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IFAJ Leaders Enjoy Dinner

Chuck Zimmerman

IFAJ LeadersTonight at dinner we were treated to superb service.

Here’s IFAJ president, David Markey (left) and James Campbell (right) with our server and her Ireland cap they presented her with.

I think some of these folks got out on the golf course today and had a little fun. Some of us just spent the day getting here.

I’ll have interviews and a lot more pictures over the next couple days.

Alltech 2007 International Feed Industry Symposium Photo Album

IFAJ

Getting Started In Lexington

Chuck Zimmerman

Lexington Downtown FountainHello from downtown Lexington, KY and the Alltech International Feed Industry Symposium and IFAJ board meeting. This is the fountain right outside our hotel. We just got back from dinner at the Woodlands Grill. The award winning chef uses Kentucky Ale in his recipes so of course we had to go there. In case you didn’t know, Alltech owns the Kentucky Ale brewery and I’m hoping to fit in a tour before I have to leave.

So tomorrow morning I’ll be addressing the IFAJ board meeting to talk about blogging and podcasting and showing examples of how these new media tools can be put into practice in an agricultural communications company. If we can do it then I’m sure others can too. Right?

Let’s get back to Kentucky Ale. I got back to my room after dinner and what to my wandering eyes should appear but a six pack of my favorite beer – Kentucky Ale. I like the people at Alltech. I’m interested to hear about the discussion on “Food, Feed or Fuel?” I’ve heard mixed remarks so far. This is an international group and I’ve already spoken with people from the USA, England, Ireland, Albania, Ecuador, Venezuela, Netherlands, Spain and a few other countries. It all depends on your perspective I guess.

I’ve heard it said that in the Unites States we like to drink the best and burn the rest. Here in Kentucky they like to make something called bourbon which I’ve been told you can only find in Kentucky. I tried this one. I always thought a certain Tennessee whiskey I liked was bourbon but tonight I learned that it isn’t. So I guess you learn something new every day, right?

I’ve started an online photo album of course so keep it in your favorites as I build on it while I’m here.

Alltech 2007 International Feed Industry Symposium Photo Album

Agribusiness, IFAJ, International

Alltech International Feed Indusry Symposium

Chuck Zimmerman

Alltech 2007 International SymposiumIt’s off to Lexington, KY for the 23rd Alltech International Feed Industry Symposium. I’ll be arriving late Saturday and activities get kicked off on Sunday.

Bright and early on Sunday I’ll be doing a short presentation on blogging and podcasting for the International Federation of Agricultural Journalists board meeting which is taking place there. This group of editors and broadcasters from around the world have a keen interest in new media and it should be fun to show them what we’re doing and answer their questions.

Alltech has pulled out all the stops to make this year’s Symposium a great one. The event runs through Wednesday of next week but I’ll be returning on Monday in time for my youngest daughter’s high school graduation. Like just about every meeting I’ve been to this year the topic will be food vs. fuel. They raise a lot of questions on the website and program so I assume we’ll hear some answers while there. You can count on learning what some of them are right here.

Agribusiness

Country Music at 2007 Farm Progress Show

Chuck Zimmerman

2007 Farm Progress ShowWe’ll be country rocking at this year’s Farm Progress Show. They’ve decided to add country music entertainment to the show this year in Illinois with two good acts.

Tracy Lawrence and Tracy Byrd are set to perform their popular country music hits on the Farm Progress Show stage, sponsored by Grinnell Mutual, in a live country music concert Wed., Aug. 29, at the 2007 Farm Progress Show. Known as the nation’s largest outdoor ag showcase, the 54th annual Farm Progress Show will be held Aug. 28, 29 and 30 at its permanent biennial location in Decatur, Ill. The concert follows the close of the second show day and will start at 5:30 p.m.; concert gates will open at 4:30 p.m. Lawrence and Byrd are respected and popular country artists and will entertain the concert crowd with their current hits and additional Billboard chart-topping country songs.

“We are pleased and excited to have Tracy Lawrence and Tracy Byrd performing in one concert just following the show’s second day. Each performer is a headline act, and this double-header lineup of top country talent really sets our concert apart,” said Don Tourte, Farm Progress national sales and events director. “It’s another milestone for the show and a great way to bring greater enthusiasm to the event and attract even larger show attendance to the Decatur area.” The concert will be held near Richland Community College, just south of the Farm Progress Show exhibit field. Tracy Byrd will perform first, followed by Tracy Lawrence. Concert attendees will park in the same lots used for show visitors.

Farm Progress Show, Farm Shows

Your Farm And Some Peace On The ZimmCast

Chuck Zimmerman

ZimmCast-119 - Announcing Your FarmThe ZimmCast is done and this week you can listen to interviews with Joel Jaeger, founder of Your Farm and Ken McCauley, NCGA president. Joel just launched Your Farm, the coolest online community for farmers and with it he’s made available the USDA/FAS 1614 Farm Subsidy Database which you can search.

ZimmComm freelance reporter Mike Rogers actually did the interviews for me this week. In his interview with Joel you’ll hear about why he’s started Your Farm and put the database online. Then in the interview he did with Ken we hear a grower’s take on putting the farm subsidy database online and what he thinks about having a new place for farmers to gather online.

This week’s ending song is “The Peace Within” by Barry McCabe which you can find on the Podsafe Music Network.

You can download and listen to the ZimmCast here: Listen To ZimmCastZimmCast 119 (25 min MP3)

Or listen to this week’s ZimmCast right now:

zimmcast119-5-17-07.mp3

The ZimmCast is the official weekly podcast of AgWired which you can subscribe to using the link in our sidebar. You can also subscribe in iTunes.

Agribusiness, Audio, Internet, ZimmCast

Consumers Love Beef Tender

Cindy Zimmerman

Would you pay $345.95 for four 12 oz. strip steaks – raw steaks, mind you, not cooked.

That’s the price on-line for “Kobe-style” strip steaks, as marketed by Allen Brothers – a company some Rush Limbaugh listeners might recognize. That compares to $159.95 for the same quantity of U.S. Prime, dry-aged strip steaks – or just $104.95 for U.S. Prime, not dry-aged. I wonder if Rush buys the Kobe-style? Maybe, maybe not – but somebody buys it and more consumers these days are demanding beef with lots of marbling, despite the health benefits attributed to leaner cuts.

Elanco BelkDr. Keith Belk, professor at Colorado State University’s Center for Red Meat Quality and Safety, provided that information for the ag editors attending the Elanco Animal Health Sensory Evaluation Briefing this week at ISU. The point he made is that consumers are increasingly more willing to pay more for tenderness. One example of that is the success of Certified Angus Beef and other branded beef products.

“Quality grades and marbling itself has become extremely important,” says Belk. “Prime and upper two-thirds of Choice branded beef are commanding a large demand and returning a large amount of money back throughout the production chain. That’s the signal consumers are sending to us.”

Listen to my interview with Dr. Belk here:

belk.mp3

Read more on the Beef Quality Center website.

Animal Health, Beef, Elanco, Food

Race To Go Green Sweepstakes

Chuck Zimmerman

Race ContestThe Ethanol Promotion and Information Council is teaming up with the IndyCar Series, Sinden Racing Service, and Rahal-Letterman Racing for a national sweepstakes. The “Race to Go Green” Sweepstakes” offers you a chance to win lots of instant prizes and have your name entered in a grand prize drawing.

Instant winners will be drawn online and notified throughout the season. The grand prize winner will be announced on August 5, and will be flown with a guest to Chicago for the season ending race at Chicagoland Speedway. During the race weekend, winners will receive the ultimate IndyCar experience including: a two seater ride, a pace car ride, a garage tour and much, much more.

Fans can enter to win on the EPIC website.

You would think that with all the Indy Car races I’m covering I’d get a ride in one wouldn’t you?

Ethanol

Sensory Panel Testing

Cindy Zimmerman

Elanco sensory labIndividual booths, red lights to mask colors, positive pressure ventilation to keep out unwanted smells and pass-through sample presentation doors – that’s the environment where trained sensory panelists do their work at the ISU Sensory Evaluation Unit.

So, basically this is what you see, sitting in your little booth, waiting for samples to come through the little door. You cleanse your palate with crackers and water and get to work evaluating the samples one at a time with just numbers to identify them. You tell the computer what you think and move on to the next. Not bad work for a college student, especially if they are hungry!

Elanco steaksElanco Animal Health is particularly interested in how any product they might bring to market for livestock might impact the meat than comes from the animal. That’s why the ag editors who attended the Elanco Sensory Evaluation Briefing at ISU this week were trained specifically on the attributes of interest to their study – tenderness, juiciness and flavor of a very plain piece of steak. Of course, our results were for demonstration purposes only – but they said we did pretty well compared to the more objective Warner-Bratzler shear determination of meat tenderness. Problem was, we got three samples and two of them were deliberately tough – only one was tender. Not as good as the steaks we had for dinner the night before, that’s for sure!

Elanco Shear testWe also got to go “backstage” to the prep area and see how they prepare the samples – on George Foreman grills to heat both sides at the same time to the exact desired temperature. Pretty nifty. Then we got to see how they cored meat samples and checked them for tenderness with the shear method. All very interesting. Real sensory panelists don’t get to see behind the scenes, so we felt very special!

Animal Health, Beef, Elanco, Food

Sensory Evaluation 101

Cindy Zimmerman

Elanco TrainingHow difficult could it be to figure out whether a piece of meat is tough or tender, dry or juicy, flavorful or not? A group of ag journalists found out this week as guests of Elanco Animal Health to a Sensory Evaluation Briefing at Iowa State University.

Basically, we all got a crash course in how to be “sensory panelists.” First, we had to learn just how our senses can fool us – like our sight filling in lines to make triangles in a picture when there are none!

Then, we had to learn how each one of our senses plays a role in how we “taste” a food. We were given a small cup covered in aluminum foil. First we shook it and gave it attributes based on the sound – like that it was small, in pieces, and dry. Then, we poked holes in the foil and gave it a sniff. It smelled salty, spicy and corny. When we looked inside, we evaluated the appearance by color and size – small, flat, kind of orange-red-yellowish. When we picked it up, it felt grainy and light. Last of all, we tasted it – and found out that most of the attributes we gave it – spicy, peppery, corny – were actually not tastes, but flavors. Big difference. By the way, it was some kind of Doritos.

Elanco WorksheetAnyway, then we moved on to learning how to evaluate little bits of meat for tenderness and juiciness. Before doing everything we had to eat a bite of non-salted cracker and swish some water around in our mouths to cleanse our palates. When we ate each bite of meat, we had to use a toothpick and place it back between our molars.

The whole process took about an hour before we were considered “trained” – but real panelists take much longer to train. The Sensory Evaluation Unit has dozens of trained panelists they use to evaluate food products for all kinds of companies, including Elanco. The panelists actually get paid for their work, but they didn’t tell us how much!

Animal Health, Beef, Elanco

Perception is Reality

Cindy Zimmerman

Elanco PrusaWhen it comes to testing food, it’s all the senses that count, not just taste.

“That’s because there’s only about four things we can taste,” says Dr. Ken Prusa with Iowa State University. “Sweet, salty, sour and bitter.”

Which makes taste alone a pretty limited factor in the total experience of how we perceive a food. In fact, we use all of our senses when we judge whether we like or dislike food products.

Dr. Prusa is the professor-in-charge of the Sensory Evaluation Unit at ISU where a group of ag editors were trained to be “sensory panelists” during a workshop this week sponsored by Elanco Animal Health. We specifically learned to evaluate meat by tenderness, juiciness and flavor – more on that in the above post.

Listen to my interview with Dr. Prusa here:

prusa.mp3

Read more on the Beef Quality Center website.

Animal Health, Beef, Elanco