Here’s a beef term you’ve probably heard without ever really thinking about it: finished. Grass-finished. Grain-finished. 90-day finish. But what exactly are we finishing?
The cow isn’t unfinished.
The beef is.
“Finishing” refers to the final feeding phase before an animal is processed.
And those last weeks or months can have a surprisingly big influence on the beef that eventually reaches your plate.
Marbling.
Fat.
Carcass quality.
And especially:
Flavor.
In fact, when researchers compared several different production factors that can affect beef flavor, finishing diet and USDA quality grade had the greatest effects on flavor among the factors they studied.
Which raises a pretty interesting question:
What should a cow eat at the end of its life if you’re trying to produce really good beef?
Let’s talk about finishing.
FIRST, MOST BEEF CATTLE START OUT EATING GRASS
This is where beef labeling can get confusing.
When people hear:
Grass-fed beef
they may picture one group of cattle eating grass their entire lives while all the other cattle spend their lives eating grain.
That isn’t really how the American beef system works.
USDA says most of a calf’s nutrients come from grass until weaning.
Some cattle remain on forage longer.
Some are “backgrounded” on forage before entering a feedlot.
Eventually, cattle in the conventional beef system generally enter a finishing phase where their diet becomes much more energy-dense.
So one of the most revealing questions about how beef was raised may not simply be:
Was this cow ever grass-fed?
A better question can be:
How was it finished?
SO WHAT EXACTLY IS “FINISHING”?
Finishing is essentially the final stage of feeding used to prepare an animal for harvest.
The animal is still growing.
But now nutrition is being managed with the final carcass in mind.
Producers are thinking about things such as:
Weight.
Fat deposition.
Marbling.
Carcass quality.
Efficiency.
And the eating characteristics of the beef.
There isn’t just one way to do it.
Cattle can be grass-finished.
They can be grain-finished.
And there are feeding programs that fall somewhere in between.
That last distinction is important.
Because the beef world isn’t simply divided into:
GRASS
versus
GRAIN.
There are a lot of ways to finish a cow.
WHAT DOES 100% GRASS-FED ACTUALLY MEAN?
Here’s where terminology matters.
Under USDA labeling guidance for a grass-fed diet claim, the animal's diet after weaning must be derived solely from forage, with limited exceptions for things such as necessary mineral and vitamin supplementation. Grain and grain byproducts are not permitted as part of the qualifying diet.
So an animal that spends almost its entire life eating grass but receives grain during its finishing period does not qualify for that grass-fed diet claim.
Read that again.
Almost its entire life on grass still isn’t the same thing as 100% grass-fed.
Those final weeks matter.
And we think consumers deserve to know about them.
WHAT DOES GRAIN-FINISHED MEAN?
This is the more common model in conventional American beef production.
USDA describes feedlot finishing rations as generally containing 70% to 90% grain and protein concentrates, along with ingredients such as silage and hay.
And cattle can spend approximately:
90 to 300 days
in a feedlot, depending on their age and weight when they enter, genetics, weather, feeding program and desired carcass grade.
That’s a pretty wide range.
Three months.
Six months.
Nine months.
Potentially longer.
And this is why saying an animal is “grain-finished” still doesn’t tell you everything.
For how long?
What was it fed?
Where was it finished?
What did it eat before that?
Those details matter too.
WHY FEED GRAIN AT ALL?
Energy.
Grain provides a concentrated source of dietary energy.
And during the finishing phase, that can influence the amount and distribution of fat an animal deposits.
One of the places we’re particularly interested in that fat is inside the muscle.
You know it as:
Marbling.
Those little white flecks running through a Ribeye aren’t just there to make the steak look expensive.
Marbling is closely associated with the eating experience of beef.
It’s one of the primary characteristics used in USDA quality grading, and premium programs such as Certified Angus Beef specifically require elevated marbling levels as part of their quality specifications.
But that brings us to the part we really care about.
WHAT DOES FINISHING DO TO FLAVOR?
Quite a bit.
Researchers have repeatedly found differences in the flavor characteristics of grass-finished and grain-finished beef.
One U.S. study developed a detailed beef flavor vocabulary and then had consumers evaluate beef from grass- and grain-finished cattle.
The grain-finished steaks scored:
7.05 out of 9 for consumer liking.
The grass-finished steaks scored:
6.08 out of 9.
The grain-finished beef was associated more strongly with characteristics such as juicy, umami, browned, fatty and roast-beef flavors, while the grass-finished beef showed more grassy, gamey, bitter and “barny” characteristics.
Another study conducted through Utah State University compared grain-finished beef with several forage-finishing systems.
Both grain-finished treatments received higher consumer ratings for:
Flavor.
Tenderness.
Juiciness.
Fat perception.
Overall liking.
That’s not marketing copy.
Those were consumer taste tests.
DOES THAT MEAN GRAIN-FINISHED BEEF ALWAYS TASTES BETTER?
No.
And this is where we don’t want to turn interesting research into a claim the research can’t support.
Taste is personal.
Breed matters.
Age matters.
Marbling matters.
Feed matters.
Aging matters.
Cooking matters.
And different consumers like different flavor profiles.
There are studies where forage-finished beef performs extremely well.
Utah State researchers, for example, found that cattle finished on birdsfoot trefoil produced beef with consumer ratings comparable to grain-finished beef for tenderness, juiciness and overall appeal.
Other research has also found consumers who prefer the flavor characteristics of grass-finished beef.
So we’re not going to tell you:
Grain = good. Grass = bad.
That’s not what the science says.
What the research does tell us is much more interesting:
Finishing diet can meaningfully change the eating characteristics of beef.
AND PREMIUM BEEF DOESN’T AUTOMATICALLY MEAN GRASS-FINISHED
This is another misconception worth clearing up.
Take Certified Angus Beef.
It’s one of the best-known premium beef brands in America, and marbling is central to its quality standards. Its traditional premium beef program and its separate 100% grass-fed program are not the same product program.
That distinction matters.
Premium beef doesn’t automatically mean grass-finished.
And grass-finished doesn’t automatically mean higher or lower quality.
They’re describing different things.
One describes how the animal was fed.
The other may describe the eating characteristics or quality standards the beef ultimately met.
NOW HERE’S WHERE OUR CATTLE FIT INTO THIS
Our cattle at Falula Farm spend nearly their entire lives eating grass.
They live on pasture.
They graze.
Grass is the foundation of how they’re raised.
Until the final 90 days.
During those last 90 days, we gradually introduce grain as part of their finishing program.
And we do that intentionally.
We’re trying to combine two things we value.
A life spent largely on grass and pasture.
And:
A short grain-finishing period designed to develop the flavor and eating qualities we want in our beef.
That’s our program.
And because grain enters the diet during those final 90 days, there’s something we’re not going to tell you:
Our beef is 100% grass-fed.
It isn’t.
We’re also not going to call it grass-finished.
It isn’t.
We’d rather tell you exactly what we do and let you decide whether that matters to you.
BUT WE DON’T JUST SWITCH THEM FROM GRASS TO GRAIN
There’s another part of our 90-day finishing program that matters:
The transition.
Our cattle have spent nearly their entire lives eating grass and forage.
Their digestive systems are adapted to that kind of diet.
So suddenly giving them a large amount of grain wouldn't just be a dramatic change in what they're eating.
It could be hard on the animal.
Cattle digest food differently than we do.
They’re ruminants, and one of the most important parts of their digestive system is the rumen.
Inside that rumen is an enormous community of microorganisms helping the animal break down its food.
When the food changes, that microbial community has to adapt too.
Moving from a forage-based diet to a diet containing much more grain changes what is being fermented inside the rumen.
And if that change happens too quickly, rumen pH can fall sharply.
That can lead to:
Ruminal acidosis.
In plain English?
Too much grain, too quickly, can cause serious digestive problems.
That's why cattle nutritionists don't recommend taking an animal accustomed to forage and suddenly putting it on a high-grain finishing diet.
Oklahoma State describes the transition as a step-up program.
Grain is gradually increased while forage is reduced, giving the rumen and the microorganisms living inside it time to adjust. Their on-farm finishing guidance recommends transitioning cattle from a roughage-based diet to the final high-concentrate diet over approximately three weeks, while another Oklahoma State guide describes increasing feed gradually over three to four weeks.
There's a biological reason for taking that time.
Research on cattle adapting to high-concentrate diets explains that the microbial population of the rumen changes as the diet changes. A gradual transition helps those microorganisms adapt while reducing the risk of the sharp drop in rumen pH associated with acidosis.
So our cattle don't go:
Grass today.
A bunch of grain tomorrow.
We slowly introduce it.
And for us, there’s a very simple reason for doing it that way:
The cow comes first.
We're adding grain because we want the marbling, flavor and eating qualities that can come from a grain finish.
But we're not willing to chase those things at the expense of the animal's well-being.
So when our cattle enter their final 90-day finishing period, we transition them gradually.
Not because slower is more convenient.
It isn't.
Because their digestive systems need time to adjust.
If we're going to say our cattle are raised with care, we think that care should include how we change what they're eating, too.
BUT CAN A SHORT GRAIN FINISH REALLY MAKE THAT MUCH DIFFERENCE?
This is where the research gets particularly interesting for us.
Researchers in the western United States compared four cattle-feeding systems:
Conventional grain-finished cattle.
Cattle grass-fed for 20 months.
Cattle grass-fed for 25 months.
And cattle grass-fed for 20 months followed by just a:
45-day grain finish.
Consumers and trained panelists preferred beef from the conventional grain-finished cattle and the cattle that received the short 45-day grain finish over the completely grass-fed treatments.
The researchers concluded that short-term grain supplementation may improve the eating quality of grass-fed beef.
Forty-five days.
That’s it.
Now, our program is 90 days, not 45.
And that study does not prove that 45, 90 or any other exact number of days is universally perfect.
Different cattle, feeds and management programs produce different results.
But it demonstrates something really important:
An animal doesn’t have to spend its entire life eating grain for a relatively short finishing period to affect the eating experience of the beef.
That’s fascinating.
AND 90 DAYS IS ACTUALLY A SHORT FINISH
Remember USDA’s description of conventional feedlot finishing?
90 to 300 days.
Our 90-day program sits at the very bottom of that range.
But even that comparison needs context.
We’re not saying our cattle are raised exactly like conventional feedlot cattle for 90 days.
We're saying that grain is intentionally and gradually introduced during the final 90 days of their feeding program.
That's the distinction we want consumers to understand.
For nearly all of the animal’s life:
Grass.
At the end:
A deliberate 90-day grain finish.
THERE’S A TRADEOFF HERE TOO
Grass-finished and grain-finished beef aren’t nutritionally identical.
Research reviews have found differences in fatty-acid composition between the two systems.
Grass- and forage-finished beef tends to be leaner and can have a different fatty-acid profile, including higher concentrations of some omega-3 fatty acids.
Grain finishing generally produces more intramuscular fat.
And that additional fat can contribute to the flavor, juiciness and sensory characteristics many American consumers associate with premium beef.
Again:
Tradeoffs.
Not heroes and villains.
That’s a theme that keeps showing up the deeper we get into beef.
HERE’S WHAT WE’RE QUESTIONING
Why don’t we talk more about the finish?
We talk about:
Grass-fed.
Angus.
Natural.
Prime.
Local.
Pasture-raised.
But finishing may tell you something incredibly important about the beef you’re actually going to eat.
Two cattle could spend the majority of their lives eating grass.
One remains entirely on forage until processing.
The other receives grain during its final months.
Those animals may produce beef with noticeably different characteristics.
Yet if nobody explains finishing, the consumer may never know why.
And even saying “grain-finished” leaves part of the story out.
How was that grain introduced?
Was the animal given time to adapt?
How was its digestive health managed during that transition?
Because finishing isn't only about producing the beef.
There's still a living animal being cared for during the process.
Maybe “What did this cow eat?” isn’t specific enough.
Maybe we should also be asking:
How was it finished?
AND THIS IS WHY WE’RE TELLING YOU ABOUT OUR 90 DAYS
Calling our beef “100% grass-fed” would certainly be simpler.
It’s a phrase consumers recognize.
It looks good on a label.
But it wouldn’t accurately describe our feeding program.
Our cattle spend nearly their entire lives on grass.
Then we begin a carefully managed 90-day grain finish, gradually transitioning them from their forage-based diet.
We’re not embarrassed about that.
Quite the opposite.
It’s intentional.
We’re trying to produce the flavor, marbling and eating experience we want while keeping the vast majority of the animal’s life centered around grass and pasture.
And we're doing it in a way that gives the animal's digestive system time to adjust.
Could another rancher choose differently?
Absolutely.
Could someone prefer 100% grass-fed and grass-finished beef?
Absolutely.
That’s the great thing about actually knowing how your beef was raised.
You get to decide what matters to you.
But first somebody has to tell you what they actually did.
THE BEEF REPORT BOTTOM LINE
“Finishing” isn’t some obscure ranching term.
It’s one of the final decisions that helps shape the beef you eat.
Cattle can be grass-finished.
Grain-finished.
Or managed under feeding programs that combine a long period on grass with a shorter grain-finishing period.
Research shows that finishing diet can influence:
Marbling.
Fat composition.
Flavor.
Juiciness.
And consumer preference.
But there's another part of finishing worth understanding:
The animal has to transition too.
A forage-adapted digestive system shouldn't suddenly be overwhelmed with grain.
The rumen and its microorganisms need time to adjust, which is why gradual adaptation is an important part of responsible grain finishing.
At Falula Farm, our choice is intentional.
Grass for nearly the entire life of the animal.
Then:
A gradually introduced 90-day grain finish.
That means our beef isn’t 100% grass-fed.
And we’re not going to pretend otherwise.
Because when it comes to knowing where your food comes from, we think the details are more valuable than the buzzwords.
And when it comes to raising cattle with care, what we feed them matters. How we make that change matters too.
Know how it was raised.
Know how it was finished.
Know your beef.