The Dogma of Meat - The New York Times
From Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s food pyramid to online influencers, beef has become more than just a source of protein. Credit... Claire Merchlinsky/The New York Times; Photographs by Getty Supported by By Lisa Miller Lisa Miller likes her steak medium rare. We live in a heyday of meat. Americans ate $45 billion of beef in 2025, up more than 10 percent from the previous year, according to Beef Research, an industry marketing group. Ground beef is driving sales — McDonald’s recently released its new half-pounder, the Big Arch — but steak sales remain robust. In a February interview at CattleCon, the beef industry conference, U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. revealed that his favorite beef cut was strip steak. He eats beef every day — “usually twice a day,” he said, to applause. Americans have always been among the world’s most enthusiastic carnivores, but this boom is about more than mere preference or taste. Once maligned as the culprit in a nationwide epi