Debragga To Stop Selling Commodity Pork And Chicken

DeBragga, New York's Butcher, will stop selling all commodity pork and commodity chicken to its clientele of chefs in restaurant, hospitality and food service industries as of February 1st this year. This means that the only pork DeBragga will source from suppliers for its customers will be heritage breeds, naturally raised without any antibiotics, without animal by-products or artificial ingredients in the feed. The chickens DeBragga will purchase from suppliers to sell will be given absolutely no antibiotics, as well, and DeBragga is making a strong push to have all of its growers air chill chickens and not water chill them before shipment for sale (water chilling adds weight and dilutes the flavor; air-chilled chickens retain much more of their natural flavor and the skin crisps beautifully when cooked). Two of the three chicken suppliers to DeBragga air chill. All of DeBragga's pork and chicken products are fresh, never frozen, and never contain hormones because FDA does not allow producers to administer hormones to swine or poultry.

Prior to stopping sales of these products, commodity pork made up 10% of all pork sales at DeBragga, and commodity chicken accounted for 18% of all chicken sales. The plan is to shift customers currently using these products to the clean, antibiotic-free class of product DeBragga features. For pork, that means choosing naturally raised Berkshire/Duroc hogs from the Niman Ranch program, a network of more than 630 family farms across the nation, as well as Mangalitsa, Iberico, and a range of fine pork products from the American South. Choices in chicken include a selection of products raised according to strict Label Rouge protocols developed in France that guarantee a naturally raised- and -fed product, air-chilled for freshness.

"We have to get the drugs out of the animals we eat," says DeBragga owner and COO George Faison. "Thanks to the flagrant misuse of drugs in livestock feed, we are developing resistance to the antibiotics we need to fight disease." George has been crusading against drugs, animal by-products and any artificial ingredients in animal feed since his career began in 1982. He acknowledges that, in terms of negative environmental impacts, the worst offenders raising animals today are the commodity hog and chicken producers. He also acknowledges that while a company like DeBragga can take on the issue of drugs in livestock feed, they may not be able to resolve all the ills of factory farmed animals. Factory farmed animals account for 99% of all the animals consumed in the United States.

An FDA ruling January 5, 2012, restricted the use of one class of drugs in the feeding of livestock that accounts for .25% of all antibiotic sales to the industry. Where government could have done more, the agency backed away from stronger action in December 2011, to limit the use of prophylactic antibiotics like penicillin and tetracycline in the feed of healthy animals. George, and his partner, CEO Marc Sarrazin, don't think FDA is going far enough. "At DeBragga," says Marc, "we are fully focused on selling animals that are naturally raised, never, ever receiving antibiotics, or in the case of cattle, hormones. We believe that this is not a fad or a trend. We believe it is a significant part of our future."

Regarding beef, DeBragga is working with its suppliers to eliminate the use of all antibiotics and hormones in livestock feed. This behavior, however, is entrenched in an industry that's been selling meat cheaply for generations, and will present a greater challenge. Additionally, DeBragga is working closely with its veal producers to stop tethering their animals, and they are close to resolution on this issue. The use of antibiotics will be a different struggle with veal.

DeBragga, New York's Butcher, is located at 65-77 Amity Street, Jersey City, NJ, (212) 924-1311.