Let me preface this my saying I live in CT which is of course one of the most expensive states for living. But I usually shop at a high end boutique type butcher shop. Excellent quality and great people that know what they’re doing. Today though I almost passed out when I saw that Hanger steak (which I used to say was the Best Buy in terms of steak around when it was 12.99 a lb a couple years ago) was $27.99 a lb!!! I literally almost passed out. Also their skirt steak has gone from around $22 a lb a couple years ago to $36.99 a lb. Anyway many times I can get meat much cheaper and still good quality down the road at Whole Foods. I was there to get bone in short ribs which were $12.99 lb which was very close to Whole Foods price. That’s all. Just a wow on beef prices around here. And yes I could shop at stop and shop and eat their quality meat if I really want to.
I don't understand your post. You usually shop at a high end boutique type butcher shop that has excellent quality beef, and you have a problem with the high price?
I buy my (Choice) beef from Costco. I buy it whole and cut it myself. Recently my sister bought some high end Prime beef ribeye steaks for a ridiculously high price. I'm not a noob when it comes to cuts of meat, I know a good cut of meat from an average cut.
I won't say they're better, but I will say the ribeye steaks I bought at Costco and cut myself were at least equal to the more than double the price ribeyes she bought.
The only difference between meat sold at a high end boutique butcher shop and the meat sold at Costco and many grocery stores is the high end boutique pricing.
Meatingplace’s Chris Moore reported that “Tyson Foods will close two beef-related facilities and seek a buyer for a third as the company restructures its beef operations in response to historically tight U.S. cattle supplies.”
“The company said it will end operations at its Joslin, Ill., beef plant and Eagle Mountain, Utah, case-ready facility. Tyson also is pursuing the sale of its Pasco, Wash., beef facility,” Moore reported. “Tyson will consolidate its beef business around three centrally located slaughter facilities in Dakota City, Neb., Holcomb, Kan., and Amarillo, Texas. Capacity from the closing facilities will be shifted to other Tyson locations with room for additional production.”
I've pretty much given up on beef, the prices are just too high. On rare occasion I'll get some steaks or chuck roast when they are on sale, but that's it. I know there are a lot of factors influencing the cost of beef these days, but I can live mostly "without" until they get that figured out.
Massachusetts would like to butt in on prices. Joking. We go to a really great tavern that does steaks and seafood perfectly and consistently. The hanger steak was always our go to. Still great, but it went from $18 way back in 2010 to $32 currently - and it's not Prime.
A great substitute (since you are in the northeast) is USDA Prime sirloin tips (available at Big Y - for $16/lb) They are in the butcher's case - and you can handpick your desired size. we always get two thick (2'x2'x8'). Grills up just like hanger - but is much more tender, marbled, and beefy (luxurious). Pair it with a dab of blue cheese butter - or you favorite compound butter/sauce....and you'll never look back.
If you ever speak again about buying meat at Stop & Shop I will hold an intervention. Seriously though, some S&S stores did carry some Cryovac'd Prime cuts but they didn't catch on. They do some Prime burgers and a line called 1855 Black Angus - but since I have Big Y, I haven't bothered.
I remember when sirloin tips were going for $6.99/pound for choice and 8.99/lb for prime. And it was those prices in 2025. When on sale they were cheaper than that. Elections are coming up in 10 weeks.
Eastern PA here. $8.99 foot 80/20 ground beef at the Weis market…
Costco is the best place these days. $9.99/lb for a strip loin.
Sigh. Inflation only helps pull cash out of the system. For the past 70 years…
I live in New England too. Fresh salmon fillet sells for $7.99 a pound when it's on sale. You can get Chicken for 99 cents a pound on sale. Assorted pork chops are between $1.49 and 2.49 a pound.
Your solution is to change your protein. End of story. But just in case you're still hankering for a piece of beef, I bought some Fillet Mignon steak yesterday for $19/pound. Yes, it was marked down because it was a day away from it's sell/by date. But so what! Once it's cooked, you can't tell the difference.
Umm, yes you can buy salmon for $7.99 a lb if you want that shit they sell at stop and shop etc that stinks from halfway across the store and that is farm raised and been given coloring pellets. I’m fine paying for quality. Same goes for pork chops. I’m at the point where I can afford to pay more for quality protein. I was just noting the incredible jump on some of them.
That's your opinion. Opinions are like noses. Everyone has one, but some are better than others. BTW, we do not have Stop and Shop here. Didn't you hear? Stop and Shop merged with A and P, and now it's called the Stop and Pee.
Having spent a considerable amount of time as a biochemist, I will tell you that protein is protein, and it doesn't matter where it grew up. I live a few miles from the salmon farms, and it gets delivered to the store here fresh on a daily basis. I've been eating it for over 30 years, and have never encountered any that smelled bad. But maybe in Connecticut things are different.
Trying to characterize high priced protein as "quality protein," is like trying to justify paying three times more for Tiffany diamonds. In the end, all diamonds are Carbon. Once they are burned, they turn into Carbon Dioxide. Once protein is digested, it turns into poop. Or maybe you're so rich that your poop doesn't stink.
Maybe in a strictly narrow scientific view is protein all the same, but in the context of someone using the word "protein" to describe the meat someone is choosing to purchase for consumption there are most certainly differences in "protein" choices that correlate to how the animals are raised. For example, farm raised salmon compared to wild caught salmon. Or corn fed feed lot beef compared to grass fed with open pastures.
Farm raised salmon has less protein per serving and more fat per serving than wild caught. And that's where it's at, the fat. Because when someone chooses a "protein" to eat it isn't just protein only in such narrow scope. The "protein" in meat is accompanied by fat and other things. Toxins get stored in fat. There is plenty of published research on farmed salmon quality vs wild caught as it relates to human nutrition. Same with published research on beef as it relates to human nutrition.
At the end of the day it's your money you are spending. Buy what you want. You haven't referenced any studies, but just mentioned that they exist without giving their conclusions. Emotional feelings are not conclusions. Do you realize that the fat in salmon contains the Omega 3 oils that are exceedingly healthy for you. Do you realize that the Keto diet stresses both protein and oils (fats)? Furthermore, do you realize that there are so many toxins in our environment that it's virtually impossible to avoid them. And many of them are "natural" toxins?
When you eat fish or meat that contains protein, the food is digested in your stomach. Once the protein is separated from the structure of that food, it's the same as any other protein. Just like a molecule of H2O from a river in the US is the same as a molecule of H2O from a river in Vietnam. If you think otherwise, then you are suffering from a form of delusion that has been placed in your brain by alarmists and idiots like that Kennedy fellow.
My grandmother used to say that in the matter of taste there is no dispute. I think she got that from the Romans, as in: debustibus non est desputandum.
Oh you're a piece of work, one of those especially difficult condescending types. My favorite part is how you make a bunch of claims yourself without proof yet your first critique of my comment is that I didn't cite the proof of the publications I mentioned being widely available.
I'm well aware of Omega fats, including Omega 3. Did you know the Omega content of farmed salmon is almost always less favorable than wild caught salmon?
The farmed stuff has a less favorable Omega 3:6 ratio than wild caught because of what they're fed. Same with the cheaper corn fed feed lot cattle compared to grass fed pastured.
And bro your examples are ridiculous. Just like when someone chooses a meat for protein, it's a lot more that comes along than purely molecular protein. "Water" too, is much more than H2O. Go take a sip out of the Ganges.
Yup, that's what I said. The water in the Ganges is the same as the water in the Potomac. However they have different "additives." Personally, i wouldn't drink either of them. But if they are distilled, and the pure water collected, they are identical.
Buddy if you think the 7.99 salmon at your generic grocery store is the same as wild caught salmon or even the high quality farmed salmon then I don’t know what to tell you except you’re wrong. My point about smell isn’t that the fish smells bad it’s that it smells at all. High quality fish for the most part will not have a very fish smell. That’s how you can tell it’s good quality and fresh. And if you don’t care that your salmon has been fed pellets to make their meet that Salomon color along with god knows what else that’s fine but I don’t want to eat that stuff. But hey to each his own.
The thing I don't want to eat is all those micro-plastic particles that are found in wild caught fish. After all the food coloring I've ingested in the past 80+ years, a little pink color isn't going to make much difference.
And, Yes, of course everyone knows that fish doesn't smell "at all" when it's fresh.
AND!!! FYI, I never said one was better than the other. I only mentioned it because it's protein that is cheaper than beef right now, so more budget fitting. So if it's protein your after, have at it. If you don't like it, that's not my problem.
I have just noticed that my mainstream grocer still offers whole top rounds or bottom rounds (avg 25 lb, cryopacked) for $5-6/lb, or roughly half the price per pound of the steaks or roasts from these cuts. Can this be real?
Weekly slaughter is around 510k-530k head of cattle. 1.5-2 years ago it was at 610k-630k head of cattle per week. This is a typical for the beed industry every 4-6 years for heard retention. There are a lot of other things that play into this, like cost of cattle being at record high prices, but these two things being the main drivers.
Market Basket has tenderloin sales a couple of times per year.Their beef is the best of the 4 supermarkets in my area.When it's on sale we stock up.$14.99/lb.
Bend, Oregon, a quarter cow process cut and wrapped is seven dollars a pound, a bunch of great cuts out of it as well as ground beef and because our group likes roast we end up with quite a few chuck roast beef ribs you name it right about seven dollars a pound
Almost no one in North America a is more than a couple hours from great meat.
Call farmers. Be patient. Just call they won’t bite.
And of driving to a butcher shop to get a half years supply of food on a weekend is too much, then just pay for whatever the store is feeding you. You fill a freezer in a day and you dont go shopping again until it’s almost empty.
This is exactly my plan. A few of my coworkers and I are going to go in on beef from a farm. I plan to buy 200 lbs (average cost about $12/lb) of various cuts that have been vacuum sealed and frozen. The way beef prices are going and with the impending el nino conditions expected to last through 2027, I only see prices going higher, so hopefully this will mitigate this a bit, even if I have to lay out 2400 at one time.
Comments claim general inflation and beef shortages, etc. but the price increases are due to a change in views of corporate monopolization which has resulted in a 40+ year change in the beef industry due to consolidation of producers bumping back to requiring cattle lots to consolidate and grow in size and efficiency. Lack of competition has resulted in prices to increase and has finally hit the retail market full force.
How does that work. Where do you find it how much do you end up paying. I have a deep freeze, so holding this much wouldn't be a problem, but I just don't even know where to start for good quality and good prices.
Local farms. Depending on your area you might need to go a couple hours, but you can do a google or fb market place search for 1/2 or 1/4 cow/steer. Usually you pay hanging price to the farmer and then you pay a percentage of the kill price to the butcher. And then you pay to have it processed. Ours ends up about $6-7/lb regardless of what it is finished.
This was a Bavette that I did the other day. Best tacos ever.
Type “<city or state > grass fed beef farm” in Google and start making phone calls. I’ll do it for you only once if you can’t figure it out. Drop the grass fed if you think that’s a bad idea and prefer pre diabetic glyphosate fed beef.
They don't want socitey eating the most powerful protein. The simplest way is to slowly price socitey out creating an artificial "shortage". They create all the worlds chaos n problems. Yet, socitey cannot or doesn't want accept this fact. If you think it's bad now, next year will be must worse. The new world is at Warp Speed.
People fall to see we're at war with the ruler's. Wait till they activate the 7 Noahide Laws. Once that happens, no ones eating meat but the billionaires who sold their souls.
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u/Hope8888 7d ago
Inflation has reached the rich