Just bought a whole lamb...

sounds very good value to me, well done, i know legs and chops are expensive aswell. i always buy a shoulder or half a shoulder of lamb for a sunday roast, little bit more fatty but roasted it`s fantastic! we are a family of 5 with 3 being under 8yrs, i find half a shoulder is enough for use and the fat is great for flavouring the pots and gravy, there`s normally some gravy and meat left for a stew, and you can even make a stock with any bones left. i think i will prob buy half a lamb in autumn for the freezer as we tend to eat alot more roasts etc in the winter. good luck with it all and enjoy. x

I'm about to do this, soon as the price of spring lamb comes down

I buy lamb steaks at 5lb per pound for making curry, and I so need to cut this down.

A friend of mine does this with pigs as well, and he learned to do the butchering himself thus saving money further. He makes darn fine sausages

My parents used to buy half a lamb and I loved it as a child, all those lovely lamb meals.... still my favourite meat... although I live in farming country and all those fluffy baby lambs do make me feel a bit sad but at least they do have a good life prior to slaughter which is more than can be said for other animals we eat.

Jamie Oliver does a lovely recipe for slow cooked leg of lamb - loads of sprigs of rosemary, quite a few garlic cloves and roughly quartered onions in the base of a roasting tin - add the lamb and rub in salt, olive oil, add more sprigs of rosemary. Cover the whole roasting dish with foil and put in the oven which has been pre-heated on the highest temperature possible then turn the oven down to 160 deg. / 325 deg and roast for 4 hours. Lovely and the juice makes a lovely gravy. I find half a leg is enough for our family of two adults and one child.

I think you'd need a big freezer for half a cow :rotfl:

ravylesley wrote: »

half a cow is a lot of meat.If you want to buy beef in bulk then go for a quarter.If you want to slow cooking cuts that work out cheaper go for a fore-quarter.If you want all the posh expensive cuts then you want a hind-quarter.Bear in mind though a quarter of a cow is about 150lb in weight and at approx £3-£4 at best per lb thats a very very expensive investment.I tend to wait till Tesco have their half price beef joints in and buy quite a few of those as it works out cheaper than buying stewing steak,frying steak etc and the off cuts I use to make mince so their is no wasteage.

As to the op request as to what to do with Lamb Shoulder how about mincing it up and making some lovely lamb and mint sausages and spicy kebabs

Lesleyxx

Thaks for the suggestions on this topic everyone.

What would be the easiest way to mince up meat for sausages or just mince? And how do you make sausages without skins, thought that was a specialists job?