Food Matters: Finding hormone-free beef in restaurants, cash mobbing, 'Weight Watchers One Pot Cookbook,' and more

Ask Addie: A Beef with dining options

I am always watching for restaurants that serve organic, hormone-free, antibiotic-free and grass-fed beef. I have also searched the Internet, but without success, except for Elevation Burgers, which I frequent regularly when I'm in the mood for hamburgers. However, it's hard to believe, with the multitude of restaurants in Austin, that there appears to be nowhere to dine out for a nice steak or other beef dishes. Chinese? Mexican? Italian?

As a woman with a high risk of cancer, my doctors have told me it's very important that I not ingest hormones. I prefer food raised without antibiotics or genetically altered grain.

- Jane in Austin

Jane's right: Organic, grass-fed, hormone- and antibiotic-free beef is hard to find in restaurants, but not because hormone-free beef raised on chemical-free grass is hard to find. It's the "organic" label that's a challenge for both ranchers and restaurants to provide. Why? The certification process leads to expensive beef that restaurants often can't afford.

"I wish we could do organic, but it would put us out of our price point," says Maria Souktouri, co-owner of the Flying Carpet, a food trailer that is getting ready to open a restaurant on Oltorf Street. "Nobody wants to pay $10 for a burger. If I thought that families with kids could afford it, I would serve it."

The good news is that much of the beef sold at local farmers markets, such as Winter's Family Beef, Pleasant Hill and Full Quiver at the Cedar Park Farm to Market, and even in some stores such as Wheatsville Co-op and Monument Market is about as organic as you can get, just without the certification. "The only difference between organic and a lot of the grass-fed beef out there is the three-year process that you have to go through to become certified organic," says Pati Jacobs, owner of Bastrop Cattle Company, which sells grass-fed, hormone- and antibiotic-free beef to area restaurants. It's a long, expensive, time-consuming process that most ranchers aren't willing to go through, even though they aren't using chemicals on their pastures, she says.

More challenging than the certification process has been the drought, which has put a number of grass-fed cattle ranchers out of business or forced them to supplement or finish raising the animals with grain. Kay Richardson, who runs Richardson Farm in Rockdale with her husband, Jim, says that with the help of sorghum and alfalfa that they grew last year, they have managed to keep their cattle grass-fed, but others haven't been so lucky. Chuck Schmidt of Fredericksburg Beef says the drought is going to push them out of the grass-fed business.

As the drought diminishes the supply of grass-fed beef, the demand continues to grow, and you can find locally raised, grass-fed beef at restaurants including Cipollina, Whip In, Wholly Cow, Thai Fresh, Wink, Paggi House, Dai Due, La Condesa, East Side Show Room, Olivia, Jack Allen's Kitchen, Barley Swine, Fabi + Rosi and Peche.

Niman Ranch is one of the largest national distributors of pasture-raised, hormone- and antibiotic-free beef, which you'll often see listed by name on restaurant menus at places like Lamberts Downtown Barbecue or Trace at the W Hotel, but Niman cattle are finished with grain and aren't locally raised.

Unfortunately, there are loopholes in the USDA labels for "natural," so if you really want to know what goes into the beef you eat, the best route is to talk to ranchers at the local farmers' markets to find out how they raise their cattle and what restaurants in town buy their products.

Friends, fans can help owner of closed Evita's

Ruben Rodriguez, who along with wife Juanita ran the beloved Evita's Botanitas in South Austin for more than 20 years, passed away earlier this month at the age of 54. After the family closed the restaurant in late 2009, Juanita and Ruben created a catering company, Juanita's Botanitas Special Events (botanitas-tx.com ), but, like many in the service industry, it didn't offer health insurance. Ruben Rodriguez had been sick for a number of years, and to help with medical expenses and funeral costs, friends, family and fans of the restaurants can send checks to Juanita Rodriguez at 205 Ainsworth St., Austin, TX 78745.