Hi Kaye; I think americans avoid raw meat because our supply is in so terrible shape, health wise. I don't know if it makes the news over there, but people die here from eating even restaurant hambergers that are not cooked enough to kill the bacteria that has come into our meat supplies. There were recently multiple re-calls of millions of pounds of hamberger because of comtamination. The "official" fix is to order everyone to over cook it well done to kill the bacteria instead of eliminating the bacteria from the meat supply in the first place. Kind of a sad situation . You're lucky to have a friend making organic meat available. A branch of a store I deal with when I'm in Boulder, Colorado, just opened here in Phoenix that carries Colman beef, which is a ranch that feeds organic grains & puts no hormones into the food or cattle. It's the only commercial brand of "natural meat" I know of, so I'm glad to see them branching out to states other than Colorado, which is where they're located in. No, I don't work for them or own stock, & this is not an ad, just perhaps useful info. I'd have to agree that more natural food sources are best and fresh is important.. Too bad so many of us live in the bigger cities where it's harder to find these things..:) Hi Melissa; Just wanted to thank you for the ref. to the very good list of high quality "natural" food. I've used Natures' recipe for a long time & have very good experience with it. My 18 yo Jimmy cat is doing well on Sensible choice, Bunny likes Flint River Ranch, Sachi likes Innova, when I'm in Colo. they like Precise feline. The only one I didn't see on the list I use is: Bench & Field Super Premium Cat food ; 800-525-4802, 32% protein, 21% fat., New Paris, Indiana. First ingredients are: Chicken by-product meal, chicken, brewers rice flour, ground corn, beef tallow (preserved with vitamin E and C, dried beet pulp, dried whole egg, meat meal, fishmeal... now these last two, does that imply the "other meat sources" we want to avoid? Mostly it's my cat Kila that thrives on the stuff, but still... Take care, Gary & the gang of fur Timmy's web site=<http://www.concentric.net/~Gferret/> ICQ#4461104 [Posted in FML issue 2123]