Organic Meat - where to get at lowest cost?

zar

funky-footprints wrote:

i know quite a few farmers (and have posted this on an other thread) who sell at farmers markets on 2 stalls , one being organic where the whop thier prices up and the stall next door that isnt organic, all thier product will have been farmed the one way ..non organic, but thier story and label sells. They are able to do this as there are ways to slip though and not all farmers have had the correct checks when going organic. My mother in law will only buy from the organic stall and quite likes to be seen paying above price and carrying the organic bag. she then tells me how you can taste the difference with the organic food ..its utter tosh, i would far prefer to buy my meat from a source i know and trust than by going on a label.

As you might be aware (I'm afraid I haven't seen your other post), it is illegal to sell food as organic if it hasn't met the EU standards (round here a couple of places sell their produce as "spray-free" as they haven't gone through all the checks yet). If you really think they are selling non-organic produce as organic then I'm sure trading standards would be interested. It doesn't make much sense though, why not sell it all as organic and get the extra money if they were doing it for that reason?

A more likely explanation is that many farmers will have some land that has organic status and other land that hasn't. They can only sell the produce from the organic land as organic (with the bigger price tag) even if they are using the same organic-standard practices on all their land. If you have found suppliers doing this and so can get produce of organic standard at non-organic prices then great! :T As I said earlier in the thread, there are certainly non-organic farmers with fantastic meat and animal welfare, but the organic label is useful for when you don't know the exact source.

funky-footprints wrote:

I would rather pay above price for free range than organic anyday, and then it would be from source, never a farmers market or supermarket.

Most (perhaps not yours) farmers' markets require the sellers to be involved in the production of the food so that you can go and ask them questions about how they produce the food when you are shopping.

I have mixed feelings about keeping-up-appearances middle class types who buy organic because its fashionable, part of me is glad that at least the money is going on something worthwhile but part of me thinks they harm the "cause" by making people think that only rich people buy organic and its just like buying designer clothes or having posh cars. Slightly ashamed to admit to my own predudices there.

lynzpower

I completely agree with other posters that say free range organic is much better quality meat, and it definately goes further, a chicken being a perfect example. Ill be looking at these boxes again, the price has been a bit prohibitive for the amount that we eat. What scares me about supermarket meat ( yet I still eat it ) is the long dates on them - the animal was probably killed a week ago, couple of days in transit and a week on in my fridge! the chemicals they spray on them, I mean what are they?

I think as long as your not eating meat daily, (which I dont for health reasons as well as the budget!) financially its a viable option. We alternate between butchers meat ( round our way - a MASSIVE amount for the freezer 2lbs mince, frying steaks, about 20 sausages 8 chicken quarters and a job lot of pork chops for £20, variable quality) supermarket meat when i cant get to the butchers, organic when theres any left, and linda mccartnys options!

competitionscafe

HappySad wrote:

I am moving to be healthier with less chemicals + better for the envirnment + animal welfare & hay the meat taste a lot better too. I am now eating red meat 1-2 a week, chicken once a week & the other days veggy & fish. Quality rather than quantity.

I have little knowlege about meat & don't know a cheap cut from a expesive cut. I don't know about any cuts & what you do with a different cut. I don't even know what meat looks like when it is off!! The supermarkets must love people like me who have not got a clue about thay are buying. I will order the MEAT book from my library & have a good read.

The meat book is an excellent place to start - worth buying if you can afford it, I got mine online for about £10 I think.

Some useful links:

H F-W's Meat Manifesto:
http://blogs.warwick.ac.uk/tomabbott/entry/meat_manifesto/

Choosing the right cuts
"Blade steak, bedpiece, sticking? Delia looks at the different names for cuts of meat for casseroles, and explains which ones she would choose":
http://www.deliaonline.com/articles/food/choosing-the-right-cuts,1408,AR.html

Meals on a shoe string: Tips on cooking family meals to a budget:
http://www.netmums.com/lc/food/meals_on_a_budget.htm

Directory: Meat and Poultry suppliers:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/food/focus/story/0,13296,961722,00.html

Real Chicken:
http://www.deliaonline.com/articles/food/real-chicken,136,AR.html

Meat and Right:
http://www.rivercottage.net/foodmatters/article.jsp?ref=foodmatters.200304115126

BBC:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/mostof_index.shtml
http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/back_to_basics/

savvy

Hi, may I point you in the direction of this email I received from the Soil Association, about the EU trying to include GM foods in with organic.

Thanks

[Deleted User]

I thought I would give you an update now I have had a few of the Devon Rose regular boxes
All the meat tastes excellent
but take this week: 8 items, 5 made from pork, I lamb chump chops and 1 minced beef and one faggots. The lamb and minced beef are both very fatty

I love the concept but I am going back to ordering from craig farm organics as I have never had over-fatty meat from them.

What is putting me off devon rose is the next box, 8 items again but 5 items from pork including belly pork also lamb chump chops again

I also want some room for fish and veggie dishes

bootman

I had a box from Jimmy's farm, not very impressed I must say. 2 items were missing. The hock was horribly off!!
It took a couple of emails to get a response. They did send replacements and some bacon instead of a hock and a small pack of sausages to say sorry.

The bacon had no taste what so ever, I won't be ordering again.

gritts

Jimmy's farm is not organic for the record, most seem to think it is.

I'm surprised your bacon had no taste whatsoever. Perhaps they have had a lot of custom recently and cannot cope with demand. They seem to have a half hour weekly advert on BBC2!

Curry_Queen

gritts wrote:

Jimmy's farm is not organic for the record, most seem to think it is.

I'm surprised your bacon had no taste whatsoever. Perhaps they have had a lot of custom recently and cannot cope with demand. They seem to have a half hour weekly advert on BBC2!

He can't sell his meat as organic because he's not been accredited by the SA, as his farm hasn't yet been running 3 years, so it will be a while before he can become approved.

However, everything is kept massively free range (the pigs live in a large woodland area) and he feeds them organically, so to all intents and purposes they are organic.

Anyone who has been following his progress through the tv series will see how much love, devotion and sheer hard work has gone into making the farm successful and treating the animals as they should be. In the latest series he rescued 100 battery hens to go and live on the farm free range, and my son and I were in tears seeing the state of these poor creatures. We knew the conditions they lived in and the effect it had on them, but seeing this on such a scale was just heart-breaking. My son now fully understands why I refuse to buy or use caged eggs or eat cheap supermarket chicken meat!

Bootman, I'm very surprised that you were disappointed with the meat you tried as I've had several orders from Jimmy's Farm over the last year and the pork is the best I've ever tasted. It comes from the rare breed Essex pig, which was originally used as a meat pig many years ago, and IMO is far superior in flavour to the standard meat pig often bred today.

Debt_Free_Chick

Curry_Queen wrote:

Bootman, I'm very surprised that you were disappointed with the meat you tried as I've had several orders from Jimmy's Farm over the last year and the pork is the best I've ever tasted. It comes from the rare breed Essex pig, which was originally used as a meat pig many years ago, and IMO is far superior in flavour to the standard meat pig often bred today.

His herd certainly includes the Essex pig, but I think he has other rare breeds too. I agree though, whatever breed the bacon came from, I would have expected it to be tasty though.

Unfortunately, I am not surprised at the apparent lack of care given to Bootman's order. Jimmy is a nice enough guy and I fully support his farming ethics. But he simply has no head for business. Instead of concentrating on getting his more important core product right - in every way - he's forever "diversifying" into something else! Like the chickens ...... noble, to be applauded but for heaven sake, make sure your core business is runnning like clockwork and making a profit first!

Any many of his other "diversification" projects actually cost money, which they didn't have (as they weren't making a profit!) to set up and are unlikely to return the initial outlay for some time yet ... like ... the Nature Trail :mad: Nice idea, great to preserve the environment naturally ... but he could have done that by leaving it alone for a few years with perhaps a few hours careful management now and then. But no ... he had to spend money on it ....

And do you remember the farce over the opening of the farm shop? Last minute rush and not prepared for customers on the first day he opened.

Anyone else would be out of business by now. He's very lucky to have a second income from his book, for which the BBC gives him free publicity. That and, I think, initial "support" from his friend Jamie.

Sorry to rant, but he makes me scream at every episode! I've had to stop watching it as his lack of business skills sends my blood pressure through the roof! Arrgghhhhhh!

That's better

Curry_Queen

You are quite right in all that you say DFC, and I have often wondered how he's managed to stay afloat thus far with everything he's trying to do. I felt very sorry for him when his plans to expand the farm were thwarted, but at the same time felt a sense of relief because I think that might have seen the end of the farm

All that aside, I can't help but love him and he makes me laugh, especially after he planted all those veggies then realised the rabbits would eat them, which they did! LOL!