Wagyu beefiness—you know, the transcendently tender, fatty, umami-rich steak—has become as synonymous with luxury equally caviar or black truffles. But no matter how many Michelin-starred menus this delicacy graces, all of the facts virtually Wagyu steak still tend to elude even the well-nigh seasoned diners.

"It'due south an extremely fascinating just confusing world," says Joe Heitzeberg, the co-founder and CEO of Crowd Cow. Heitzeberg, who admits it wasn't until he'd spent ample time coming together with Japanese slaughterhouse owners and farmers (his small in Japanese at the University of Washington helped) that he felt like he truly understood Wagyu.

"In that location'southward a lot of data out there that'south not accurate, mostly unintentionally, and mayhap some intentionally," he says. Because of the prestige associated with Wagyu and the premium price information technology fetches (a pound tin can easily run in the triple-digits), some people throw effectually "Wagyu" and related terms as a marketing gimmick, even if what the purveyor is selling isn't that luxury version. And so what is Wagyu beef—and why does it taste and feel unlike any other steak y'all've ever had? We've gathered some of the foremost experts in restaurant industry to explain.

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Related: Buy the Holy Grail Steak'south ultimate Wagyu experience to bask at home

What is Wagyu beef?

Simply put, Westward agyu means Japanese cow, But the straightforward definition belies a subject riddled with misinformation.

For starters, information technology'southward pronounced wah-gyoo, not wah-goo, a mispronunciation that's common even among American Wagyu farms (and that absolutely tripped up even this intrepid reporter), says Heitzeberg.

And Wagyu isn't an umbrella term for just any Japanese cow. The luxury version of Wagyu we all desire on our plates refers to a specific brood of Japanese cattle with special genetic qualities. "There are four breeds native to Nippon. Of those four breeds, one of the breeds is genetically unique," Heitzeberg says. "It has a genetic predisposition to create this crazy marbling of fat on within of musculus tissue. No other livestock does that." Call back of your average slice of steak. Chances are, information technology'll accept a fat cap on its exterior. With Wagyu, the cow metabolizes the fat internally, so it's integrated inside the muscle.

"When I eat too much nutrient it goes to my belly, but when they eat a lot of food and they get fatty, that one breed gets it on the inside of the muscle," Heitzeberg explains. This means any other breed, even raised by an award-winning Wagyu cattle farmer in the verbal aforementioned weather condition as Wagyu, would not produce Wagyu beef.

The effect is a rich, luscious cut of beef that practically dissolves one time it hits your natural language. "When you have very loftier-end Wagyu, you barely desire to cook information technology. The middle y'all desire to keep every bit raw equally possible. Simply even if information technology were cooked medium or medium-well, it would withal be juicy," says Giuseppe Tentori, executive chef of GT Prime number in Chicago. "Simply piece it super thin and then it melts in your rima oris.

What'southward the difference between Japanese and American Wagyu?

japanese and american wagyu beef

American (top 3) and Japanese (bottom ii) wagyu have different marbling patterns. Photo: courtesy CUT by Wolfgang Puck

In add-on to the looser rating system and divergent cattle-farming techniques, the biggest divergence between American Wagyu and Japanese Wagyu is that Japanese Wagyu is purebred, where American Wagyu is crossbred. "[American Wagyu] is still going to exist crazy marbled with intense season, but it's most likely Wagyu bred with angus," Henderson says.

"Almost all of that stuff is angus beefiness crossbred with Wagyu in an uncontrolled, unregulated, unspecified per centum of Deoxyribonucleic acid," Heitzeberg says. "I've eaten my bodyweight several times over in Japanese Wagyu and American Wagyu, and I oasis't tasted annihilation that's angus mixed with Wagyu at any percentage that tastes like Japanese Wagyu does at 100 percent."

Because of this, American Wagyu doesn't have the sweetness umami flavor that Japanese Wagyu does, and it never quite reaches that aforementioned melt-in-your-mouth level of marbling. Though Heitzeberg is quick to stipulate that this doesn't mean that American Wagyu isn't delicious.

"The American stuff is wonderful. You can eat more of it," he says. "With the Japanese stuff, considering information technology'southward and then fat and rich, about people can't eat more than than a few bites of it before it'due south and then overwhelming. And then if you're in the mood for a steak dinner, and you want a giant steak, you tin can't really do that with Japanese Wagyu."

American Wagyu packs the familiar beefy flavor of an angus steak. "The Japanese stuff is almost like a light beer experience. You just don't take every bit much of that beefy gustation, and then you accept that umami flavor that's hard to depict. Information technology's well-nigh like a sweetness," Heitzeberg says.

If you have the opportunity, guild i of each. "Try unlike types of Wagyu from dissimilar countries and compare one to the other," Tentori says. "You'll learn something new, and y'all will appreciate it for more only being so expensive."

Where to Buy Wagyu Online

Holy Grail Steak Co. A5 Kobe Beef

Teddy Wolff

Y'all used to but be able to get the finest Wagyu in the world if you were at a high-end steakhouse or dining at a Michelin-starred restaurant. Or, of course, if you went to Nippon. Merely over the years some outstanding importers have made inroads in Japan, working directly with ranchers to bring outstanding A5 to America. Additionally, US farmers have proliferated raising their ain hybrid cattle. Here are five of our favorite purveyors.

Holy Grail Steak Co.

At Robb Study we scour the earth in search of the finest products and experiences, from watches to cars to restaurants. In Holy Grail Steak Co., we found a company similarly obsessed with sourcing the world's best beef. When it comes to steak, that means Wagyu. Yet not all Wagyu is created equal: Robb Written report and Holy Grail accept partnered to curate a collection of beef that highlights the ultra-rich A5 from Japan and the beautifully marbled American cuts, and then you can savor the ultimate Wagyu experience at habitation. The package includes A5 Wagyu strips from iii distinct regions of Japan: Kobe, Miyazaki and Hokkaido. And then its packaged with some of the finest American Wagyu too.

Buy At present: $949

Crowd Cow

This visitor was originally founded on the idea of crowdsourcing beefiness, where a group of buyers on the cyberspace could join together to procure a premium caput of cattle and a great price, and so call dibs on the role they wanted until it was gone. Oversupply Cow has branched out a little more than that these days, go one of the summit importers of A5 in America, selling a broad multifariousness of cuts and dissimilar breeds from around Japan.

Buy Now: $45

Meat N' Bone

While a lot of purveyors, working with limited supplies, will exist able to get yous thin cuts of A5, Meat N' Bone comes through with big, prime rib roast-sized cuts of the finest Japanese beef (all the mode upwardly to 11 lbs!) so y'all can be your own butcher, breaking down the meat exactly to your ain specifications.

Buy At present: $365

D'Artagnan

For years some of the all-time chefs in the game turned to D'Artagnan as a premier purveyor of gourmet ingredients from foie gras to wild game to humanely raised meats. The likes of Eric Ripert, Barbara Lynch, Daniel Boulud and more have been counted as customers and during the pandemic, the visitor started selling even more of its products to us mere kitchen mortals. Among the premium ingredients on offer is A5 Wagyu imported direct from Nippon.

Buy Now: $160+

Mishima Reserve

From Beecher'due south Handmade Cheese—the aforementioned outfit that brought us one of our favorite fromages fabricated in the Usa—comes a company devoted to outstanding crossbred American Wagyu that boasts Kuroge Washu cattle bloodlines. Not quite as decadent as A5, Mishima'due south steaks are less marbled and thus improve for grilling than the ultra-fatty Japanese import. Mishima offers a wide diversity of cuts likewise as basis Wagyu for some decadent burgers.

Buy At present: $12.50+

History of Wagyu in Japan

D'Artagnan

Photo: courtesy D'Artagnan

Cattle have been in Japan for millennia, but the Wagyu nosotros've come up to know started taking shape in during the Meiji Restoration start in 1868, when the government introduced Western influences to the nation. Office of that influence involved beef. Cattle from England, Continental Europe and Korea were imported to Japan and bred with the native stock. Eventually three major strains of black Wagyu emerged: Tajima, Fujiyoshi and Kedaka. These make up 90 percent of Japan's herd, while the residuum are reddish strains of Kochi and Kumamoto. Eventually, Japan realized how prized of a breed of cattle it had created and eventually banned the consign of whatsoever members of the herd, thus ensuring the very all-time stayed home.

History of Wagyu in the United states of america

In 1976, Morris Whitney brought over four Wagyu bulls from Nippon (named Mazda, Mt. Fuji, Rueshaw and Judo) and the American Wagyu was born. Well, more accurately information technology was born after the bulls were crossbred with American Angus cattle.

Eventually, four Black Wagyu females were brought to the states in 1993 to permit the breeding of full-blooded Wagyu Stateside. A few hundred more followed them in the years afterward until in 1997, the Japanese authorities decreed that the Wagyu breed of cattle was a national treasure and banned the export of the breed. Then American ranchers had to brood and enhance with the genetic lines already introduced to America. That has led to a total herd of Wagyu in the Us that's effectually 40,000 total with about v,000 of them existence full-blood Wagyu.

Australian Wagyu's rising

Outside of Nippon, the largest population of Wagyu cattle isn't in America, it'southward in Australia. However, similar American Wagyu, what comes from Commonwealth of australia is crossbred beef. Downwardly Nether, you're not getting that ultra-fatty A5 experience that pure Japanese beef volition give you. It's still likely to accept ameliorate marbling than cattle that isn't crossbred with Wagyu though. Likewise in America, the Wagyu is crossbred with angus, whereas in Australia, they generally utilise Holsteins, which produce a more tender meat that has less of a beefy season than its Stateside counterparts.

And in New Zealand, i ranch raises crossbred Wagyu cattle in a way that'southward quite different from the Japanese. First Lite's cattle are grass-fed, not grain finished. Normally grass-fed beef is much leaner; nevertheless, the intense marbling of this Wagyu still provides enough fat that you get the best of both worlds with beefy grass-fed flavor and a grain-finished level of marbling.

How are Wagyu cows raised and why practise their conditions matter?

japanese cow wagyu

Japanese cows live a low-stress life. Photo: courtesy Shutterstock

There'southward a misconception that Wagyu is produced in the same way that foie gras is: The cows' move is limited and they're strength-fed in society to create fatty, tender meat. This couldn't be further from the truth, according to Heitzeberg. "The number ane principle is managing the stress of the animal to zero. Farmers want to make sure these animals from birth to harvest are in a stress-gratuitous environs," Heitzeberg says. "Stress creates cortisol which volition deteriorate the quality of beefiness."

Japanese cattle-breeders get to groovy lengths to give their cows a zen-like existence. They control the noise level and then animals don't scare. Farmers constantly replenish water, so there's a steady supply of fresh, clean Water to drink. Cows who don't get along are separated (because what's more than stressful than grazing next to your nemesis?). And unlike some American farms where cows are left to roam costless in open up pastures, Wagyu cattle are kept on open-air farms where they can be carefully monitored.

"[Crowd Moo-cow] works with farms that will check animals every four hours. In America, if you lot're in Montana with a thousand-plus acres, yous may not see your animals for seven days," he says. "They're out at that place foraging on the natural Montana grasses, simply y'all don't know what else they're doing." In other words, a cow left to roam, could too be prone to stressful, cortisol-raising experiences.

Wagyu vs. Kobe Beefiness

You may have heard "kobe" used interchangeably with "Wagyu," or used to tout an expensive cut of meat. And then what is kobe beef? Kobe is substantially simply a make of Wagyu beef, in the same way that Nike is a make of shoe.

In order for something to be labeled every bit Kobe beef, first of all, it has to originate in Kobe, Japan. And so, all parties who have a hand in getting this sought-after meat to your tabular array—from the subcontract to the abattoir to the buyer to the eating house—has to be licensed by the Kobe Beef Association. "Everyone is paying to be part of the thing called kobe beef," Heitzeberg says. "But the last matter is they have to be rated A4 or A5—so everything else could be true, but if it's an A3, you tin't call information technology Kobe," Heitzeberg says.

And if you encounter the words "American kobe" on a menu, have information technology equally a large cerise flag—American kobe doesn't exist. "Kobe is from Kobe, Japan, just similar Champagne is from Champagne," Henderson says. "To be true kobe beef, it has to be from Kobe. [Restaurants] cold be part of an clan where they're able to sell kobe beef, but kobe beefiness is not able to be produced here."

What does the Wagyu rating system mean?

wagyu

A couple serious slabs of Wagyu beef. Photograph: courtesy Paige Dark-green Photograph

When you run across Wagyu on a card, chances are information technology'll be aslope an A4 or A5 rating, with A5 representing the nigh premium level of Wagyu. In that location are two components that become into that rating.

The first cistron—the one that differentiates A's from your B'due south— is yield. "If you were a farmer and had a moo-cow … I would give you a yield score, which tells me how much meat I'll be able to go off the bones," Heitzeberg explains. An "A" represents the highest meat yield, while a scrawnier cow will become a "B" rating. This function of the rating is really more for the purveyor than for those of the states sidling up to a steak dinner. "What's important isn't that A or B, it'due south that v or iv," Heitzeberg says.

To understand that iv or five, you need to know virtually another rating system: the Beef Marbling Standard (BMS) rating. The BMS is a scale of one to 12 and relates to both the amount and quality of the marbling. A rating of 12 means you're getting the highest degree of marbling.

To be rated A5, the meat must take a BMS of 8 to 12. A4 is just beneath that level, representing a BMS score of half dozen through 8. "In the The states system, nosotros accept the four grades, ranging from Select Option to Prime," Heitzeberg says. "A4 and A5 are picking up where Prime leaves off and goes across."

"If y'all have A5 12 Wagyu, y'all take the best of the best. It's not going to get better than that, always," says Hilary Henderson, chef de cuisine at Cut past Wolfgang Puck in Beverly Hills, one of America's best steakhouses. Nonetheless, this peak-tier Wagyu is hard to come by on this side of the Pacific, she says. "About A5 12 volition be sold nose-to-tail in Japanese markets. Unfortunately, nosotros tin can't go that hither in united states of america because it won't pass USDA regulations on the bone."

Some other thing to take into consideration is that in Japan, the rating is an intensely studied skill. To become a rater requires three years of grooming, and each animal is rated by three dissever raters. "Information technology'south important to understand that this rating organization is a very Japanese thing. Information technology'south highly skilled, highly regulated and highly practiced," Heitzeberg explains. In America, there aren't such stringent rules in identify, so the rating may be employed as a gimmick.

"A lot of people in America volition say we're A4 or A5, or we have a BMS score of vii, and I look at that and say, in that location isn't a unmarried person who has trained for three years…. You just made that upward," Heitzeberg says.