Buying from a butcher

zippychick

ive merged this with our buying from a bu tcher thread

Thanks
Zip

hulahoop09

Hiya

Okay so I planned on bulk making some foods before I went back to work after maternity to freeze BUT I dont do enough to feed us AND freeze so I serve it all up :eek: :rotfl:

I have looked at some meal plans and noticed that some people have things like steak & chops but I find these quite expensive. I dont have a butchers nearby but am guessing this is the cheapest way to buy these things?

JodyBPM

I actually find butchers just as expensive (and sometimes more so) than supermarkets, but generally better quality meat. The beauty, though, is that you can buy exactly the amount you want and then portion it up, rather than having "just a bit more than you need, but not quite enough for two meals or enough leftovers to bother freezing" which I often find happens with supermarket portions (are they deliberately packaged in this size?).

I agree that steaks and chops can work out very expensive. My staple meats are diced chicken breast, whole chicken, drumstick and thigh packs, joints (usually turkey leg, bacon or pork, unless see some whoopsied beef or I'm splashing out), mince, diced pork, diced stewing steak (I add my own kidney to it as my butcher charges the same per kg for steak and kidney as diced steak, and it works out much cheaper to add my own kidney to it) and sausages. I rarely by steaks or chops, and I rarely buy lamb due to the price.

With a little creativity, you can often use much less meat than you think with a lot of dishes by padding out with veg or pulses.

If you want to do some bulk cooking and freezing, I'd suggest getting a couple of kgs of mince, plus a kg of stewing steak and perhaps a kg of diced chicken, and then spend a day cooking lots of dishes and freezing. The mince ones in particular can use the same base for lots of different dishes (eg cottage pie and mince and onion pie and then add some tomato sauce, herbs and roasted veg to covert the rest into spag bol mix and lasagne filling...)

PipneyJane

Jody summarised it beautifully.

When you say, "I dont do enough to feed us AND freeze so I serve it all up", is it because you don't know how much to cook or that you just dish it up and then try to freeze whatever's left?

If I do the latter, then there wouldn't be any leftovers. Doesn't matter if the recipe is for 4 or 6 - if it's in the dish, then we eat it. So I had to devise "set asides". Basically, when I serve up dinner, I put a spoonful on his plate, a spoonful on my plate, a spoonful into DH's lunchbox, a spoonful into my lunchbox, and spoonful into a container for the freezer. Rinse and repeat until the pot is empty or all containers are full. (Anthing left after that is available for DH to go back to for seconds.)

Quantity wise, unless I'm cooking a roast or steak, I usually work on 100g/4oz of raw meat per person and pad it out with lots of veggies/pulses. We eat a lot of curries, stews, stir-fries (one chicken breast to feed 4) and pasta dishes. When we do eat slab-of-meat-plus-veg-on-side stuff, it's usually fish so one fillet each.

(Oh, and my husband? 6ft 1 and built like a rugby player with an appetite to match. I think his legs are hollow. He certainly doesn't go hungry in this house.)

zippychick

ive merged this with our thread about buying from the butchers

these threads may also help

meat from butchers vs supermarket

frozen meat or fresh

how much meat do you eat?

cheaper cuts of meat

bulking out meals

Hope those help. Let us know how you get on.

Zip

TheBanker

JodyBPM wrote: »

(I add my own kidney to it

:eek: I know times are hard but.... feeding your family on your own kidney? :rotfl:

I used to have a great local butcher. My tip would be don't go in wanting a specific thing like Rib Eye steak. Go with an open mind, see what they have in stock and whether they have any offers on and cook around what's available.

chumbasmum

I also wanted to support my local butchers so I went to the newish butchers in my town (Cirencester). I had never used a butchers before and so went in and told him that. I also explained I was worried about ordering things and finding the price too much and being embarrassed so he suggested that I say how much I wanted to pay e.g. I wanted £6 of chicken.

It has worked well and the quality is far superior but more expensive than supermarkets BUT...

I bought 6 lamb and mint burgers recently which looked lovely but it was not until I had them home that I realised that I had been sold fresh and frozen burgers wrapped together. I wasn't too impressed as I had planned to freeze them and so they couldn't be refrozen.
I did complain and they did refund my money but it does make me wonder if they freeze a lot of their meat and then thaw it...

Shame really.

Farway

chumbasmum wrote: »

I also wanted to support my local butchers

It has worked well and the quality is far superior but more expensive than supermarkets BUT...

I bought 6 lamb and mint burgers recently which looked lovely but it was not until I had them home that I realised that I had been sold fresh and frozen burgers wrapped together. I wasn't too impressed as I had planned to freeze them and so they couldn't be refrozen.
I did complain and they did refund my money but it does make me wonder if they freeze a lot of their meat and then thaw it...

Shame really.

Sometimes local butchers are their own worst enemy, I ordered a Christmas turkey from mine, when I collected it on Christmas eve it was frozen Bernard Matthews one, I could have bought cheaper from any supermarket :mad:

Another local one I bought mince from, I found on getting it home they had mixed old, brown oxidised, mince with the newer stuff. Nothing wrong with it I know, except deceptive

Unsurprisingly they both have now gone out of business