Stay Off My Operating Table

From Tech to Clean Meat: How Two Entrepreneurs Are Revolutionizing Healthy Snacks - 167

• Dr. Philip Ovadia • Episode 167

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Two entrepreneurs created a preservative-free, clean meat snack company  -Joburg Meats - that produces traditional South African biltong using only beef, apple cider vinegar, salt, and spices - making it ideal for low-carb and health-conscious consumers.

Yuda Holzburg and Joseph Baumgargen of Joburg Meats are bringing traditional South African biltong to the American market with a focus on clean ingredients and quality sourcing.

Unlike conventional jerky, which is cooked with sugars and preservatives, their biltong is naturally cured for two weeks using only beef, apple cider vinegar, salt, and spices. The meat comes from pasture-raised, grass-fed cattle from South America, where traditional farming practices are still the norm.

The conversation takes an interesting turn when Chief Product Officer Jon Engleson shares his personal experience of losing 10 pounds in one week simply by switching from eating babka (a sweet bread) to biltong for breakfast.

The company is expanding their line to include new flavors like Korean BBQ and truffle, plus developing clean versions of traditional salamis without nitrates or preservatives.

Did You Know...?
One of the founders was originally a tech professional who also practiced as an energy healer and EMT for 15 years. This unexpected background led him to be particularly conscious about creating clean, additive-free products, as he had developed sensitivity to testing food quality through his healing work.

NOTABLE QUOTE
"You kind of muscle test each product. You're like, is this really good? Is this really not good? And you test and nope, no good. I'm like, okay I'm going to need it anyway. Okay. When it came to this biltong, I was introduced to it. And I don't know why subconsciously I did a muscle test and asked, is this a good product? Is this healthy for me? And I got a confirmed solid yes."

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Joburg Meats
Keto/Carnivore-friendly meat snacks. Tasty+Clean. 4 ingredients. Use code “iFixHearts” to save 15%.

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Theme Song : Rage Against
Written & Performed by Logan Gritton & Colin Gailey
(c) 2016 Mercury Retro Recordings

Any use of this intellectual property for text and data mining or computational analysis including as training material for artificial intelligence systems is strictly prohibited without express written consent from Dr. Philip Ovadia.

Speaker 2:

fantastic hey, welcome folks. It's, as you know, the stay off my operating table podcast, and we have today a couple of guys who I have spent the last three minutes with, and I can already tell this one's gonna be fun. Oh yeah, I love it and we're gonna talk about put your seatbelts on one of my top I think my top two favorite things in the world. One of them is meat. So let's talk about meat. Phil, introduce our guests.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, I came to the right place.

Speaker 4:

Yes, indeed, this is really, I think, going to be a great episode. John and Yuda, who I've known now for I don't know quite a while we'll say a year probably, or maybe even a little longer and they're doing some really great stuff in the meat space and really, you know, in support of the type of lifestyles that we talk about, you know, low carb carnivore dieting, low carb carnivore ways of eating. Really excited to talk with them. Their company is Joe Berg Meats and they just have some great products that, I'll admit, I have personally tried on many occasions. Full disclosure. They did send me some free samples a while back, which is how I became introduced to them, but I continue to purchase because I'm such a big fan of their products. But they're really doing something.

Speaker 2:

Ooh, we lost your audio there, Phil.

Speaker 4:

A little bit of background from you guys on how you may want to go back 10 seconds the meat product space and why don't we start with Yuda?

Speaker 3:

Hello, exciting day. I've been looking forward to this, meeting you guys here Sitting. Nothing better, even though, dr Avad, meeting you at the Low Carb USA event was beautiful, that was fantastic. And meeting all the people at Low Carb USA, that was wow, wow. Where do we begin? Wow, yeah, where do we begin? I mean this is a yeah. How many hours you got?

Speaker 2:

tell us about, first of all, what's the biz?

Speaker 3:

give us the business the business is something I was somehow divinely directed to this meat. I have not exactly sure how god got me here, but he did. Somehow. He managed to getting me here, as I'm a tech guy, I love tech, been doing tech my whole life and I still do tech, because you can't take away somebody from tech. But quite a few years back, all of a sudden, I had this little urge it's okay, there is no clean, healthy meat snacks. It just doesn't exist. Whatever you eat, somebody's telling you oh, this has got nitrates, oh, this has got that chemical in it, oh, this has got that preservative in it. You're like okay, I give up.

Speaker 2:

There's nothing you can eat. That's good. You're talking about like slim jibs right Everything.

Speaker 3:

I mean, I come from the kosher side personally, so I don't need slim jibs, but on the kosher side, it doesn't matter where you are, the junk is everywhere. Yeah, junk is everywhere. And I took my partner and I was like, joseph, we are going to do something. I don't know how we're going to get there, what we're going to do, but it's going to happen. And we started to look around. We started to do look into beefs. We started to look into Wagyu. We were playing with Wagyu for a little bit, because Wagyu is known for its healthy amino acids and for all its beautiful omega-3s sorry, omega-3s and its fat content. Then I was introduced to David Liebesman, who is the original founder of the name Joburg, who then took over and built a factory around him. He is originally from South Africa In South Africa somehow.

Speaker 3:

Ah, yeah, go ahead the joe berg okay yes, thus the joe berg, and for johannesburg, and he makes the best south african, what you would call a south african jerky or bill tongue. And we tasted the product. I'm like I've never tasted anything like this in my life. This is the best snack. You could call it, you know, a charcuterie. Call it when you take a slab and slice off a slice, it's a charcuterie. It's a bastrama or if you call it, if you know what a bastrama is. Nope, no idea. Okay, you know, basically a long, salted cured beef, air dried. But this was insane. I taste it. I'm like, oh, my God, I've never tasted anything like it Tender, soft, flavorful. I'm like, okay, what else? This is just and just. And I was like, okay, how do we do this? How do we produce this on a mass scale? Because he was doing it in a little, you know, and we built a whole factory around the product.

Speaker 2:

So, in essence, let me get this straight. You started with this product from this guy that already had this thing, but he didn't have a factory.

Speaker 3:

Correct. He was co-packing it and making a very small, tiny batches and I'm like, okay, we're going to take this to the masses Now. I also had no clue what the audience was like. I had no idea how many people are going to enjoy this. No idea how many people are going to enjoy this. I was literally going like a bull tank full forward and I was like what are you doing? I'm like I don't know, this is what I have to do and I don't know why, but I got to do this and we just went full force.

Speaker 3:

And all of a sudden, I'm just like sitting in synagogue where I sit with Big John and sitting good friends for years and brilliant man and understanding products and companies and we're sitting, we're talking about and he and then he invited me to one of his, his talks, you know where he talks about low carb and glycemic and health food eating and and all that. All of a sudden I'm like, okay, it's funny. I came from a simple person, business-minded, of how do we create clean, good products and tasty products for innocent, good people. All of a sudden, I'm like introduced a whole new world and saying there's actually people who want you, not just that you have to go and tell them that it's a clean snack. It's people who are actually looking for this. And the big John here introduced me to this whole world of this the carnivore, paleo, keto and the carnivore and I'm like I'm still learning to understand it.

Speaker 3:

Like eating healthy, I understand, be careful what you're eating, you know, and all that. So we all know that because we all hear it everywhere we go. We don't know much, we don't understand much, but all of a sudden I'm sitting over here and I'm like the biggest surprise was at the Low Carb USA event, where you know I'm showing up with a product and have you know, no clue. I figured I'm going to do the same thing. I'm showing up with a product and I've no clue. I figured I'm going to do the same thing. I'm just going to tell them here this is a good product to try and I brought with me over 250 bags. I think it was three hours in I was out.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I bet.

Speaker 4:

I can attest it was a mad rush. You know I was scratching my head. Yeah, let's. Before we get into all of that, why don't we get John's story, john's background? And then I certainly want to circle back and dig in a little bit more Yuta on. You know how you jumped from the tech space to the meat space. But before we get there, let's get John's story out there. They can understand. You know, I want the audience to really understand. You know how all these sort of forces came together to make this happen.

Speaker 1:

Sure, great start, yudha. I got to follow up on those on your coattails a little bit. So just briefly. I grew up in Los Angeles. All my family are doctors. My father taught at USC Medical School. My father was an internist in Beverly Hills and my grandfather was a doctor. My uncle is the head of Chicago Medical School. I was pre-med at UC San Diego and after my first quarter I knew it wasn't going to be for me, but I ended up. My degree ended up in economics, but I got into health and nutrition just after college.

Speaker 1:

Actually, when I got married and I had my children, my son came home from school with allergies and I was like you know what's going on here? What are they serving? You know they give them all this junk. So I came up with an idea to bring in nutritional products into schools and I founded a company called you Are what you Eat in 1990. And we ended up selling to mass market and we were part of the you know, when you see, like a health food section, so to speak. Now I have to backpedal from that because you know my mind was in the 90s. Those were health food sections, which I don't believe there's so much healthy today, but at that time we were putting the nutrition bars and in the marketplace and developing those products in the market. We built an Inc 500 fastest growing company in 1998.

Speaker 1:

And I've been in marketing consulting food products since in various forms. And about a year and a half ago my son said you know, you have so much knowledge, you have to start giving seminars on all the nutrition and health. So I started giving seminars here in Brooklyn and I really got into the. You know I studied a lot of people through the years, whether it was Dr Avadio or Ken Berry or Anthony Chaffee. I went to Dr Edie. A lot of the people at the seminar and it's so honored to meet you live better life in our community, which is they call it vitamin K, which stands for on Shabbos, which is kugel and kishka and all the stuff that really don't have vitamins, and we want to try to switch people's diets and try to help people.

Speaker 2:

Okay, you're speaking to an utterly ignorant Gentile here.

Speaker 3:

Don't give away all the secrets.

Speaker 2:

Okay, I'm not asking for the secrets.

Speaker 3:

What do you think keeps us healthy and going? What do you think keeps us off the operating table the Sabbath afternoon? Kugel and kishka.

Speaker 2:

What is a kugel and kishka? I have no idea.

Speaker 1:

A kugel is potatoes drenched with seed oil and whatever salt Spices and overnight baked, you know.

Speaker 3:

Oh, I mean, it's delicious.

Speaker 1:

It's delicious, but possibly the worst food, and Kishka is probably one of the things a little bit better. I mean, it's the intestines of the animal. Well, that was used to be, we don't.

Speaker 3:

nobody's not eating like that, it's just dough. No.

Speaker 1:

I know.

Speaker 3:

It's a dough with animal fat based spices. It just tastes good.

Speaker 2:

This sounds like the Jewish version of a haggis, probably, which is just the most disgusting stuff. Correct I apologize to my Scottish friends. Correct. I understand why the Scots have been warlike for their entire history, correct.

Speaker 3:

Oh wait, no, there's something really good John.

Speaker 4:

I was just going to kind of back up the story a little bit. Talk about how you got interested and involved in low carb to start with. What is it that brought you there?

Speaker 1:

Because you said you know you were selling these nutritional products. So I started my first seminar and so I ended up studying a lot of alternative medicine, homeopathy, herbal. I studied a lot of diets, macro, macrobiotics and many things over the years and you know, having a company, you know I had to have the goods and I was. You know I made it a focus to do that. Um, when my son asked me to start giving seminars, I started to backtrack on my knowledge and look and just keep an open mind of diets and nutrition science and where it is today. So I just started to go and I started to study again and because I refined my craft, so to speak, and when I opened and started looking at people and looking at health and nutrition, I was dumbfounded because I was like I come from the macrobiotic world, which is high in grains and high in carbs, and I'm thinking like you know, this is where I'm going with this. Ok, you have a little meat here, that's fine. And I'm trying to look at people that I really respected, or really respect like Jordan Peterson, and he was like he's on a carn. Like Jordan Peterson, and he was like he's on a carnivore diet. And I was like what? And then I was like what is, what is? How could that be good for you?

Speaker 1:

And then what I found, and what was interesting when you see these people who are on it two things came to my just was a light bulb. The first was the testimonials. You know, I like to look. Anybody can go and do a video, but to have people say, oh, I was 68. And you know, I, I had this inflammation and now it's gone. And I, and one after the next, and one after the next. That was number one, but this was the biggest thing, the second part of this equation and that was that at the end of a diet video generally somebody talking about diet there's always a sell point Okay, 1-800-call-this-and-get-this-thing, get this pill, get this. Every time somebody spoke about carnivore, or even keto slash carnivore, at the end it was like there was nothing there there was no call to action.

Speaker 1:

No call to action. It was just telling their story. It wasn't like, okay, call the farm and order this beef. It was just. This is what happened.

Speaker 1:

I had this and this and now, through my diet and through, not you know, getting off statins, getting off all these other, you know medications, whether it was high blood, you know the metabolic, I call them the. You know the unfab four I'm a big Beatles fan but you know is, you know, blood pressure, triglycerides, pre-diabetes and possibly gout, you know is the other one that a lot of people were having or high you know high blood pressure. So the metabolic determination of people's health. And then I was like, oh, my God, I got to start integrating this. And this is so I start to move toward this mentality, because my philosophy was always been in diet and nutrition, two words, and I still go by this and I still think it's true and that is what works. And when you say and, and I feel like I was blessed in a certain way not to have been in a particular, a certain way, not to have been in a particular indoctrination, I don't want to say indoctrined, but a specific way of thinking, because what happens is I study homeopathy. Now the homeopathists don't like the herbal people. The herbal people don't like the homeopathic people both of them don't like the vitamin people because everybody has their own path and their own way of thinking, you know and the and allopathic medicine people definitely don't like any of the alternative medicine in general, and so everybody's, because they've been pigeonholed in a corner and through my life not being pigeonholed and just saying this, I just say, look, I've seen things work. I've seen macrobiotics work, I've seen this work, I've seen homeopathic. I mean, I know it's not something that is a fake, because I give it to my two-year-old kid and Ibased diet for so many people is. It works a lot and it works well and that's what we're seeing and that's how I got into it and I started doing more and more seminars about this and then I got involved then with Yuda and I was like Yuda, so my marketing background kicked in and I was like Yuda, so my marketing background kicked in and I was like Yuda.

Speaker 1:

You got to stop the supply side, which supply side in business is just, I created a product and I supply it to a distributor who supplies it to a market and we hope we're going to get it off the shelf. I want to create a demand side, which means to go to people who really want your product, not people who you have to convince in this and that, and today they're going to go. You know you're going to put this product in a 7-Eleven and you know today they're going to buy it and tomorrow they're going to buy their $0.99 chips because they don't really care what their snack is. But the guy who's on, or the gal who's on keto or carnivore paleo, and really he's not buying that chip, he's buying your product. Yeah, and so that's how I sort of directed the company. I said, listen, there's a huge audience I mean now we see that it looks like keto is 23 million strong and growing as a base people who are ascribed to this diet, lifestyle style. It's and not only is it huge, they love you don't have to go and beg them.

Speaker 1:

So there's three.

Speaker 1:

You know and I'll give the time back after this I say there's three types of marketing interactions those who need you but you don't need them.

Speaker 1:

Those who you need them but they don't need them.

Speaker 1:

Those who you need them but they don't need you. And those in the middle. You kind of need each other, but the best position to be is, of course, where they need you but you don't need them, so to speak, where they're coming after you for your product, and this is what it is here. People really love your product and this is where we moved the company to and I've been able to, thankfully, help and direct it into this area so that we can be around people with like-minded thinking and help people in the snack market, so to speak, which I'm not at. Again, I put that word in quotes. It's not going away as difficult as we can push people to, you know, just eating a meal and not snacking. It's not going to the way the world works, you know, especially with travel, with people's schedules. So this product and these type of products are going to continue to be huge or fulfill a huge need in that area, and we're very glad to meet you and your team and be a part of it.

Speaker 1:

A little of the story.

Speaker 4:

I mean, like you said, you know, rather than call it a snack, right, we'll call it a convenience food. Right, because people that are doing, you know, diets that are centered around animal protein. You know you need sometimes those convenience foods and, as you just said earlier, you know there isn't a real. You know the options that are out there are not great. They all seem to have, you know, the stuff we don't want in it Lots of sugar, seed oils. You know all of that.

Speaker 4:

When you came, I guess you know and I'll go back to you with this you know, when you came across the Joburg Biltong you probably didn't fully recognize, you know what was so good about it, but it sounds like you knew right away it was good and it was different than other stuff you had seen on there. So maybe talk a little bit about what some of the challenges out there in the marketplace, what is going on with the other stuff that maybe someone who says, okay, I'm going to eat a animal-based diet and I can go into any convenience store and I can find some beef jerky, you know that should be good, right, and talk about why maybe it's not going to be the best options and then maybe that will lead into what's a little different about the biltong generally and the Joburg biltong in specific.

Speaker 3:

Dr Ovadia, absolutely. You just gave me whoa 80D amount of information to go over and I will I knew this was going to be fun. Right up my alley and I'm going to try to address it one by one. But if I go off topic, by the way, I have to interact.

Speaker 1:

I don't even know how Yehuda's on this call right now, because I tell you, I've never met a guy who is doing so many things at one time. I don't know how you came into the right time, so I'm very impressed, my buddy.

Speaker 3:

With pleasure. Okay, I'm going to share with you something that actually I don't know, big John, if I've shared this with you before, but did you know that I was an energy healer? I heard, okay, good, so I did tell you that. So it may be off taboo. We have here a cardiologist and a heart surgeon on the table.

Speaker 3:

Okay, Totally down with it If you're okay with me talking about it for a minute. So I actually started. I would say my son is now 25. And he was about a year, less than a year old and he was all took a winky and was choking on a winky and I had no clue what to do. I'm like I mean, I learned first aid once I was a lifeguard. I'm like what do I do? I'm like how do I? My wife was freaking out, everybody was freaking out and I was trying to just stay calm. At the end we got it out and my son is 25 now to tell the tale or he doesn't remember. But anyway, within a year I learned to become an EMT.

Speaker 3:

I joined Volunteer Ambulance Corps and I volunteered as an EMT for about 15 years. One of the things that bothered me as being an EMT I looked at myself as obviously comfort, security, helping, doing whatever you can to help the patient in need. But one thing that bothered me was I felt as a glorified taxi service, because there's nothing really we can do as an EMT other than comfort them, give them some oxygen. I can't administer, I can't give medications, nothing I can do. And I remember coming out once out of a call and I bumped into a spiritual friend of mine and he tells me he says you know you can do energy healing. And I'm like sounds like hocus pocus to me, what is that? And he introduced me to a book or two Within. Sounds like hocus pocus to me, what is that? And he introduced me to a book or two. Within a few weeks I was already practicing and doing this. I never took money for this. I've done it as a hobby and as a service. I've been doing it now for about 15 years.

Speaker 3:

One of the things that I do is, you know you do muscle testing, doctor, have you heard of muscle testing? So when I met, you know, know, hearing about this. So doing this energy work and being aware of good products and bad products, so you kind of muscle test each product. You're like is this really good, is this really not good? And you test and nope, no good. Like okay, I'm gonna eat it anyway. Okay, when it came to this Biltong, I was introduced to it and I don't know why, subconsciously I did a muscle test and asked is this a good product, is this healthy for me? And I got a confirmed solid yes. And I was like very interesting, very cool, not knowing what to make of it, but I was like, okay, it's a healthy, good food, done, finished, now that I've said this part.

Speaker 3:

So being aware of healthy, being aware a little bit, of being consciously, just try to avoid foods that are bad for you, try to avoid things that are not good for humanity in general. So, going in this direction of trying to create, where my push was to create a product that can give an answer, now you, as the consumer, have a choice where you don't have to take something else. You don't have to say I'm limited to junk or I'm limited to a product that has even my own, even other products built on. I'm looking at it and I sacrifice by not putting in preservatives into the product. I have no preservatives in there, in my product. I have no nitrates, I have no junk. Even the apple cider vinegar that we use is, you know, apple cider is not a regular vinegar, it's a step up. And then you're using organic. It's even more of a step up. Every single other product where you're dealing with a regular consumer to them it's all the same. They don't know the difference.

Speaker 3:

And I'm looking at it and I'm scratching my head. I'm like, oh my God, this thing has preservatives in it. This thing has nitrates in it. This thing has soy sauce in it. This has Worcestershire sauce in it. I'm like what other sauces do you want to put into it? It's just a clean carnivore product. Why are you filling it with things? Can you not figure out how to make it taste good without adding all those ingredients? So that's where I go. I'm out of the box thinker. So from there, I have already taken it to the next level we like. Right now we are focusing on making all the different salamis, all the different Italian dry whole muscle meats like what people know as the brasiolas and brasiolas and the capicoles, and all these fancy meats that are usually in charcuterie boards, and anyone who's careful with what they eat stays far away from it because of the nitrates that are in it. These products are unified with one thing they are all made with what? The one word everyone knows nitrates and nitrites. Everyone knows that. Now here, doctor, you're going to help me out with this one here.

Speaker 3:

There's a product out there which is called celery salt. Have you heard of it? People use celery salt which was grown. They use it because it's a fast growing vegetable or root, whatever you want to call it. It grows, so they plant it with nitrates in the ground. So now they take something that's already pre-filled with nitrates and now they're grinding up the celery salt and putting it in and saying, oh, it's a natural product, no, it's nitrates. And the USDA is actually now coming out with that. Even by saying that you have celery salt, you cannot say you have no nitrates in there.

Speaker 3:

So we, our focus, is creating products which are 100 clean. We are not going to use celery salt, we're not going to be using nitrates. All the products we're going to make is all going to have natural products with no nitrates, zero nitrates. But yet, sorry, I I don't think I can say zero nitrates. I think meat in its own merit has a bit of nitrates naturally in it Nitrites, nitrites, whatever it is, nitrites Added, no added, nothing added. And that's really the goal is to be able to give luxury food to even those that are careful and say, oops, can't eat the salami, oops, can't eat the meat, because it's got into the stuff. That scared my living daylights out of me and that's scared my living daylights out of me. And that's what we want to focus on Now. Why don't you ask me another question how I got about this?

Speaker 4:

I was going to ask and then you know you've sort of. You know the next step is there's different qualities of meat that you can be putting into these products, that you can be putting into these products, and I know you guys have also gone what I would say is sort of above and beyond to make sure that it's good quality meat going into you know you're taking good quality meat and you're not adding a bunch of crap to it to end up with a great product.

Speaker 3:

Very well, thank you, dr Vajay, for reminding me. I like that. Yes, I like that.

Speaker 4:

Maybe just also because our audience might not be familiar with built-on. Right here in the US, which is where a large part of our audience is, it's not very common. They are familiar with jerky, and so let's highlight the differences between jerky and built-on. First of all, because I think it will help people to understand what you're trying to do, what you're trying to accomplish.

Speaker 3:

So first, when you're dealing with a clean product, you start with the ingredients first, which is the core product. So the core product is actually a pasture raised, grass fed animal. So you, these are non and they are also mostly these are non NOAA antibiotics. None of that stuff. We take them from farms that come from, actually from South America, where we know that they're all natural, where they don't have the pressure that the local American farmers have of actually injecting antibiotics and feeding them grains and corn and everything to fatten them up. These are more simple farmers out in South America, which they're smaller animals because they're pasture raised and they have large spaces and they're all grass. None of them finished with corn or anything like that. They don't have corn but that kind of guarantee.

Speaker 3:

I don't have to ask it 20 times. I know that the product we're getting is a clean, really beautiful piece of meat that was cared for, that allowed it to naturally grow into its being. I'm going to go over now what you asked, dr Vajay, is the difference between jerky and biltong. Jerky is actually a product that you take it, you thinly slice it, marinate it in a bunch of beautiful sauces, like all the honeys and the barbecue sauces and brown sugars and you name it Anything to give it that you know the flavor that you associate with a good jerky. That's what it is and once it's like really soaked up, approximately about 20% of the product is the actual sauce and stuff is then put into a dehydrator or a oven on a low temperature for about four hours to dry up Usually about four hours, reaches temp and is then taken and put into bags.

Speaker 3:

It's already sliced, it's already everything and that's jerky for you, other than having you saying it's a protein. Are you getting the benefits of the protein? No, because it was still cooked, it was heat treated. Are you getting all the sugars in there? Yeah, you're getting a lot of sugars. Yep, go ahead, ask.

Speaker 2:

Cooking removes the benefit of the protein.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, I will let the more educated people than me answer that question Dr Ovadia and Big John.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, I think you know in some cases there are concerns around you know, especially overcooked meats, and you know denaturing the proteins and maybe introducing some you know contaminants, I guess, or some things that might be undesirable for your health. But certainly cooking does change. You know the nature of the proteins. Does that mean that we should all be raw carnivores? I don't know that I would take it that far, but I think you know what you're getting at is the way that jerky is cooked, you know probably further lessens the quality of the protein that you're getting in that product. And the other thing that I would put in there that Yehuda didn't mention is they tend to use pretty lean cuts of meat to make jerky. They don't want fat in there, so it's, you know, usually going to be a very low fat cut of meat to start with.

Speaker 2:

Okay, all right, thank you.

Speaker 3:

Also, I think there's the B6 and B12, that is, in more of the raw product rather than the cooked product, which is cooked out. Is that a true statement?

Speaker 4:

Honestly, I'm not sure about that. I don't know if John has insight in there.

Speaker 1:

I know that the grass-fed and the pasture-raised definitely have more of the nutrient-dense. The cooking again, depending on how it's cooked, I mean certainly if it's cooked for long periods of time you're going to reduce and knock out some of those nutrients, but I don't know exactly how much. I can't give an empirical answer to that because I think that puts a gray area. But Yehuda's point is that, or he's going to bring the point of how biltong is what is it? I'm going to introduce some air dry. Yeah, all right, now we're going to go what dry?

Speaker 3:

Yeah, all right.

Speaker 3:

Now we're going to go. What is biltong? Biltong is actually a word. Some people ask me is it biltong? Nope, it's not a biltong. I promise you it's not. There's no tongue in it. It's actually. It's just a South African way of saying.

Speaker 3:

It's a dry age steak, simple as that. Americans know what a dry age steak is. And age steak Simple as that. Americans know what a dry age steak is. And you go to a restaurant and you're paying a fortune for a dry age steak because you can't do it at home. You don't know how to dry age a steak and those fibers are not broken down properly for you, and in a restaurant, that's what they're doing for you.

Speaker 3:

This is actually in that exact way. The biltong is a steak we slice up literally it's a one-inch steak that is then put into a special chamber environment which is temperature-controlled and humidity-controlled, to get that perfect texture over a two-week period, and then it is sliced like as if you're sitting in a restaurant. You're taking that big slap steak and you're slicing it up for yourself and we put it in a bag. So what you're getting yeah, it's a little more drier than what you would get in a restaurant, because that's the purpose USDA has to have. You have it that way. It cannot be too wet in the bag to be shelf stable. So this is a drop more dry and it gives you that texture like a steak. Sorry Jack, it looks like I'm boring you already, oh no.

Speaker 1:

No, you're getting hungry, jack's getting hungry, that's true, you're talking about Brian.

Speaker 2:

I read you I read you and I haven't had breakfast yet. So come on, yeah, me neither.

Speaker 3:

Okay, now talking about breakfast and dieting, joburg, I said, okay, let me try this. I was going on bad eating habits already for a while, running to the factory back and forth and busy with sleepless nights. You just wake up in the morning, got all you that are listening to this. I'm sorry, I beg for forgiveness. I've eaten my babka in the morning and if you don't know what babka is, that is the most delicious chocolate yeast cake. Oh my God, it's amazing. Okay, that's what I've been eating for breakfast every morning, all right, Until one day.

Speaker 3:

I said enough. I said I'm going to do the Joburg diet. What's a Joburg diet? It's like I just ate Joburg biltong every single day for a week and see what happens. It was a little hard for transform my brain a little bit, but I went on my own product and I went on for a week and I lost 10 pounds in that week.

Speaker 2:

And the only thing you changed was moving from a dessert for breakfast to a meat for breakfast, Correct? Did you hear that, folks Ding?

Speaker 1:

ding ding, Ring the bell.

Speaker 3:

I've done that and I'm going to do it again next week. So I did it for a week and then I went back to being careful. So I actually cut out all my carbs, except for sorry, I still cheat. On Saturdays. I still cheat, but then. But next week I'm doing it again and I want to see how much I lose during the week, again going on it for a week. So what we're getting here is you get-.

Speaker 1:

And how'd you feel also, how did you?

Speaker 3:

feel. So what we're getting here is you get it and how do you feel? Also, how did you feel? Okay, so I'm going to do right now. Somehow this turned into an intermittent fasting type thing. I know I probably shouldn't even doing that, because I'm not really following anything specific. It's now New York time 151. I have not eaten anything today other than two large cups of water and a black coffee. That's it I had today. And I'm not lethargic, I'm not hungry, I am not. I'm nothing because I'm eating. I'm just eating clean and healthy instead of bloating myself. So I just feel great. This has really been a life changer for me, so I kind of feel good doing it also. Yeah, jack's laughing at me.

Speaker 4:

I'm loving this because so often.

Speaker 2:

The folks on our show have been doing this forever and we forget what it's like to move from the standard American diet to the clean way of eating and what an extraordinary difference it makes when folks do it so.

Speaker 3:

I'm laughing. I feel clean. I feel I've never felt like this. To be honest, I don't feel bloated, I don't. My stomach doesn't hurt. Nothing hurts me, I'm not even. I'm not even usually at this point I'd be falling down on my face because it's craving the carbs which I usually gave it, and I'm not giving it, but because I starved myself from the carbs. My body doesn't even want it. He's just happy. He's just happy.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, it's great to hear that perspective as someone who, again you came at this sort of from a business standpoint didn't really even recognize necessarily the health implications of it. But I guess hanging around all of us crazy people and probably being at the conference a few weeks ago the Low Carb USA conference that we met at, you know, was a positive influence. One other thing about Biltong so you mentioned apple cider vinegar. You know where does the vinegar come into play? You know, I know maybe some of my most stringent, hardcore, carnivore audience might cringe at that a little bit, but just talk about how the vinegar is used in the product and why it's used in the product.

Speaker 3:

When you're okay, very good question. And I know cause. When I was at the low carb event, I've met a lot of carnivore diet people who were asking me about like pepper and asking about the vinegar and the ingredients, and I kind of tried addressing it and me and Big John were actually talking about even creating new product that would even address the pure carnivores that need to eliminate some of the other products and look at a way of what to create in order to accommodate to that audience. Being that this is what our goal is, you might as well make some more products to satisfy more people. So the apple cider vinegar is a kill step and the USDA process of what kind of step? Kill step. It's called a kill step to kill bacteria.

Speaker 3:

On raw meat Okay, when you're letting raw meat dry and then you want to serve it to eat, letting raw meat dry and then you want to serve it to eat, you know usually it would have to heat up to 165 degrees in order to be safe for eating, but if you want to do that without it, there's actually a few steps that are actually done in it. Part of it is drying it, part of it is putting in. Even before we begin, we're putting it in a parasitic acid to kill any parasitic, any parasitics on there, clean it's like a water parasitic. And then we, and then the apple cider vinegar. Not just that, it's a curing agent that actually adds good flavor, but it also helps and reduce the microbials that are in the meat. So when you get it you know you're eating a safe, a safe to eat product and not question, you know, is there any microbials, being that it was not heat treated? I hope I answered that properly.

Speaker 2:

Okay, let me. Let's turn to to where the rubber beats the road. Phil, you've eaten this stuff. Thumbs up, thumbs down.

Speaker 4:

Give us the Reddit overview. Yeah, I mean, as I said earlier, definite thumbs up and, like I said, these guys were good enough to send me some free samples to start with. These guys were good enough to send me some free samples to start with and I've gone back and ordered more because it really has become a go-to for me, like I said, as a convenience product, right when I'm traveling or if it's just I'm not going to be able to cook a steak or make myself something to eat and I want to have something available. This really has become my go-to there because it is convenient and it is a clean product. That you know I have no qualms about eating and no qualms recommending you know to my followers.

Speaker 4:

Now, you know, like everything right, give it a try is what I say. But you know, I think it makes, I think I see where it, you know, fills in some of the gaps, some of the challenges that people have when they're trying to transition and then trying to maintain. You know this way of eating. You know we have to meet people where they are and you know, I know, quite frankly, some of my colleagues in this space will kind of say you know, you just, you know, just eat your steak all the time and you know, if you're not able to eat your steak, you just fast and you know. But we have to realize that people need options, you know, and people need what we might call snacks and children. Right on cue, you bought in some.

Speaker 1:

What a good time my granddaughter.

Speaker 4:

For children. I have no problem. You can put a bag of this in your kid's school bag, so they have snacks at school that are going to be much better than anything they're going to get served in school generally. That's what I like about it. And then, of course, I like that, again, they're doing it right. They're using well-sourced, responsibly raised meats and they're not putting anything additional any of the stuff that gets put into all these foods, maybe to help increase its mass appeal or just, quite frankly, in the case of the sugars that get added to so many things, just to increase its addictiveness. And that's really my review of the product.

Speaker 2:

I'm looking at the website all three flavors. Here is the full list of ingredients, folks Beef, apple cider, vinegar, salt spices. That's it. That's all that's in. It got it, I gotta tell you, all by itself, I love that already. I was thinking this morning about what I like to eat. My diet consists basically of meat, coffee, dark chocolate and I like salt.

Speaker 4:

I think, figures prominently in most of our diet. I think that's great, you know. Before we wrap up here, maybe talk a little bit about where you're going. I know you mentioned some of the other meat products that you're looking to develop. If you can, you know, figure out how to do that in a clean way, which I know is sort of a guiding principle for you guys. So maybe talk a little bit about what the future of Joe Berg Meats looks like.

Speaker 1:

And a couple of new flavors. Yehuda, you want to introduce Sure, let's talk about it.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, yeah, dr.

Speaker 4:

Avani, you're talking about.

Speaker 3:

My granddaughter here is looking at you. She's whatever you're talking about, I want it. I want you. She's getting excited. I want it Hi.

Speaker 2:

Hannah Hi. Hannah Say hi.

Speaker 3:

I'm excited, really excited, forward thinking of creating some new product here On the flavor side of the steak. We'll call it the steaks. The three flavors are going to be one Korean barbecue. Yes, I know you're like. Wait a second. How are you going to do that without sugar? Yes, I think who was it Doctor was telling me about different sweeteners that we're going to try with, like allulose, right?

Speaker 4:

Does that go? Dr Avadja Seems to be I would say Jerry's still out, but it seems to be one of the better. I mean, it's not a sugar alternative, it is a sugar, but it seems to have some unique properties that might make it particularly interesting to people doing ketogenic diets.

Speaker 3:

Okay, Now we're doing a black truffle flavor. This is going to be the biggest hit of all truffle. I see some smiles there on that one. There's nothing like it out there. You like truffle?

Speaker 2:

no, nobody likes truffle.

Speaker 3:

Okay, I'll try it all right and a uh like, a like a chili lime oh, there we go.

Speaker 2:

Now we're talking yes, take the truffle. Take the truffle out of the bag and double up the chili lime for me Really.

Speaker 3:

I'm all there on that one. I'm waiting for the truffle because I'm like I'm a truffle buff myself. So that's on that side. And the other side we're looking for now is the whole muscle and salamis that are going to be available for all you listeners that are praying and saying is somebody going to do something clean and delicious and good and taste better than what the stuff that tastes in the store like? That's what we are going to deliver. We are going to give that to you and you're going to be able to buy your, let's say, your brother, your sister, your father, your friend or your company partner or anyone else that's going to want a. You know that they are ketogenic or you know they're carnivore. You could turn around and be able to buy them a charcuterie board right from our website. You can be able to go to joebergmeatscom, be able to say I want a charcuterie board and it will be like carnivore ready. You just give it to him and you don't have to worry about the ingredients. It's clean. I like that carnivore ready.

Speaker 1:

I like that line yeah definitely so.

Speaker 4:

No, I mean again, I think you know, looking at some of these traditional, you know meat products that you know were made for meat products that were made in clean ways, and then sort of big food, the food industry got involved and now they're made in not so clean ways and shortcuts are taken and they want to get them to market quicker than spending the two years aging them or whatever it might be. So I think the more that we can get back to that and give people options is going to be great.

Speaker 2:

We've made folks listen this long. I'm going to spell it for you folks, because it's not exactly what you think. Joe Berg meets J-O-B-U-R-G. Short for Johannesburg. J-o-b-u-r-g. Short for Johannesburg Joburg Meats plural.

Speaker 1:

I've already got three different flavors in my cart and desperately wishing that the chili lime was already available. And we'd like to offer a discount code.

Speaker 2:

One second, one second. Big time Wait, wait wait, I got it, you're running.

Speaker 3:

Wait, I got it, you're running. You know, instead of instead of you offering, why don't you ask Dr Avada what he wants to give us as a special offer to his listeners?

Speaker 2:

Absolutely.

Speaker 1:

That was what we offer.

Speaker 4:

I'll suggest the discount code. You guys can say how much of a discount it will be, because I certainly don't want to give away your business. But let's use the code iFixHearts and we'll get a discount for everyone who goes to the website and orders using that.

Speaker 3:

You got it, big John. How much of a discount are you offering? 15%, there you go. 15% for all listeners that use the code iFixHearts.

Speaker 1:

I love it. I'm putting it up within five minutes of the conversation.

Speaker 3:

No, you should be putting it up right now, because as you're listening, as we're talking, people already got logging on.

Speaker 1:

Okay, okay, okay. It's going up right now.

Speaker 3:

In five minutes it's going to be too late. Okay, yeah, now, because people are already going on there as you're talking.

Speaker 4:

Love the enthusiasm.

Speaker 2:

I could just keep this going all day, because I'm talking with these guys.

Speaker 3:

I fix hearts up. Okay, you know what? Maybe we can make a part two. We can do this again.

Speaker 2:

I think maybe we might. I have no idea what we're going. A part two we can do this again. I think maybe we might. I have no idea what we'll talk about.

Speaker 3:

Oh, we got plenty. Yeah, let us run.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, we can just have fun. You guys may need your own podcast.

Speaker 4:

I know we might have to do a spin-off show here.

Speaker 1:

Please, louise, let's do it, we can do it All right. We could just call it Ovadia Meats M-E-A-T-S. Right the pun. There you go. Ovadia Meetings.

Speaker 2:

The meetup Right Okay.

Speaker 1:

The meetup Amazing.

Speaker 2:

Before this thing goes completely, totally, utterly off the rails, and I feel like we are in imminent danger right now. Yes, I'm going to say thank you for joining us. John and Yuda of Joburg Beats Folks, I haven't eaten it, but I got to tell you. If Dr O says it's good, I'm definitely jumping on it. Joburgbeatscom discount code IFIXHEARTS gets you 15% 15 off. I'm ordering a bag of everything right now.

Speaker 2:

thanks for joining us, thank you next time, thank you really a pleasure this has been the stay off my operating table podcast and we will talk to you all later.

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Dr. Philip Ovadia

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Jack Heald

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