Nick DiGiovanni - How Wagyu Is Made (Farm To Table)

Episode Date: November 25, 2025

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The voice that we love that we're going to be. This is Michael. A Wagyu cow worth so much money that he has his own security guard. In this video, we're going to see where Wagyu comes from, how it's auctioned and sold for millions of dollars each day, and how it's eventually broken down and served at restaurants. And I came to Kobe for a reason. All Kobe beef comes from Wagyu cattle, but not all Wagyu beef is Kobe.

If Wagyu is your average car, Kobe is a Ferrari. Just for some size comparison, I am 6'33 and this cow is almost as tall as me. I didn't know that they could be that bait. I would not want to mess with this guy. Hey, buddy. Usunaga, thank you for inviting me to your farm. This man here is responsible for raising some of the most expensive cattle on earth. And when he started, he had just 50 cows.

But now he has over 500 cows. And this is just one of the many barns that they have here on the farm. Wa'i in Wagyu means Japanese. So Wagyu means Japanese cow. Could we start by going and seeing the baby cows? Yes. Okay. Let's go.

Let's go. So, it's so cute. They have a jacket on because they're so cold. So how much do all these babies weigh right now? 25 kilograms to 30 kilograms. So how long will it take for these ones to get to the medium-sized cows over there? About three to four months. They gain about one kilogram per day.

Wow, they're growing really fast. Yeah, they grow about 10 times faster than humans. How old is this cow right here? One week. If this cow right here that's already this size is only one week old, imagine how big the ones we're going to see later in this video that are fully grown are going to be. There's so many myths online, I feel like, about Wagyu.

Some say that they're massaged every single day. I've also heard that some get Mozart played to them while they sleep at night. And I've even heard that a lot of them are fed sake and different alcohol and they're drunk all the time. Is any of that true? Let's find out. So these cows now are good size bigger than the babies. Like there's a big difference all of a sudden in the size. How old are these cows and what's happening now? Well here the cows are about one year old to three years old and this is the phase where we feed them. How much food do they eat? They eat about eight kilos of feet per day. How do you know which ones are going to have that really

beautiful marbling because when I think of Wagyu and when anyone thinks of Wagyu, they think of that amazing intramuscular fat, all the fat between the muscle and that's what makes Wagyu so special. How do you know which cows are going to have that good marbling? I take a look at the area with the sirloin, which is on the back, that gives me an idea of the quality of the meat. You can just tell just by looking. Yes, once you get used to it. He's a genius. This just shows a scale of how wide and how big one of these cows is compared to a human. He isn't really leading the cow right now the cow is sort of leading him and he's just crossing his fingers that it doesn't freak out how big are these cows how much do they weigh tajima cows weigh about 700

kios wow 700 kilos how much is that in pounds like a thousand four hundred what's the biggest cow you've ever raised or seen the heaviest we had weighed 950 kilograms can we see how you make their food let's go see it it smells very fermented here is this maybe the alcohol or sake that we were talking about earlier. Sake beer, whiskey, meeting soy sauce. So there's five different alcohols in the feed. Are the cows getting drunk? If you give them too much, they'll get drunk.

Have you ever made one drunk? I've never done it. No? They go to sleep. So they don't really get drunk. They guess they just knock out right away. So this one right here is a sake feed, Mirren, which I use for like a sweet cooking wine.

It's actually one of my favorite ingredients in the kitchen. And this is a sugar cane feed. It smells like a mix of raisins and fig Newton's. And this feed here is from beer. Actually, it smells really good. Kind of a gentle beer scent. This one is whiskey. These cows literally just seem to be sitting here all the time and just eating, eating, eating, eating.

And I guess that's because that's their full-time job and that's what they do. That's how they're getting as big as they're getting. Do you ever eat it? No. No? Would I be okay if I ate it? No, you can't eat that. All these cows have these tags on them.

What do the tags mean? All cows raised in Japan, not just Wagyu, have these tags. with a 10-digit tracking number. You can use that number to look up all sorts of information, like where the cow was born and raised. Do the cows get excited when people walk around? They're all causing this commotion now. Their heads are all sticking out when we're standing here.

Do they have personalities? Yeah, they get interested by the different smells and the different people that they haven't met before. I can't stop washing these guys drinking. They're fighting over the water. It's natural spring water. The water they give to wagu cattle is the same water that humans can drink.

I think that's the secret recipe. So it's really high-quality water. Yeah. Now that we've seen a farm and how Wagyu cows are raised, the next step is an auction where Wagyu cows are sold to buyers from all around the world. Nobody can get into these auctions unless you know Yamamoto-San. Hello. So we are entering the auction room.

Whoa. So this is where the auction happens. Yeah. And the cows are going to eventually be coming one by one. Exactly. Yeah. Okay. So, what, I can't.

How? What the fuck am I supposed to do with these? Do I look okay? Yeah, very good. Very good on you, yeah. I feel like you're lying. Yeah, no, no, no, no, very good on here. This should show you how big some of these cows are when they come by.

Like, they're hanging down to here, yeah? Yeah, yeah. So this right here, this is the trophy for today. The best cattle of the day. Only number one gets this award. Do you think we can try to win it? It's really hard to win, but we try to get on this cattle for today. We're just going to have to pay a lot of money, yeah.

But we're going to be bidding against some pretty big people in Japan here. Yes, sure. Let's do this. Okay, so we're gonna go to the carcass room for the next. Whoa! What's going on here? Oh, so new shoes, new shoes? Yeah.

Oh, over my hat. Yeah. Like this? Uh, yeah, like that. So this is a very, uh, most hygienic side of the house in Japan. Well, now I see why I have to wear all this. I hope you're fitting, yeah. You hope I fit?

I know. Nothing in Japan fits me. I'm too big. Another thing. Yeah. Oh yeah. Protect your head. Okay.

Anything else? Oh my, my. This is crazy. And finally, you put this. Okay. And now we can see the cows. Yes. What is this?

This is an air shower. You can just come inside. I'm scared. It's so cold. Holy cow. These are massive. Look at the size of me next to these cows. These are the cows that we're about to see at today's auction.

They're massive. Yeah, this is 640 kilogram. Look at the marbling on this beef. It's unbelievable. They all have different awards, certifications, different stamps on them. Every carcass has its own identifying things for people to know how good the quality is. The floor is also so slippery because there's waggou fat everywhere. It's the most expensive floor you could possibly find.

So here's how it works. When grading beef, there are two main factors. The first is how much meat can actually be taken from the cow, and the other one is how good the marbling of the fat is. The scale goes from A to C and one to five. So the worst possible cut of beef would get a C1, the lowest grade you can get. And the best of the best of the best would get. this stamp right here, A5.

So they cut all of these open so you can grade it and see. This is the Tachrol pot and this is the Tachry pot. This is the one that we want to get today. Yeah. It's called the reward cattle and there's only one every single day. Right here is the A5 stamp. So this is the best grade you can possibly get. It's a beautiful, beautiful, huge cow.

Wow. Look at that. Why is this so good? The body is very wide and big. This cattle contain lots of beef as well and also, And also eating is very, very good. And everybody's going to be trying to win that. It's going to be hard, right?

Yeah, it's going to be very, very hard. It's time to go to the auction. People are starting to walk in, my heart's starting to beat faster, my competitive juices are starting to flow. I want to win the number one cow, and I want to get that trophy. Do you want to win? Yeah, of course. How does this work?

You press the buttons to bid? Doing the auction, like everybody pushing just this button, one yen is rising every time. But if you want to get this carcass very, very specifically this one, and then you just put the hundred yen and the 50, Yeah, 10 y'all out. This is when you want to ball out. Yeah, yeah.

Now that you've told me how this works, I have a strategy for the bidding. I'm going to put this one in one hand. Okay. I'm going to be clicking this as fast as I possibly can. Okay. And then in my other hand, I'm going to go like this. Then you've been every cattle. The first cows are coming in.

My heart is beating so fast right now. I'm nervous. Be ready. 550, 1,850, 980, 1,99, 2,000, 2,000, 2,000, 2,000, 2nd,000, 2nd,000, 100, 1010, 100, 1,000,000, 100, 100, 1080, 500,000, 100, 250-1. Wow, the trophy cow today is number 12. We're almost there. Tell me when, tell me one. Right now?

Yeah, continue, continue. All right, it's going to be. My heart's big, so high. It's going to go high. Oh, it's going to be so expensive. Oh, it's going so high. We can't. We can't.

There's our cow. I don't want to celebrate because I think everyone's mad that we won. You won? We won, yeah. That's good. Oh wow, thank you. Thank you. One, two, three.

Yata! This is the cow that we won, and look how incredible that is. He is so much bigger than me. You did it. You did it. Our cow is now going to be processed and sent along to a butcher who's going to break it down for us. Only Wagyu has kindly allowed me to take the entire tenderloin to give away to 10 of you. So, comment your Instagram handle down below in the video,

and make sure you're following me so I can message you if you win, and 10 of you are going to get a beautiful filet mignon from our exact cow that we won today. So we are now here at the butcher. This is the place. where they take the meat, they break it down, and then they send it to restaurants to get it cooked, which will go to next. What is your name?

Oh my god's to meet you. So he's the meat artist, and that's why we've come to the best butcher in the game. Do I look good? Good. This is what you get if you're in the Kobe Beef Association. It's so heavy. Oh my Thai.

What's his name? Kobe Beef. So this is their freezer where they keep a lot of their meats, and this is our cow that we got today. This is from the same area as where the flat iron steak comes from. steak comes from and he's going to cut it down into a beautiful platter of usable cuts of beef. First, it looks like he's removing a lot of the fat off the top of this meat.

Because this has a lot of fat. He's very quick and efficient with the knife. You can also see that he's really making an effort here as he cuts to not waste any meat from this cow. It's incredible to watch. So now is when the Wagyu is really starting to look good. We're getting down to those beautiful parts on the inside here. It's like a long train of Wagyu. Do you like to eat Wagyu?

Wagu, much. Munch, munch, munch, munch. Okay, so now you're about to see why they call him the meat artist. Most butchers will just break down the wagyu just like that and then they'll package it up. But he is literally an artist with how he treats the Wagyu and he does something a little extra. And it looks like he's using Wagyu beef tallow, some fat to prop up the edges of the flour. Wow. It's insane. Now what's going to happen is he's going to cut it down again and show us yet another presentation that he can create with this same cut of our Wagyu beef.

I love how with Wagyu every time you cut it, it makes a new art piece. I have no idea what he's going to be making this time, but I know it's probably going to be something really cool again. He's super, super careful and really specific. Wow, that is beautiful. Now you see why they call him the meat artist. Okay, now we're moving on to this giant cross section of our cow here. What is your name? Settle song. Nice to meet you. Nice to meet you. So this piece of beef has ribeye, sirloin, and tenderloin all in one. So he has a lot to work with here. And he's going to start by deboning the whole thing. We have to remove all of those thick bones. The way that he's using the knife. knife here is very surgical. It's so precise. He is tracing around every single bone.

So what he's working on right now is trying to pull off the first bone and if you recognize it it's sort of a T-bone, you'd have the tenderloin on one side and the strip would be on the other side. The cool thing here to me is you can sort of see that the butcher has all these different choices when they go to break down your beef. Right now, he's pulling out those bones that would normally be left in a T-bone or a porter half steak. He's just pulling all of those out right now because we already took off that tenderloin and then on the bottom side of of these is going to be left this nice clean strip. They work the knife in every possible way than doing this.

They hold it in their hand in different ways. A lot of people talk about how Wagyu cuts like butter, but they're not just sitting here slicing easily through this Wagyu. They are masters of their crafts with the knife. It's crazy to watch. So something's happening now. He's going to cut this whole big piece here in half.

This is really cool for me to see the meat getting smaller and smaller and smaller. Wow, that's beautiful. Look at the difference here between the fat that's on the outside and then all of this beautiful marbled fat that we think of when we think of wagyu. So now we've got a different portion here of our cow. We're going to see him cut this into some blocks. So one really cool thing here is we have so many cuts of the cow that we're able to play with and work with here.

It should just show you how big one of these cows really is and how much meat comes from one of these massive, massive wagyu cows. Although you do pay a hefty price for it. Every single piece of what he's cut here has a completely different pattern on it, which I think is one of the most amazing parts about Wagyu. This is the last thing we're doing before we get to cook and eat some waggu at a restaurant. This is a giant machine that's gonna slice this waggou very thin. So it goes into the machine. Wow, this is intense Okay, here we go. Whoa. That's not what I expected to just happen. This is so fast look at that it's the thinnest piece of waggew How much is one of these? Can I buy one? I'm gonna 30,000 dollars. Okay, all right, never mind. So now that we're finished, they're just packing all of this up although I wish we could just sit together and eat it

all this waggy together, but it's going to go off to different customers now. Thank you. Thank you. I'm bringing this to the restaurant. It is time to go eat some Wagyu. This is Wagyu Mafia, a member's only Wagyu restaurant in Tokyo, Japan. And this is Chef Hama. He's known as the Prince of Kobe beef.

Nick San! I brought you a gift. Oh my god, where did you get it from? How are you? Very good now. Can we cook it? It's Wagu mafia. Let's go.

Chef, you are the Wagyu expert, so I am not cooking today. I'm gonna step back and let you do your magic. Sound good? Right on, Nick's on. Today, I'm going to cook three levels of Kobe beef. Level one, Wagyu sushi. It's yawesi. We have all the most amazing ingredients in the world here.

This is my favorite sea urchin from Hokkaido, Japan. The best flavor, so sweet. We also have royal et cetera caviar, fresh wasabi, and of course, our Kobe beef. The process to make this one is quick. You have to be gentle when shaping the rice, which we cook with sake for extra flavor, and the niggily comes together quickly.

To finish, you brush it with eight-year barrel-aged soy sauce and topped with the sea urchin and caviar. Next time, your sushi is ready. One bite. One bite. Can you get up from my honor? I've never done omikaze right out of the chef's hand. Holy shi-hue.

Not bad, not bad. At all. You got a little soy sauce sea urchin right away because it hits the roof of your mouth. At the very end of the taste, Kobe beef comes after. And it's so nice to have the Kobe beef just raw and delicate like that.

So level 2 and level 3, you're gonna have a tough time. Let's skip it. Level 2 is Kobe beef yakikikou, which means barbecue. For the meat, I'm using the Kobe beef tongue. They're impossible to get since there is just one per cow.

Breaking down is similar to flaying the fish, just like you removing the skin from the fish. So you see Dimpo on the tongue, this is a sign where you cut it. And this here is all fat and fat is flavor. This is the best part of Kobe beef tongue, one of the most expensive tongue in the world. 300 grams, easily, $2,000.000.

We're going to cut it into small pieces like this and then gently score it on both sides for some textures. We have already prepared the Japanese charcoal. You want it to be a nice gray color when it's time to cook. This is Kobe beef back fat, which we use to oil the glen.

Listen to that nice, sizzle. Grieved for one minute each side and finish it off with a bit of salt and ready to eat. Let's go! Level two, let's see. It looks good and it smells even better than it looks. It's just the right amount of chewy and still soft and fatty. It has a little bit crunchiness. Level two is going to be hard to beat. Level three, Wagyu Kats Sando. I'm going to use this special $3,000, Kobe beef tenderloid. This is one of the most difficult cuts to anywhere in the world. First, I'm going to carefully cut it into these small portions.

The marbling on this beef is incredible. Then we'll roll it in our special Japanese flour and then the egg and finish with our homemade bread which is made from Japanese milk bread. The size of this, the thickness, two and a half minutes. Let's go ahead. We'll fry until it looks nice and golden brown like this. This is our sauce.

It has 15 different ingredients. The main ingredients are soy sauce and rice vinegar, but the rest is a secret. To assemble the sandwich, place down the beef, and close the sandwiches. And now I will trim off all the edges. Wow. And I finished by slicing through the middle.

Nick San, level three is ready. Come on. I was drooling back there watching this whole time. Oh, level three, we need to have a gold. Yes. I feel bad even eating this. Look at it. Don't eat it. All right.

Okay, so this is a Kobe beef. Chateau-Bri-on, entire cow, you can only get ten pieces. Saky-misho-i! Dira-shake! Mm! Words cannot really describe that bite. Even though I created, I still love it every day. You're done. Oh, one more thing.

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