15 OctOber 31 - NOvember 6, 2024 dallasobserver.com DALLAS OBSERVER Classified | MusiC | dish | Culture | unfair Park | Contents I was a little west of Cameron, Texas, when the fog ap- peared, scattering the beams of my car’s headlights that guided me through the darkness. As I turned off High- way 190 on the east side of town, a break in the fog re- vealed the first sliver of dawn, a muted smudge of orange and blue that separated the terrain from the inky sky. The previous evening, an employee of 44 Farms warned me to watch for deer as I navigated toward the main high- way from the 44 Farms ranch a few miles northwest of Cam- eron. As I returned to the ranch the next morning, the fog and the threat of deer had my full attention. A big day lay ahead at 44 Farms, and I didn’t want any unexpected run-ins with the wildlife to spoil my plans. Over the last several years, restaurants across Dallas have leaned into sharing where they source the food they serve. It’s a trend that customers are in tune with. What started as “farm to table” has expanded to the point where it’s not un- common to see even smaller restaurants touting the rela- tionships they have with suppliers. 44 Farms is a name that appears often, particularly in beef-loving Texas. Rodeo Goat’s multiple locations all serve burgers made from 44 Farms beef. That slice of suc- culent brisket you get at Zavala’s Barbecue in Grand Prai- rie comes from 44 Farms, too. And at Knife Steakhouse in Dallas, Knife Plano at Willow Bend and Knife Italian in Las Colinas, 44 Farms steaks are all over the menu, a deci- sion chef John Tesar made before he opened the first Knife location over a decade ago. It’s natural to assume that these and other restaurants are serving 44 Farms beef because they trust the source of the product that goes into their delicious dishes. But I wondered what 44 Farms was doing differently to produce beef that Dallas restaurants adore. I heard that 44 Farms was hosting a bull sale on Oct. 26, with ranchers across the country de- scending on Cameron, so I trekked 160 miles south to tag along and learn more. B ob McClaren is 44 Farms’ president and CEO. He’s tall and tan, with silver hair and a comforting, pater- nal voice. The 44 Farms ranch is the same land, next to the Little River, where his great grandparents started ranching over a century ago. But McClaren’s dad told Bob how hard it was to make a living on a small ranch and im- plored him to do something else with his life. “So I followed his advice and became a lawyer,” McLaren says. In the mid-1990s, McClaren and his sister acquired a third of the family ranch, about 200 acres. McClaren bought out his relatives’ share and worked on expanding the ranch, convinced that he could make more than a meager living. “It was wild, and it was rough, but I remembered what my dad had said, that unless you had a big ranch, making a living was tough” McClaren says. After clearing much of the land to function as a ranch, McClaren went to work selecting the breed of cattle he would raise. Longhorn cattle are an ingrained piece of Texas’ cultural identity, but McClaren believed that Black Angus cattle could be successfully raised in Texas. “I thought that if people knew about the Angus breed in Texas, they would see the value that others were seeing,” McClaren says. “The knock on Angus cattle is that they wouldn’t survive in hot and humid weather here, but we tried it, and they’ve thrived. They really do quite well.” McClaren says that most cattle ranches in Texas now have Black Angus cattle, which was unheard of just 20 years ago. D espite younger generations who are dialing back how much red meat they eat, the United States remains a country of beef eaters. According to the U.S. Depart- ment of Agriculture, just under 27 billion pounds of beef was produced nationwide in 2023, and the figure looks to tick up slightly in 2024. If there were any questions about the scale of this busi- ness, my visit to 44 Farms’ fall bull sale removed any Nathan Hunsinger Nathan Hunsinger A rib-eye steak at John Tesar’s Knife from 44 Farms. OUTSTANDING IN THEIR FIELD How 44 Farms became the prime source of the beef Dallas adores. BY CHRIS WOLFGANG | CITY OF ATE | t Dish Tyler Gideon (left) works at 44 Farms, where Jake Gideon and Brent Hodges review cattle before the auction. >> p16
