :

"These practices may include a diet of saké and beer, and daily massages to relieve muscle stiffness, presumably resulting in tender meat."

I like to have beer, sake, and a massage.

6/14/2008 11:58:36 AM

Weird. I actually ordered Kobe beef as entree for the first time ever last night.

Damn tasty.

6/14/2008 12:31:59 PM

you can get cheaper "Kobe" beef if you look for it. the beef is "Kobe" because it is a hybrid of the wagyu cattle and another breed. They also let the cow roam around a little more. The beef is from Black Snake River Colorado. It is pretty darn tasty.

6/14/2008 12:37:39 PM

a little off topic but buffalo steak is very tasty as well.

6/14/2008 12:42:16 PM

well they had an american kobe steak, which i ordered. it was very different from the japanese kobe.

the japanese was ordered medium, and the american medium well.

either way, they were both very different. just melts in your mouth

6/14/2008 2:39:53 PM

I'm only had the American kobe raw as carpacio (sp) it was awesome. And I only ate it because it was on the menu at the restaurant I worked at.

6/14/2008 2:52:01 PM

you can get kobe burgers at hi-5 for $7

6/14/2008 4:11:11 PM

^^ Where was that?

6/14/2008 4:25:26 PM

Nelsons^

6/14/2008 4:28:28 PM

medium and medium well?

6/14/2008 4:46:31 PM

Quote :

"the japanese was ordered medium, and the american medium well."

why the fuck would you waste good meat just to have it burned

6/14/2008 5:22:42 PM

^seriously, why bother with a steak @ that point if you're just gonna cook it all to hell.

6/14/2008 5:22:53 PM

agreed

6/14/2008 5:26:58 PM

i have a history of getting sick with any pink in my meats.

the waiter wanted me to get it rare-medium rare. i just couldnt do it.

i got the japanese one a little more pink than i would usually get just because.

i dont eat a lot of steak because of that. i eat all my steaks to medium well

6/14/2008 6:24:31 PM

like food poisoning sick or what??

6/14/2008 6:27:59 PM

Quote :

"white girls love it?"

let me check the scorecard......





yep folks, looks like we have a winner

6/14/2008 6:37:17 PM

Japanese equate tenderness with fat content in their beef. I've had Kobe beef a couple of times and every time I like it less. Generally Kobe beef tends to be much much greasier than american or australian beef.

6/14/2008 8:03:10 PM

I'm stuck eating wagyu (the real name for Kobe beef) all the time. It's waaaaaaaaaay too fatty for me

6/14/2008 10:56:20 PM

Quote :

"like food poisoning sick or what??"

just on the toilet type sick. i dont throw up or anything. just real bad stomach cramps/aches after beef.

6/15/2008 1:17:32 AM

innnteresting

6/15/2008 1:18:10 AM

if you go to a good steakhouse, ordering anything but blue or rare is just wrong

6/15/2008 5:19:26 AM

True Kobe beef costs around $300 per pound

IN JAPAN

There are are american knockoffs of kobe where they imported some wagyu cattle and sell it to restaurants who call it kobe. it ain't the same thing.

6/15/2008 8:19:53 AM

i thought the ban on japanese beef was lifted in 2006, so you can get real kobe beef now

6/15/2008 8:44:50 AM

Quote :

"True Kobe beef costs around $300 per pound IN JAPAN"

Not entirely true. I can get a wagyu steak for about $20/pound if it's on sale. Generally there's some bullshit reason for it to cost $300/pound, like the cow came from a farm that Tokugawa once took a shit on etc.

6/15/2008 10:00:13 AM

Being wagyu doesn't necessarily mean that it's kobe beef, although being kobe does mean that it's wagyu. IOW, it's not just about the type of cow.

It's the same reason that real champagne only comes from the champagne region of France.

Now whether those minor differences justify the huge price difference is another issue altogether...

6/15/2008 10:55:31 AM

Well if you really want to get technical there's no such thing as Kobe beef. That's an English term. I have never once heard Kobe-gyu or Kobe-niku. Those would be some very unhappy cows if they were actually raised in Kobe It's usually called Hyogo-gyu and it's not even considered the best beef in Japan. Not by a long shot.

Ohmi-gyu is considered a step above Hyogo-gyu and is what I usually get stuck eating here. I find it too greasy for my tastes. Move above that and you have Matsusaka-gyu. I tried that a few months ago when I was in the region. I actually thought it was pretty good but I also only had it on top of a salad and not as a steak. Again as a steak I probably would have found it too fatty.

[Edited on June 15, 2008 at 11:10 AM. Reason : romaji FTL]

6/15/2008 11:09:14 AM

Thinly shave some ribeye steak and wrap it around a stick of butter... much cheaper than Kobe beef and about the same thing.

Oh, and grass fed American beef would be a very, very poor alternative to Kobe beef. It is far too lean.

6/15/2008 9:39:06 PM

I think the best beef is considered "Matsuzaka-beef" in Japan.

6/15/2008 9:54:23 PM

^ yeah that's another spelling of Matsusaka-gyu It comes from Mie prefecture and if I remember what the menu at the restaurant said correctly it was the beef that was supplied to the Emperor up until WWII or something.

6/15/2008 10:08:42 PM

i'm just glad im not a big beef/steak eater.

i'm happy with my chicken. haha.

6/15/2008 11:01:22 PM

hopefully you ate it with ketchup. you'll ruin the experience if you skip it.

6/16/2008 4:58:55 PM

not a ketchup fan, more of a bbq sauce fan

6/16/2008 5:52:33 PM

ive never had a steak that Ive thought tasted better than mediocre and Ive gone to a lot of different places where people have had me try steak. i guess its just not my thing. this might be something to try though

6/16/2008 9:14:02 PM

Kobe burger with white chedder was the best burger I ever had.

6/16/2008 10:25:10 PM

Kobe burgers are a waste of money.

Quote :

"Enterprising restaurants are now offering the "Kobe beef burger," enticingly priced at near or above $100 a pop. And if there's a better way to prove one's total ignorance of all three words - Kobe, beef, and burger - this, my friends, is it. It's the trifecta of dumb-ass. The Kobe experience is principally about the marbling, the even distribution of fat through lean. A hamburger is a bunch of lean beef thrown into a grinder with varying degrees of fat. If you are foolish enough to order a Kobe burger, you are entirely missing the point. Firstly, the fat will melt right out of the thing while cooking. Secondly, you are asking the chef to destroy the very textural notes for which Kobe is valued by smarter people. Thirdly, for an eight-ounce Kobe burger, you are paying for the chef to feed you all the outer fat and scrap bits he trimmed off the outside of his "real" Kobe so he can afford to serve properly trimmed steaks to wiser patrons who know what the hell they're doing. And fourthly, you're paying a hundred bucks for a freakin' hamburger! Get over yourself! You've already established you're too drunk and stupid to enjoy it in the first place."

6/17/2008 9:05:52 AM

the best part of this thread is watching people argue Japanese beef quality & pricing with someone who actually lives there

6/17/2008 9:09:07 AM

i mean, i can see a difference.

its like buying seafood from the coast, or having it driven to the inland and eating it here.

6/17/2008 10:13:54 AM

^^^ haha so true. I never understood burgers made from Kobe beef.

^^ indeed

6/17/2008 10:36:35 AM

The reason "Japanese" Kobe beef is so expensive is because Japan is so crowded that they actually have to import a lot of beef from America, which in turn they export back to us with the "Japanese" label.

6/17/2008 11:51:22 PM

^ That doesn't make any sense at all.

Let's forget the simple fact that the vast majority of imported beef in Japan comes from Australia.

6/18/2008 2:50:39 AM

i love it when people interpret jokes literally

6/18/2008 3:27:37 AM

Considering the kobe burger I order is $12 and they dont serve kobe steaks at this joint I see no problem with it.

6/18/2008 10:23:03 AM