Those three words have become famous. If you're not an American or are just too young, you won't know why - or indeed, what it means.
It all started in 1984 with a viral hamburger commercial - Wendy's claiming that their hamburgers had more substance than their oppositions'.
At the time, pre-selection for the Democratic party's presidential candidate was underway, & the eventual candidate (Mondale) destroyed a losing candidate's (Hart) nomination by continually using that phrase.
The entertainment industry has dined on it ever since.
In the former case, one might think that 'beef' refers to the explicit animal product, which would be an optimistic association.
In the latter, 'beef' refers to 'substance' - a policy you can sink your teeth into.
Americans generally only eat one red meat - beef.
They don't eat much lamb, moose, deer, goat, etc.
There is an almost one-to-one correlation between red meat & beef in the minds of most Americans.
In most western countries these days, the term (in English) 'meat' generally means some animal product.
In recent years, there has been some debate over this usage with alternative non-animal products trying to call themselves meat, & producers being up in arms as a result.
This could see the general usage narrowing of the term becoming more formal - possibly government regulated. That's an odd thing, when you realise that English has no regulations in general.
There was once an advertising campaign claiming that mushrooms are "meat for vegetarians".
It made perfect sense to me, but it was short-lived.
Once upon a time, 'meat' was ... some solid food (as opposed, say, gruel) - a food of substance, something to sustain you.
You could think of it as a proper meal, not something you pull out of your pocket while out working, for example.
Like in so many things - such as the use of 'mutton' (from Norman French) to mean the cooked meat product, while 'sheep' (Anglo-Saxon) refers to the animal in the field - the usage in upper society becomes dominant over time.
The manor would have been far more likely to have animal products in the main meal, & therefore the association stuck: if you sit down to eat, then your meat includes animal products.
If you want to be considered like the best of society, then you have animal products in the meal.
Scientifically, biologically, chemically, this is unnecessary & leads to flatulent grass-eaters filling the atmosphere with toxins, but don't get me started..
Over time, we got to the narrower use of 'meat' in general.
Then, in another step, Americans, with a limited range of meats, managed to narrow the term once used for the contents of a meal down to one animal product.
Just to make it interesting, "beef" as a term for conflict allows the question "Where's the beef?" to be answered quite reasonably with "Where's your beef?", as in, "Why do you have a problem with the substance of my policies?"
This is, however, somewhat cross-cultural, because it is likely that this use comes from Cockney rhyming slang in the eighteenth century. They wouldn't have had much of the animal product, either.
