Meat Inspection and Grading

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has strict guidelines for inspecting meat.  Once approved, it gets a mark (stamp) indicating it has been approved.   

Meat Inspection and Grading
By Pierre Mouchette | Bits-n-Pieces

Did You Know That Meat Inspection Is A Requirement in The U.S.?
The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has strict guidelines for inspecting meat.  Once approved, it gets a mark (stamp) indicating it has been approved.     Usually, you do not see this stamp because the butcher trims it off.
 
How Meat Inspection Works
The USDA must inspect all meat for public consumption.  Processing is at a USDA-approved facility and inspected at every step.  The procedure is as follows:

• The USDA inspectors inspect the live animal to ensure they are healthy from head to hoof.  They also inspect things like the slaughtering process (animal’s parts and organs, the temperature of the meat), and they ensure that the carcass stays as clean as possible during the entire process.
• If beef does not pass inspection, it is removed entirely from the food supply.
• When beef passes inspection, it is stamped or labeled with the USDA inspection stamp verifying that it is fit to eat.

The inspection is all or nothing.  There is no half-way or partially passed beef.
 
Grading Beef
Once beef passes inspection, it can be graded for quality.  You should note that this is an optional process and does incur additional expense for a licensed Federal USDA grader.  The grader evaluates the beef for eight quality grades: tenderness, juiciness, and flavor.  Examples of the top three grades are:

• Prime Graded Beef comes from well-fed beef cattle and has lots of marbling (i.e., white flecks of fat within the beef).  You will usually find Prime beef at restaurants and hotels.  It is known for being flavorful, tender, and juicy.
• Choice Graded Beef is high quality but has slightly less marbling than Prime. Choice beef.  It is tender and juicy.
• Select Graded Beef is even more lean than Choice.  Select has less marbling, so it may also lack some of the juiciness and flavor of the higher-graded meat.

The grader does consider grass or grain finished. 
FYI:  Grass-finished cows are not Prime Beef because grass-finished beef is leaner, so they do not meet the USDA’s Prime Beef requirements for tenderness, juiciness, and flavor.