Steak in South Africa isn't like the stuff you'll find in the United States. All of the beef has to be taken from cows younger than a year and have absolutely no marbling to ensure the beef is lean. To highlight the nation's delicious meats, Steve Maresch set out to create a competition pitting the best ranchers head to head for the title of The Ultimate Beef Challenge. The winner? Brian Angus' Wagyu strip loin.
During a South Africa safari, you'll undoubtedly have numerous opportunities to try out the local cuisine, and if you happen to be a beef-loving omnivore, you should definitely try out a slab of steak. Better yet, if you manage to find a restaurant that serves Angus' Wagyu, you may just find yourself in meat heaven.
What exactly makes an award-winning slice of beef? For this competition, judges look at a number of characteristics, including color, texture, taste and even more obscure and subjective categories like mouth feel and personality. Not surprisingly, Wagyu beat out the competition in every single category.
People who tried this cut described it as being melt-in-your-mouth delicious, shockingly tender and the undisputed champion. Other featured steaks came from a variety of backgrounds and boasted starkly different flavors, such as the Senopol breed, which defied South African norms and was actually from a four-year-old cow. Some judges thought the Senopol had more flavor than the Wagyu, perhaps because of its age and the fattening process that takes place in the last few years of the cow's life.
