The Great Kobe Beef Scam

Let's give a big round of applause - and our thanks - to Larry Olmsted and the fine folks of Forbes magazine:

Think you’ve tasted the famous Japanese Kobe beef?

Think again.

Of course, there are a small number of you out there who have tried it – I did, in Tokyo, and it is delicious.

If you ever go to Japan I heartily recommend you splurge, because while it is expensive, it is unique, and you cannot get it in the United States.

* REPEAT:

[Y]ou cannot get it in the United States. Not as steaks, not as burgers, certainly not as the ubiquitous “Kobe sliders” at your trendy neighborhood “bistro.”

That’s right. You heard me.

You cannot buy Japanese Kobe beef in this country.

* REPEAT:

You cannot buy Japanese Kobe beef in this country. Not in stores, not by mail, and certainly not in restaurants.

No matter how much you have spent, how fancy a steakhouse you went to, or which of the many celebrity chefs who regularly feature “Kobe beef” on their menus you believed, you were duped.

You may have had an imitation from the Midwest, Great Plains, South America or Australia...

You may have even had a Kobe imposter from Japan before 2010.

* NOTE... "IMPOSTER."

It is now illegal to import (or even hand carry for personal consumption) any Japanese beef. Before 2010 you could import only boneless fresh Japanese beef, but none was real Kobe.

* REPEAT:

[N]one of that was real Kobe.

Under Japanese law, Kobe beef can only came from Hyogo prefecture (of which Kobe is the capital city), where no slaughterhouses were approved for export by the USDA. According to its own trade group, the Kobe Beef Marketing & Distribution Promotion Association in Japan, where Kobe Beef is a registered trademark, Macao is the only place it is exported to – and only since last year.

“How is this possible?” you ask, when you see the virtues of Kobe being touted on television food shows, by famous chefs, and on menus all over the country?

A dozen burger joints in Las Vegas alone offer Kobe burgers.

Google "Kobe beef" and you will find dozens of online vendors happy to take your money and ship you very pricey steaks.

Restaurant reviews in the New York Times have repeatedly praised the “Kobe beef” served at high-end Manhattan restaurants.

(*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD*)

Not an issue of any major food magazine goes by without reinforcing the great fat Kobe beef lie.

(So how could I possibly be right?)

The answer is sadly simplistic: Despite the fact that Kobe Beef, as well as Kobe Meat and Kobe Cattle, are patented trademarks in Japan, these trademarks are neither recognized nor protected by U.S. law. As far as regulators here are concerned, Kobe beef, unlike say Florida Orange Juice, means almost nothing (the “beef” part should still come from cows). Like the recent surge in the use of the unregulated label term “natural,” it is an adjective used mainly to confuse consumers and profit from that confusion.

The con the U.S. food industry is running is leading you to believe that what you are paying huge dollars for – like the $40 NYC “Kobe” burger – is somehow linked to this heritage of excellence. It’s not.

* BASTARDS!

All the myths about cows getting massages and drinking beer while listening to classical music are just that, myths...

* SON... OF... A... BITCH...!!!

[N]onetheless real Kobe beef is produced under some of the world’s strictest legal food standards, whereas “domestic Kobe” beef production, along with that in Australia and South America, is as regulated as the Wild West.

In Japan, to be Kobe requires a pure lineage of Tajima-gyu breed cattle (not any old Japanese breed crossbred with American cattle as is the norm here). The animal must also have been born in Hyogo prefecture and thus raised on the local grasses and water and terroir its entire life. It must be a bull or virgin cow, and it takes considerably longer to raise a Tajima-gyu for consumption than most other breeds, adding to the cost. It must be processed in a Hyogo slaughterhouse – none of which export to the US – and then pass a strict government grading exam.

There are only 3,000 head of certified Kobe Beef cattle in the world, and none are outside Japan.

The process is so strict that when the beef is sold, either in stores or restaurants, it must carry the 10-digit identification number so customers know what particular Tajima-gyu cow it came from.

* WOW...

It is impossible to say exactly what you are getting in your Faux-be slider, or $100 Faux-be strip, but one thing is certain – it is not Japanese Kobe beef. [And for] the past two years, it has not been any kind of Japanese beef at all.

What about “Domestic Kobe” or Wagyu?

“Domestic Kobe” beef means just as much as slapping the word “domestic” in front of any other product made better somewhere else: Would you spend $50,000 on a domestic Swiss watch?

(*SMIRK*)

Kobe is just the tip of the labeling iceberg – there are literally hundreds of other food items, from the extravagant, such as Champagne and Cognac, to the more common, like Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese, whose production and sale in this country would violate many very old and well-known foreign trademarks – except that these trademarks are not recognized by U.S. law.

Like Faux-be beef, this domestic production is undertaken mainly for one reason – to reap the benefit of good will and quality brand reputation created by someone else, namely foreigners who have no recourse in U.S. courts.

And for that we can thank the U.S. government.

This is not an oversight, as in, “hey, we forgot to regulate the labeling of Kobe beef.” This is part of a pattern of deliberate actions going back well over a century on the part of the Federal government to actively ignore foreign trademarks and intellectual property claims in order to support domestic industries.

It has very much been done on purpose, and continues to be done on purpose, at the expense of the American consumer (and foreign producers).

It is also stunningly hypocritical, and flies directly in the face of the government’s deep pocketed attempts to combat piracy in the arenas of music, film, technology, and software.

The Treaty of Madrid in 1891 was among the first major international agreements on the protection of geographically designated food production. These are known today variously as Geographic Indications (GIs), the term collectively favored by the European Union, or by various national terms of geographically protected Designations of Origin (PDO, AOC, DOC, DOCG, etc.). In each case they refer to products so associated with production in a particular place as to warrant protection of that place/product combination. Usually the rationale is a combination of history, manufacturing tradition, terroir, and local law. The product typically grows or is made there better for environmental reasons, like the famously chalky terrain of Champagne or the volcanic soil in which legendary San Marzano tomatoes grow. In many cases the product also has been made there under very specific and unfaltering rules of purity, with strict supervision, sometimes for centuries. As a result, when you as the consumer buys that item, you should know exactly the level of quality and purity you are getting, be it Georgia peaches, Florida orange juice, Champagne or Kobe beef.

Twelve decades ago, the highest profile of the many foodstuffs to come out of the Treaty of Madrid protected was Champagne. Every major power in the world at the time elected to sign the treaty, with the exception of the United States. As a result, the term “Champagne” has been protected in almost every other first-world country since 1891. The Treaty has been revised many times, and in every case since, the U.S. has adamantly refused to sign. This is not an issue forgotten by the rest of the world. The European Union alone has a list of over 600 geographically designated products it protects under law, almost none of which the US agrees with. Despite repeated requests dating back more than a century from the French, and in recent decades the World Trade Organization and European Union, the U.S. has stubbornly and purposefully refused to become party to this treaty or dozens of others like it. If they did, “Kobe” salesmen, “parmigiana” cheese makers, and “Champagne” producers in places like upstate New York would no longer be able to make a living tricking consumers into buying their products.

Sell New York State "Champagne" almost any place else in the civilized world and you go to jail. Sell it here and you make a profit. This is the result the U.S. has fought long and hard for - it is no mere loophole.

Rather than join the status quo of our closest allies to protect their intellectual property – and protect American consumers – the U.S. has consistently taken the other side of the issue.

(*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD*)

Today, after more than a century, the result of all this is that U.S. law encourage the hottest current trend in the food world, that of the “localvore.” As long as you don’t care about quality, you can now sit down to a complete dinner of faux gourmet items like Greece’s famous Kalamata olives and domestic Spanish or Italian cured ham, followed by a pasta course made with “Italy’s” world renowned San Marzano tomatoes and topped with Parmigiano-Reggiano, “The King of Cheeses.” The main course? Kobe beef of course, maybe topped with Kobe pork, all washed down with Champagne and red Burgundy. Top it off with a glass of Port or a nice cup of Darjeeling tea, and you will have just consumed a meal that may well have been produced entirely in a factory down the street from you.

(*SIGH*)