Alberta Beef Magazine - BeefNews.com

Fred Taylor: challenged yet content by Lee Gunderson
January, 2010

Fred Taylor cooks the Sterling Silver ribeyes for the Hamilton Angus sale every fall. You can bet they're the best you've ever had. He's the man who wrote the rules for both the Calgary Stampede Steer Classic and the Certified Canadian Angus beef program. And he's the head grade inspector for the Canadian Beef Grading Agency (CBGA) at Cargill Foods, High River and XL Beef, Calgary. Fred and his staff are responsible for grading a tremendous amount of beef sold in the West and across the globe. He does not take that responsibility lightly. CFIA audits his work regularly and the task is demanding.

Fred is fulfilled. He loves his work with the beef industry from producers to consumers. He especially likes consulting with operations like the Lazy S Ranch and Lewis Farms, who made radical changes to their herd's marbling through extensive consultation with Fred and his meat consulting business (Taylor Made Research). Fred does cutability and grading studies for Lacombe Research, University of Saskatoon, Lethbridge Research, University of Alberta and the Beef Breeds Council among others. But apart from private consulting, Fred can be found on the floor with his bevy of grade inspectors, grading the thousands of carcasses daily at Cargill, High River and XL Beef, Calgary. His overview of the beef industry: "All breeds have the potential to produce tender carcasses."

Fred's real work involves scientific assessments of carcasses. Certainly he judges beef animals on the hoof from the PNE in Vancouver to Quebec and teaches livestock carcass judging at the Calgary Stampede and to his own staff trainees. But he does not embrace one breed as superior, nor one cross as "the best," nor one colour over another. "My decisions are made solely on scientific criteria I can quantify. The rubber hits the road at kill time - right between the 12th and 13th rib. We make grade decisions based on square centimeters of ribeye and one fat measurement around the ribeye. It comes down to saleable meat to the consumer, and quality. The optimum sized ribeye is 89 sq/cms for the meat counter today and restaurants. Consumers walk away from oversized ribeyes. They are buying mostly by price not size, weight and quantity. Today, Costco is doing a splendid job selling AAA marbled beef and they have just introduced "Prime grade" cuts into their beef display cases. When we went into the stores and promoted the retail beef sales at the individual Costco stores, sales increased $4,000 on the days we were present."

Taylor adds, "In the early '90's we might find a period during one year where we might get 30% of our kill grading AAA for maybe a few weeks at a time. That would be the highest. But today things have changed. Now, 30% of the daily kill grades AAA all year long, not just for a few weeks or months. And quite often we have days where 70% of the kill will grade AAA."

Taylor wrote the protocol for the Canadian Certified Angus Beef Program and was sad to see that program challenged by the US Angus Association; but adds "We sold too much of our Angus beef over the border, they just got protective. We should have kept that beef in Canada or sent it to other markets."

Speaking of leading breeds and industries, Taylor remarks, "We do research on all of Brian and Judy Sutter's retired cows at Atlasta Angus. Brian sends them to us to study the marbling and yield on every animal from the program. There's one man who is doing his homework and knows exactly the grades and yields on every animal he produces. He is a leader in Canada; I am aware of no one else in Canada doing this. We use the standing line at XL, Calgary for this research." Fred is thankful to Lee Nilsson at XL Beef for allowing him to do the research and thus lead to the improvement of carcass quality in Canada.

Taylor continues, "The Sterling Silver program has fine grained meat and marbling, bright red in colour and no more than 1 inch of back fat. The beef comes from the upper two thirds of the AAA grade. Sobeys is now offering Sterling Silver cuts. The program is non-breed specific and they are the only cuts I personally use. All breeds can marble, some more consistently than others. For instance, Wilbur Stewart can bring his high marbling Limousin cattle for slaughter and consistently grade and marble with the best of any breed that's out there. Just remember, all breeds can marble."

Taylor goes on to note the demise of the Agribition Carcass competition due to its emphasis on ribeye area, not the best marbling. "I wrote the Calgary Stampede carcass competition rules based on consumer and retail demands. Every breed can win that competition and every breed has a carcass that has won. The rules are an 80-89 cm sq. ribeye; 2-4mm back fat; AAA marbling; carcass weight of 650-750 lbs.; white fat; fine grain marbling and fine grain meat texture. The top 15 head in that show every year has just about every breed mix you can imagine."

Taylor went on to share his secrets on how to best age beef at home and he reviewed his start in the industry in 1977 in Winnipeg as a meat inspector. He later moved back home to Pierson, Manitoba to grade and inspect beef. He was also an animal health technician, covering the southwest Manitoba district. Fred met his future wife Connie on the slaughter floor of Burns Meats in Winnipeg; she was the CFIA vet at the time for the plant. Today she is CFIA vet in charge at Cargill Foods, High River. She had her own private practice at Pierson, Manitoba from 1980-87 but after a stint in Moose Jaw both decided the future was going to be better at High River with the new Cargill plant and decided to compete for and won positions where the action was.

Neither regret the move. The days of the high union wages and the plant at Moose Jaw were numbered. Taylor notes that none of the packers have an easy path these days with fluctuating markets and currencies. "Packers have a very volatile role in our industry. They can make or lose millions on the turn of a dime. I don't think the public really knows the other side of their story. For instance those big Chinooks that blow in affect the pH level in cattle which is affected by barometric pressure. One big Chinook can cause scores of dark cutters (B4 grades) and through no fault of their own, the packers and producers bear the financial burden. No one knows how to fix that problem yet."

Fred and Connie have two kids: Zachary is 25 and is grading beef with his father at Cargill and daughter Darby is a 23 year old registered nurse working in Red Deer. Fred adds, "I love it all. I'm happy in my work, challenged and learning. I don't want to retire because life is full and fun. A man couldn't ask for more."

Note: Canadian Beef Grading Agency is funded by the producers and packers with a 50/50 check-off program for both parties going towards cost of CBGA operations across Canada. The agency is a non-government organization which contracts its own graders. Graders are trained while working on the line and all work is audited by CFIA and CBGA auditors. Taylor has 4 employees working with him to oversee grading at XL Beef, Calgary and Cargill Foods, High River. As well as grading, the graders continuously monitor carcass trim and branded boxed beef programs. Both functions ensure consistent product and returns for producers and retail trade.

Industry Question

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