Grosse Pointe News - September 07, 2000 Grosse Pointe Woods man has a mission --better beef for all. By Jim Stickford Staff Writer Grosse Pointe Woods resident Gene Baratta is a man with a mission -- to bring quality beef to the public from cows that haven't been treated with steroids, growth hormones or antibiotics. "I want a product that is all-natural, " Baratta said. "My belief is that what we're putting into the ground is creating a lot of illness. If people knew what they were putting into chickens to grow these birds. That's what we're eating today. They're putting people in jail for selling the drugs we put into our foods." Baratta came into the meat industry naturally. His father, the late Emmet Baratta, started Belmont Packing with his brothers in 1947. Baratta joined the company after graduating from Grosse Pointe High School. He has four children, Angela, Rosalie, Emmet III and Anthony. He works with his brothers, Joe and Emmet, at their packing plant at Eastern market. When his father retired 13 years ago, said Baratta, he decided to leave the company because his didn't like the direction it was going. So he decided to start his own company, Fairway Packing, with his brothers. "We unretired my father, " Baratta said. "He helped us start Fairway. We've been here for 13 years and started out with 7,000 square feet and have expanded twice and now have 15,000 square feet. We had eight employees and now have 35. Our niche has been the upscale restaurant and country club market." A packing house, explained Baratta, is different from a slaughterhouse. Cattle are harvested at a slaughterhouse. then the sides of beef are shipped in refrigerated trucks to packing houses, where they are divided into the various cuts of meat we all know and love. Baratta said that before the meat is cut up, it is aged at the plant for 14 days. "I was surprised to learn at a seminar given by Michigan State university professor Harlan Richie that beef reaches its optimum aging point in 14 days. Richie is probably the leading expert on bovines in the Untied States. I learn something new every time I attend one of his seminars." The company has 600 accounts in the tri-county area, including several restaurants in the Pointes," Baratta said. "We all live here and we take it personally that local places are our customers." Baratta said he works six days a week. He enjoys gold, but hasn't played more than three or four times since he founded his company. "People ask me how I can work without a vacation, " said Baratta. "I tell them that I love buying good meat and I love selling good meat. I feel my work is like a vacation." Baratta's latest passion is Peidmontese beef. The cattle originally came fro the Piedmont area of Italy. He credits the Amish farming community with bringing the breed over to the United States 10 years ago. "They (the Amish) use natural farming techniques." said Baratta. "They had such success with their naturally bred chickens, that they wanted something similar for their cattle". It was Baratta's father, Emmet Sr., that first read about Piedmontese beef in the Wall Street Journal about five years ago. Noticing that it was an Italian breed, he suggested that they bring the company representative in to talk. When they first looked at the beef, they saw that it was very red and had no marbleization. They couldn't believe how good it tasted. "We're now in the cattle business, " said Baratta. "We have a bull, Pedro, and are looking at artificially insemination and embryonic technology. We slaughter about 500 head a month, so it's small right now." Baratta boasts that an eight ounce Piedmontese steak has fewer calories as well as less cholesterol and fat than an eight-ounce piece of skinless chicken. The beef has passed all USDA tests and said that there is a gene unique to the Peidmontese that is responsible for the lower fat and cholesterol. The U.S. Heart Association has also given the beef its Heart-Smart seal of approval, he said. "They've changed the way our food states in the last 30 years," said Baratta. Our beef and our chicken have a different texture. I've seen chicken farms down South where the birds look like mutants, not chickens. This is all-natural. We work with a ranch in Montana, Leechman Cattle. There's nothing artificial about our product." Baratta has also taken advantage of the new information technology. Fairway created its own Internet web two years ago. http://www.fairwaypacking.com Thanks to Federal Express, they can pack the meat in dry ice and ship it overnight anywhere in the country.