Hi! My name is Victor Albishu, I’m the chef de cuisine here at BLT steaks in Washington DC, we’re talking about beef basics. Today, more specifically, we’re talking about different grades of beef. Here at the restaurant, we specialize in prime and certified black angus beef. Prime is not so easily found in your local butcher shop or grocery stores, but what you’ll generally find is choice, which is the majority of meat that the USDA approves. Certified black angus is a higher level of choice, and that, the grading system comes more from the intermuscular fat within the beef or the marblization within the actual muscle, which intensifies the flavor and tenderness. There are all different types of rating, there’s also select, which we do not use here at the restaurant, but you see those a lot in the grocery stores, but I will recommend to somebody to go with either choice or prime. Although prime is a little bit more difficult to find, because it is only three percent of all the beef produced is certified prime. There is also different kinds of meat that we get here at the restaurant, namely the Japanese wagyu, or the kobe beef that they refer to. Kobe is actually the area in Japan where it comes from, wagyu is the actual cattle. Wa, implying that it’s Japanese, and gyu, implying that it’s actually cattle. It is the most intensified, it has the most intensified marbling within the actual muscle, and it is very rich in omega 3 and omega 6 fatty acids, making a very clean, although fatty piece of meat. Next we’ll be talking about different cuts of meat and showing you the places they come from.