In the mid-1990s a group of ranchers put their heads together to find some way to be sure that their top quality beef stayed that way, consistently, from farm to market. Seems that they were selling their beef to distributors who were mixing herds of their beef in pens with animals of lesser quality and then selling the beef all under the same label, which resulted in unpredictable quality that restaurants and store customers were complaining about. This answered the question, “Why isn’t the beef as good as it used to be?”

About 7 of the ranchers banded together to form Painted Hills Premium Beef and to sell only their own high quality beef under this label. The cattle are pasture-raised and then “grain-finished” with a 100% vegetarian diet consisting mainly of barley, corn and alfalfa hay.

Painted Hills now also offers (my favorite) 100% grass-fed (pasture-raised) beef too! We carry an assortment of Painted Hills beef cuts and both the Painted Hills regular and 100% grass-fed ground beef…ask us if you don’t see it in the meat case!

One important thing to note is that they do not allow hormones or antibiotics of any kind, including ionophores, EVER in any Painted Hills Beef…if an animal does become sick and need to be treated with antibiotics at any time during their life they no longer qualify to end up as beef under their label. This stands in stark contrast to other “antibiotic free” brands which only means that an animal has not been treated with antibiotics within a certain period of time before harvesting. Painted Hills stubbornly stands by their chemical and by-product free standards saying they won’t send anything out under the Painted Hills label they would not serve at their own table. (Hey, that rhymes!)

Manzanita Market continues to seek out more healthy, local and northwest-sourced foods in our effort to support providers who practice more ethical & sustainable methods…and to offer our customers the best products we can!