FAT Interactive Tool
What your ground-beef label can — and can’t — tell you
Ground beef is a blend: fatty trim from grain-finished cattle cut with very lean trim from cull cows, a growing share of it imported. No public record ties a package to one animal — so this tool doesn’t pretend to trace your burger. Instead, answer what’s actually printed on your package, and it decodes what each statement (and each silence) legally means. The same logic runs in the FAT app when you scan a label.
Your package
1. What does the product name say?
2. Does it say “Product of USA” or “Made in the USA”?
3. USDA establishment number, if shown (e.g. “EST. 245”) — optional
No number on a store-ground tray? That’s the retail exemption (9 CFR 303.1(d)) — the store’s grinder log has the answer, and it’s fair to ask for it.
4. Does the label state the animal’s harvest age (e.g. “22–28 months”)?
5. Does it describe the grind (e.g. “coarse ground”, “double ground”, a plate size)?
Sources: USDA FSIS 9 CFR 319.15 & 310.22; USDA “Product of USA” final rule (eff. Jan 1, 2026); Oklahoma State University Extension; FAT research papers Lean Beef in America and Harvest Age, Grind Specification, and Named-Primal Grinds. This tool describes documented rules and industry patterns — never the contents of your specific package.
📊 Wondering what that grass-fed premium actually costs — week by week, against conventional beef? See FAT’s Grass-Fed Retail Price Tracker, the living price companion to this decoder.
Prepared by Dirk Adams with the assistance of AI.
About the hamburger label decoder
The hamburger label decoder reads the statements printed on a ground beef or hamburger package and explains what each one legally means and what it leaves out. It does not trace a specific package; it describes the rules and the industry patterns behind them. For the supply chain behind ground beef, see Lean Beef in America, Harvest Age, Grind Specification and Named-Primal Grinds and Purchased Silence. USDA’s consumer guidance is at FSIS: Ground Beef and Food Safety.
