Image generously supplied by Meat & Livestock Australia Why butchers are dancing in the streets   Steak is back on the menu and now has a science-based guarantee of tenderness for diners.  SUE BENNETT reports on our taste for red meat. After years of being slightly on the outer, red meat is back in favor.  And nowhere is it more visible than in restaurants. A couple of weeks ago Blacktown Workers and Sports' Club changed its revolving Hi-Lights restaurant to steak house.  It's not as simple as swapping the menus and labels. The kitchen, previously set up for pan cooking, had a re-fit to char grill and pasta cookers. Before the change, 45 per cent of meals were beef and lamb.  In the past two weeks, it's increased to 80 per cent. "I've worked in the industry for 20 years and I've seen a significant shift in demand back to red meat - steaks and lamb." Says executive chef Martyn Webster-Williams. The past few decades haven't always been easy for the red-meat industry.  Fuelled by fad diets and celebrity-driven eating trends, people in developed countries across the world turned away from red meat, in many instances not eating it at all. It's still quite common to hear people say they "only eat red meat once or twice a week" but that's one or two times more than previously. While living in New York, Peter Holmes a Court, now head of one of the country's largest cattle companies (AACo), stopped eating meat for 18 months.  The advice of a misguided dietician, he now says. In Australia, the dancing butchers' "feel good" meat campaign has driven home the message that red meat has dietary qualities, primarily iron, that are essential for good health. There's another reason to return to red meat and rather less visible.  It's the flavour and the tenderness.  In its research to get people back to beef, the industry found tenderness was the consumers' most important request. It coincided with the introduction of the Meat Standards Australia (MSA) program.  In this remarkable system, the industry can guarantee a piece of meat is tender.  "In the two years since I arrived at Hi-Lights, I've introduced MSA meat," says Webster-Williams.  "When I arrived, there was a lot of diner feedback about variable meat.  You need consistency.  MSA gives you that." 'I've seen a significant shift in demand back to red meat - to steak and lamb' When MSA meat arrived on the Sydney market four years ago, it was branded as such.  The industry's since shifted direction with MSA standards now underpinning branded meat.  So, visit Hi-Lights and the menu will say CAAB rump, a 300g grain-fed certified Australian Angus beef rump steak chargrilled to order ($16.50).  It also offers CAAB rib eye ($21.50) and sirloin ($20.50). Visit Kingsley's Steak and Crabhouse, Woolloomooloo, and certified Angus beef is again identified.  But branded steak is much less prevalent in Sydney than say, Brisbane, where a major steak house selling point is its 'make'. There is now a large range of beef brands appearing, including Stockyard, AACo and Hereford Prime.  NSW restaurants and butchers may buy MSA meat but they don't always label it as such, preferring to rely on its quality for return business. MSA works like this.  At the abattoir, a beef carcass will be graded using data from the farmer for each animal along with technical information such as its breed, sex and feed. A unit will 'read' the meat and will provide scientific information which, categorically states how each piece of the carcass will eat. Only the highest quality gets MSA rating.  It's a remarkable system and means butchers can accurately label meat and how its best used.  It also means if any problem arises, DNA testing can trace a piece of meat all the way back to the grower. But the butcher can't be held responsible for everything.  If you buy a fillet steak, take it home and try to casserole it and it falls apart then it's not their fault because the item was to grill or roast.  Beef branding is also going one step further with producers working on individual traits such as hormone free; organic; antibiotic free; grass fed; grain fed. Bush's Fresh Meat, which sells MSA-labelled meat, introduced its own Riverina blue brand about 12 months ago.  Specifications for meat to reach the grade are even more stringent than MSA. It's more costly but selling well at stores in Castle Hill, Roselands, Miranda Fair, Macquarie Centre, Hurstville and Shellharbour. "Customers do ask what it is ... obviously it's more expensive but when the tenderness guarantee is explained, it has a market," says marketing manager David Barnes.   "You buy a piece of meat this week and it's exactly the same tenderness and quality as the piece bought last week." And that is what MSA delivers ... consistently and guaranteed tenderness each and every time.  Extract Sydney Daily Telegraph - Food and Wine - Wednesday May 14, 2003