Beef vs. Mutton

Main Difference

The main difference between Beef and Mutton is that the Beef is a meat from cattle and Mutton is a meat of a sheep.

• Beef

  Beef is the culinary name for meat from cattle, particularly skeletal muscle. Humans have been eating beef since prehistoric times. Beef is a source of high-quality protein and nutrients.

  Beef skeletal muscle meat can be used as is by merely cutting into certain parts roasts, short ribs or steak (filet mignon, sirloin steak, rump steak, rib steak, rib eye steak, hanger steak, etc.), while other cuts are processed (corned beef or beef jerky). Trimmings, on the other hand, are usually mixed with meat from older, leaner (therefore tougher) cattle, are ground, minced or used in sausages. The blood is used in some varieties called blood sausage. Other parts that are eaten include other muscles and offal, such as the oxtail, liver, tongue, tripe from the reticulum or rumen, glands (particularly the pancreas and thymus, referred to as sweetbread), the heart, the brain (although forbidden where there is a danger of bovine spongiform encephalopathy, BSE, commonly referred to as mad cow disease), the kidneys, and the tender testicles of the bull (known in the United States as calf fries, prairie oysters, or Rocky Mountain oysters). Some intestines are cooked and eaten as is, but are more often cleaned and used as natural sausage casings. The bones are used for making beef stock.

  Beef from steers and heifers is similar. Depending on economics, the number of heifers kept for breeding varies. The meat from older bulls, because it is usually tougher, is frequently used for mince (known as ground beef in the United States). Cattle raised for beef may be allowed to roam free on grasslands, or may be confined at some stage in pens as part of a large feeding operation called a feedlot (or concentrated animal feeding operation), where they are usually fed a ration of grain, protein, roughage and a vitamin/mineral preblend.

  Beef is the third most widely consumed meat in the world, accounting for about 25% of meat production worldwide, after pork and poultry at 38% and 30% respectively. In absolute numbers, the United States, Brazil, and the People’s Republic of China are the world’s three largest consumers of beef; Uruguay, however, has the highest beef and veal consumption per capita, followed by Argentina and Brazil. According to the data from OECD, the average Uruguayan ate over 42 kg (93 lb) of beef or veal in 2014, representing the highest beef/veal consumption per capita in the world. In comparison, the average American consumed only about 24 kg (53 lb) beef or veal in the same year, while African countries, such as Mozambique, Ghana, and Nigeria, consumed the least beef or veal per capita.

  Cows are considered sacred in the Hinduism and most observant Hindus who do eat meat almost always abstain from beef.

  In 2015, the world’s largest exporters of beef were India, Brazil and Australia. Beef production is also important to the economies of Uruguay, Canada, Paraguay, Mexico, Argentina, Belarus and Nicaragua.

• Mutton

  Lamb, hogget and mutton are the meat of domestic sheep (species Ovis aries) at different ages.

  A sheep in its first year is called a lamb, and its meat is also called lamb. The meat of a juvenile sheep older than one year is hogget; outside the USA this is also a term for the living animal. The meat of an adult sheep is mutton, a term only used for the meat, not the living animals. In the Indian subcontinent the term mutton is also used to refer to goat meat.Lamb is the most expensive of the three types, and in recent decades sheep meat is increasingly only retailed as “lamb”, sometimes stretching the accepted distinctions given above. The stronger-tasting mutton is now hard to find in many areas, despite the efforts of the Mutton Renaissance Campaign in the UK. In Australia, the term prime lamb is often used to refer to lambs raised for meat. Other languages, for example French, Spanish, Italian and Arabic, make similar, or even more detailed, distinctions between sheep meat by age and sometimes by gender and diet, though these languages do not always use different words to refer to the animal and its meat — for example, lechazo in Spanish refers to meat from milk-fed (unweaned) lambs.

• Beef (noun)

  the flesh of a cow, bull, or ox, used as food

  “beef cattle”

  “there was the smell of roast beef”

• Beef (noun)

  a cow, bull, or ox fattened for its meat

  “a beef sent to the abattoir”

• Beef (noun)

  flesh with well-developed muscle

  “he needs a little more beef on his bones”

• Beef (noun)

  strength or power

  “he was brought in to give the team more beef”

• Beef (noun)

  the substance of a matter

  “it’s more a sketch than a policy—where’s the beef?”

• Beef (noun)

  a complaint or grievance

  “he has a beef with education: it doesn’t teach the basics of investing”

• Beef (verb)

  complain

  “he was beefing about how the recession was killing the business”