OBE Organic Beef is top-quality halal beef that is chemical-free and safe to eat without compromising on taste, available throughout Dubai and Abu Dhabi. The brand has recently joined hands with one of the UAE's most celebrated chefs, Dima Sharif to create more awareness of the importance of eating organic and its health benefits. As their brand ambassador Dima, has created a range of different recipes that enhance the flavors and perfectly compliment the meat and can be enjoyed by the entire family.
Khaleejesque recently sat down with OBE Organic Beef to get a better understanding about the importance of switching to organic beef. They also shared a great beef tacos recipe with us.
What is OBE Organic Beef?
OBE Organic is a leading producer of certified organic, grass-fed, halal beef from the Channel Country, in the heart of the Australian Outback. Proud to be one of the very few brands offering high-quality beef that’s not only certified organic, OBE Organic is also certified halal, grass-fed and also grass-finished. OBE Organic’s cattle are never given antibiotics or hormones, so their beef is also chemical free and GMO-free. OBE Organic understands that families in the UAE are increasingly concerned with what’s in their food, and are happy to address this previously unmet need and lead the market in this category.
The Channel Country, where OBE Organic is produced, has long been recognised for the production of high quality livestock. Its geographical isolation from many other agricultural regions of Australia ensures that the environment is free of contamination from chemical intensive farming practices. The beef is recognised for its superb quality and taste.
The cattle that create OBE Organic beef have always been and will always be free-ranging in the pristine Channel Country grasslands. OBE Organic’s cattle are never concentrated into feedlots and are stress-free, healthy and robust, ensuring consumers like us receive juicy, tender and superior tasting beef with the world’s highest safety and nutritional qualities.
Who Is Dima Sharif and what is her role with OBE?
Dima Sharif, is a Dubai-based cooking and baking instructor. She is passionate about helping people discover the many rewards of cooking and baking, as well as help families cook and enjoy healthier meals. Besides her cookery courses, Dima is also the author of ‘dimasharif.com’, a blog dedicated to all things food, from recipes and step-by-step tutorials, to culinary travel and raising her readers’ awareness about food related issues, causes as well as on the subject of healthy cooking and eating… she covers it all to make it a well rounded food experience for home cooks. She also regularly contributes features to different local and international online and in print publications.
Dima’s recent campaigns include:
- ‘Go Organic’ Campaign through which she raises awareness on health benefits and importance of going Organic both to individual life and natural sustainability.
- ‘#BRANDSwithAvision’ promoting brands that are helping towards a more green Middle East.
- ‘Raising Diabetes Awareness’ in collaboration with the UAE-based DECIDE initiative, to educate readers about diabetes and its relation to food and lifestyle with special consideration for diabetic children.
- ‘No Body is Perfect’ in collaboration with various schools, through which she raises awareness of Eating Disorders among teens and ways for prevention.
Dima is partnering with OBE Organic to educate consumers in the UAE about the health benefits of eating organic, grass-fed beef, and demonstrating how OBE Organic’s beef can be incorporated into healthy, family meals.
What are the Benefits of eating organic foods such as beef?
Endless are the benefits of consuming organic foods and it goes beyond just our health.Probably the most obvious benefit is reducing our exposure to harmful chemicals, growth hormones, antibiotics and suspected carcinogens all of which are extremely hazardous to our health. However, by choosing organic foods, you are choosing to be a better-informed consumer who chooses quality, safety, health and sustainability over junk. This will not only reflect on your and your family's health, but will also have its positive impact on the wellbeing of the environment within which we live.
Since modern agriculture has become hugely devastating in most cases, consuming organic foods, you will also be supporting farmers and producers who care about your health, that of earth and sustainability too as well as supporting products that come from a vision and a philosophy to respect. We need more small sustainable farms, more quality foods that are all: safe, healthy and foremost better flavoured.
What is the difference between grain-fed and grass-fed beef?
Quite simply, it’s just better – better for the cattle and ultimately better for us. Here are just a few reasons why meat-eaters should go grass-fed.
Let’s start with the flavor. Grass-fed beef is absolutely more flavoursome than its counterpart, grain-fed beef. When eating grass-fed beef the meat has a completely different flavor palate that is more delicate, yet meaty with hints of grass and earth, it is almost like you can tell what the animal was eating through the flavour of its meat. Grass-fed does not rely on fat for flavor, the meat itself is very tasty and the experience is always more tender meats as these animals have lived a stress-free life, grazing freely. In the case of OBE Organic, because the meat is Organic and no preservatives are used, the meat is very fresh and we all know the fresher the product, the better the flavor.
Grass-fed beef is nutritionally superior to factory-farmed grain-fed Beef. According to Dr. Frank Lipman, a specialist in sustainable wellness, and based on various researches conducted on the topic, “grass-fed beef contains higher amounts of Beta carotene, Vitamin A, Conjugated Linoleic Acid (CLA) and Omega-3 fatty acids, all of which help keep cholesterol, obesity, diabetes and high blood pressure in check.” Furthermore, grass-fed animal products are also significantly lower in fat, cholesterol and calories, which also helps consumers maintain a healthier diet, especially those who need to watch their cholesterol and fat intake.
Grass-fed animals are eating what they are meant to eat and what their bodies are meant to digest ‘Grass’. Unlike feeding the animals carb-laden grains that exhaust their bodies, digestion and cause them many ailments for the treatment of which the use of antibiotics becomes very necessary. Grass-fed animals live stress-free and are usually antibiotic-free .
All recent reports are warning against a post-antibiotic era, where important medicines crucial to treating seriously ill people will become ineffective, due to the current irresponsible use of antibiotics in factory-farms and to treat grain-fed animals. Such misuse of antibiotics is creating antibiotic-resistant bacteria (superbugs), which are able to spread, antibiotic resistant, causing infections that are harder to treat and more likely to cause complications and even lead to death at times. This alone is reason enough to go grass-fed.
There is a much appreciated and almost artisanal quality to grass-fed beef. The farmers ensure the animals are in best condition and are proud of their product, so much so that they ensure the quality to always be of highest standard, as opposed to mass-produced feedlot animals. However, because grass-fed animals are raised entirely on grass, their maturation process is slower and the end product is therefore slightly more costly as opposed to the more convenient and cheaper mass production of grain-fed animals. Most important to note here is that mass-production comes at a cost too, the countless side effects of consuming confined, sick and stressed animals that live off a continuous supply of antibiotics, growth hormones and suspected carcinogens and whose diets would usually include restaurant waste and animal byproducts, municipal garbage among many other rubbish feeds… making their meat qualify as junk really!
For more information on OBE Organic, click here.
-Saira Malik
