Good value from butchers?

Chickadee_3

Totally off topic (sorry!) but it's nice to see you back CQ!

(I know my join date is January, but I was a lurker for a long time before then!!!)

nearlyrich

Chickadee wrote:

Those of you who have these great (& cheap!) markets are so lucky.

Perhaps I'll have to move!

We use Bury market, just won the best market award and here is my butcher's webpage, no compromise on quality, great value and service well worth travelling for, although I think Hertfordshire is a little far to be honest.;)

calleyw

Curry_Queen wrote:

It's not just a case of how the animal has been treated prior to slaughter which concerns us over such cheap meat being available, but the bigger issue at stake is that in order to prevent these animals from dieing of terrible diseases due to their appalling living conditions they are fed food that is packed with antibiotics, as well as chemical growth boosters. These antibiotics (and chemicals) are then passed down the food chain to US and we wonder why there are so many anti-biotic resistant super-bugs around killing off lots of people!!! :rolleyes:

Everyone is free to make their own choice over what they eat and/or buy, but I'm sure people would appreciate being able to make an informed choice

I am not denying that we should be kept informed. But it does not matter how well informed you are. If you can't afford organic you have to buy the cheapest there is.

And animals that are that badly treated or ill would not make it in to the human food change in the uk as the Vet would condemn them to start with.

And considering the amount of the food that is imported we don't know how it has been treated in another country. Let alone the fact is we don't have enough excise and duty officers to check every shipment that comes in to the country. We have had tomato paste dated 1987 being brought in to the country to be re-sold.

And a lot of organic food is being imported from other european countries. So how do we know how organic is organic from these countries as they don't have soil association approval.

So unless you keep you own pigs/sheep/cows/chickens and grown all you veg, grain etc you have no idea what is in it and how it is been treated and what chemicals there are in it.

And the sudan dye scare last year goes to prove who do you trust with your food.

What it really boils down to is cost. I personally and I am sure a lot of people on these forums don't have the money to afford to buy organic. if I could I would. And you are right is my choice what I buy the same as everyone else.

But as a lot of people buy on price they really don't want to be lectured about what sort of lives those animal have led that they are going to eat.

Yours

Calley

Spendless

moggins wrote:

To me that would seem expensive but I always buy my meat from my local market in bulk. I spend about 30 quid usually and come home with enough stuff to half fill my freezer. He does 10lb of chicken portions for a fiver, 3 huge joints of meat for a tenner. 3 whole chickens for a fiver etc etc.

p.s. Co-op have a BOGOF on Danepak bacon atm, 1.99 for 12 rashers.

These are similar to the prices I pay at our market, though I think chicken is slightly more expensive than this. I regularly buy 3 joints for £10, 1 each of pork,beef and lamb. The lamb is usually NZ so we eat it the following day, but on a couple of occassions we've had English lamb when the butcher has had the odd one left over which hasn't sold, he adds it to his 3 for £10 trays. Our local paper did an article about meat at our market and at our supermarkets. The meat had come from local sources unlike at Asda and Tescos.

bektoria

calleyw wrote:

And the sudan dye scare last year goes to prove who do you trust with your food.


But as a lot of people buy on price they really don't want to be lectured about what sort of lives those animal have led that they are going to eat.

Yours

Calley

I think the Sudan dye scare highlights the need to eat less food with added additives, colourings etc. I am also on a budget like most people on this site, but choose to give my family the best home made meals that we can afford. I buy organic meat when it is reduced and then freeze it and often there is not too much difference in price between organic and 'normal' food. I don't think Curry Queen was lecturing but then everyone reads posts in different ways.

The way I see it is that I have save loads of money from using this site to learn how to use vinegar etc around the home so my budget has not increased by altering my food choices.

Bek x

Mrsbojangles_2

I have been thinking of ordering from http://www.meat-online.co.uk/products/Mixed-Pack-1.html not sure if anyone knoes anything about them, seems good value to me, will let you know the quality if I decide to take the plunge!!

rubytuesday

Its possible to save money whilst still buying organic meat by eating it less often and using alternative forms of protein such as pulses and lentils.

Curry_Queen

calleyw wrote:

What it really boils down to is cost. I personally and I am sure a lot of people on these forums don't have the money to afford to buy organic. if I could I would. And you are right is my choice what I buy the same as everyone else.

But as a lot of people buy on price they really don't want to be lectured about what sort of lives those animal have led that they are going to eat.

Yours

Calley

I'm sorry if you thought I was lecturing you Calley, I wasn't, honestly. My "rolly eyes" smiley was directed at the food manufacturers for causing many of these superbug problems, not at you hun

It is a tough choice to make when you have to manage on a tight budget, I fully agree, and yes organic products are more expensive than intensely farmed produce, although the price has been steadily falling recently as more and more people switch over to buying it (power of the consumer!), but you're never going to be able to say for instance buy an organic chicken for £2.99, unless it's been reduced on the shop floor of course, in which case stock up the freezer!


I echo what Bektoria said above though and I too have found that the savings I've made elsewhere in my budgets, thanks to MSE, have enabled me to make better choices in the food I buy now. There are also alternatives to pure organic meat/poultry if you shop around which are considerably cheaper too, such as additive free and free range, which to all intents and purposes amounts to the same thing but they've not been accreditated by the Soil Association therefore cannot label their products as organic.

For me personally it comes down to health as much as the welfare of the animals, and strictly speaking I probably should be a vegetarian with some of my views, but I enjoy eating meat too much, albeit less often than we used to

Just as an example, we eat sausages quite often as a "cheaper" meat alternative, although I wouldn't say they were exactly cheap compared to some you can buy, but they do actually contain mostly meat (~90%) and when cooked they retain their size and shape and not one drop of fat or water is left in the frying pan or collecting tray of my GF grill.

Now the other day, my son brought home a pack of sausages from the Co-op which had been reduced to 10p (great :money: ) they were Co-op own brand I think, 12 thick pork sausages, but I don't know what the original price would have been. I decided to make a sausage hotpot in my SC so dry fried them to brown off first and ended up with over half an inch of fat in the bottom of the frying pan, and it was a large pan. Then after being in the SC for several hours, I had to skim off a further half inch of fat that was swimming on top of the hotpot!!! :eek:

The sausages had shrunk considerably and didn't really taste very nice either, and had I not paid just 10p for them I would have been very disappointed indeed. What's worse is I've got to eat it again today as there's still half left :eek: ... but I'm too tight to throw away good food so will have to grin and bear it :rotfl:

(BTW, no offense intended to anyone who buys and enjoys Co-op sausages )

Curry_Queen

rubytuesday wrote:

Its possible to save money whilst still buying organic meat by eating it less often and using alternative forms of protein such as pulses and lentils.

I agree and this is mostly what I do now. I'd say that around 60% of our meals have a vegetarian base these days, using pulses, lentils, cheese, eggs etc as a protein source.

When we do eat meat, the portions are smaller than they used to be, and things like pork chops, lamb chops, steaks etc are a rare treat these days. I pad out mince meals with plenty of veg and often add lentils too to make it go further. If we have a joint, or a whole chicken, I buy the largest I can afford and stretch it to last 3-4 meals and use cheaper cuts where I can.

Only on very special occasions do I buy something like a pork loin joint or rib of beef etc, but we thoroughly enjoy it as it is a special treat! I've also switched to using mutton for lamb casseroles and curries etc and find it tastes much better, as well as being cheaper!

soba

Personally, I would rather eat good quality meat that may be twice as expensive, and have it half as often, than poor quality meat twice as often.

Just my own view though.......