Making Their Mark

These are exciting times for Eagle Ridge. As the Reinhart brand undergoes a sweeping relaunch—complete with a new certified angus beef program—its team of young guns is busy making great steaks more approachable than ever. Here, three of the people shaping Eagle Ridge’s future share their thoughts on delivering the dining experiences consumers are looking for today.

Pictured above (left to right)

Jon Lerch
Vice President of Meat Operations
Eagle Ridge® & Legacy 72™

Amanda Page
Marketing Administrator
Eagle Ridge® & Legacy 72™

Justin VanHorn
Eagle Ridge® &
Legacy 72™ Chef

Chuck Short Rib

rfs#31168

Rub lollipop with a mixture of Dijon mustard, prepared horseradish, minced garlic, salt, and pepper. Sear in a Dutch oven with roughly chopped onions. Once seared, braise with a Lakefront River west Stein, add minced garlic and a bay leaf. Cover and place in the oven cook until fork tender. Serve with roasted veggie medley and juice from cooking the meat.

KC Strip

rfs#30090

Season strip with salt and pepper and sear each side in a cast iron.
Braise with a shot of bourbon and finish in the oven. Serve with Chimichurri and frites.

NY Strip Steak

rfs#29614

Tenderloin

rfs#29786

Season tenderloin with salt and pepper. Place in the oven and roast to medium rare. While tenderloin is roasting on a skewer, place red onion, fresh mozzarella, and cherry tomato wrapped in a fresh basil leaf. Once your tenderloin is done, slice thin fold in half, and zig zag on the end of the skewer. Finish with balsamic glaze.

Boneless Ribeye Steak

rfs#29336

Porterhouse Steak

rfs#29932

Season Porterhouse steak with salt, pepper and minced garlic. Turn oven on broil. Wait 20 minutes and place steak on broiler pan and cook to the desired temperature. Serve with creamed peas and onions and a baked potato.

The focus is on providing superior quality products with a traceable background, according to Jon Lerch, Reinhart’s vice president for meat operations.

“We launched our new Legacy 72 Angus by Eagle Ridge product line, which is an upper two-thirds certified Angus product, in May,” he says. “It’s a hot commodity out there across all the markets.”

The line is a perfect fit for a marketplace in which diners are more conscientious than ever about what they’re eating.

“It’s a breed-specific, 51 percent, black-hide program, and it creates a premium quality product underneath the breeding standards of that program,” he explains.

As part of the relaunch, the brand’s facilities and packaging are being improved as well, Lerch says.

“We’re working with our La Crosse, Wis., meat-cutting plant, upgrading the equipment and production facility to better service all of our customers,” he says. “We’re also changing all of our boxes and going to a corrugated craft box for sustainability reasons.”

Even the tagline has been changed to reflect the history of the brand.

“Our new tagline is ‘Handcrafted meats since 1972’ because the Reinhart organization was started from a meat plant in Wisconsin in 1972,” Lerch explains. “Legacy 72 now ties back to our tagline, and we can develop the story of how the company was started from a meat company.”

The new Angus program is designed to meet the demands of the modern consumer, according to Amanda Page, marketing administrator for Eagle Ridge.

“Legacy 72 Angus boxed beef is a certified program, which you can find on the USDA website,” she explains. “The demand for high-quality beef is out there, and our sales teams now have a great program to become a leader in selling center of the plate.”

Consistency in quality, along with a broad product line, is essential to success, Page adds.

“Legacy 72 Angus boxed beef comes from a single facility in Dakota City, which is located in the heart of the Midwest,” she says. “Having a single sourced facility provides consistency in our program.”

“We have a great assortment of products, with roughly 27 different boxed beef items,” she continues. “With multiple Eagle Ridge co-packers across Reinhart Country, they are able to take our Angus boxed beef and further process the product and provide our customers a cut steak program as well.”

When all is said and done, the value of the Legacy 72 Angus program can be found on the plate, says Eagle Ridge chef Justin Vanhorn.

“The meats speak for themselves,” no matter how they’re prepared, Vanhorn says. “From plain old salt and pepper, to searing them with a blueberry horseradish glaze, to a perfectly grilled steak topped with a chimichurri and served with a simple frites.”

Related Articles

Going Deep