Read the label
What the words on meat mean
Some words on meat are protected by law. Most are not. Here is what each one actually requires, and what it still lets a label leave out. We would rather you could check us than take our word.
- Grass-fed
- Sounds like: the animal lived on grass. Actually: not a legally defined term in Belgium or the EU. Compatible with an animal finished on grain. Nearly all beef qualifies.
- Grass-finished
- Sounds like: a stronger grass-fed. Actually: the meaningful one. No grain in the finishing period, right up to slaughter. Not legally defined either, so ask the butcher to show it, as you can ask us.
- Free-range / plein air
- For pork and poultry, a real certified scheme (we use Porc Plein Air; our poultry is Label Rouge). For beef the term is looser. Ask what it means on the animal in front of you.
- Organic / bio (EU)
- Legally defined and audited: no synthetic pesticides or routine antibiotics, outdoor access, organic feed. It does not by itself mean grass-finished. Our lamb is organic; our beef is not certified organic, it is conservation-grazed, which is a different and unlabelled thing.
- Label Rouge
- A real French state label for demonstrably superior taste: slow-growing breeds, outdoor access, minimum ages. For beef it authorises cereals and requires five months of pasture a year, so it is not a grass-finished standard. Our poultry carries it.
- Dry-aged
- Not legally defined. Means the meat hung in air for weeks to lose water and gain flavour. Easy to claim, harder to do for real. Ours hangs on the bone four to eight weeks.
- Belgian Blue / Blanc-Bleu Belge
- Not a quality mark, a breed: the double-muscled national animal, about three-quarters of the red meat here, finished on concentrates. Lean, tender, mild. Most "Belgian beef" is this.