Cant balance out monthly shops - thinking of trying a butchers for the meat.

Just back form my local butchers myself with-

1.56kg rib eye joint, 5 decent 3/4 inch steak and enough diced extra to make a decent plate sized steak and mushroom pie.
Belly pork joint that i have cut 8 belly pieces from 6 ribs to marinade in bbq sauce
1kg minced steak that will be knocked up into quarter pounders and other dishes.
5kg fresh chicken breast , roughly 20.

£47.odd

Quality is better than the supermarkets, i can adjust sizes my self and its cheaper to boot, £17 per kilo for rib eye in my local Morrisons, i paid £11.50 per kilo.
 
Kanifee said:
Just back form my local butchers myself with-

1.56kg rib eye joint, 5 decent 3/4 inch steak and enough diced extra to make a decent plate sized steak and mushroom pie.
Belly pork joint that i have cut 8 belly pieces from 6 ribs to marinade in bbq sauce
1kg minced steak that will be knocked up into quarter pounders and other dishes.
5kg fresh chicken breast , roughly 20.

£47.odd

Quality is better than the supermarkets, i can adjust sizes my self and its cheaper to boot, £17 per kilo for rib eye in my local Morrisons, i paid £11.50 per kilo.
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This seems very good value.

This thread grew quick!

Cheers everyone else for the advice. Looking at onkline butchers now and notices western gourmet was suggested a few times. Any other online butchers worth a 'butchers' mind the pun :D.
 
JoeF1 said:
This seems very good value.

This thread grew quick!

Cheers everyone else for the advice. Looking at onkline butchers now and notices western gourmet was suggested a few times. Any other online butchers worth a 'butchers' mind the pun :D.
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Im quite lucky, my butchers ha a nice farm shop 50 yards down the road so it is very handy for eggs, fruit, veg and potatoes too.

I had a look at the western gourmet website and that is good value, 1.5kg steak mince (bye 1 get 2 free) £4.70, 20kg chicken for £106.

The chicken alone will last an age, they do smaller pack of breast that are still worth the mony. cant go wrong actually looking at those proces.
 
JoeF1 said:
Cheers everyone else for the advice. Looking at onkline butchers now and notices western gourmet was suggested a few times. Any other online butchers worth a 'butchers' mind the pun :D.
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I go high end, which is a bit more expensive. But not insane. I'd rather keep quality and user the cheaper cuts. So so tasty, I actually prefer most cheaper cuts anyway. Sod chicken breasts, thighs are where it's at. Keep your beef rib roast I'll have the Jacobs ladder day to day.
And lamb neck is the dogs ***** dangles for any slow braised stuff in sauces and a bargain.
http://shop.fordhallfarm.com/p/Ford...a7a862d8622/56e7934f6c6e4ed18b337c4fbb89f578/


I find fordhall exceptionally good value, cheaper than the other two by a fair bit.

http://shop.fordhallfarm.com/
http://www.fieldandflower.co.uk/
http://www.devonrose.com/

http://www.wildmeat.co.uk/ there chicken is tasty and you have to try the squirrel. By big boxes and in a few months shopping from different places, you can have like 8+ types of meats in the freezer, let alone cuts. Variety is the spice of life.

ATM I have
Chicken
Lamb
Beef
Pork
Goat
wild duck
Squirrel
Venison
Rabbit
Boar


I've also used, but they aren't in the same league
http://www.meatpacks.co.uk/

I've used plenty of others as well,but can't remeber names.
 
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I also wouldn't asus,e that the meat is more expensive than vegetables. I can get a variety of high quality meat in the $3-5 per lb range ($5 is a USD a select sirloin steak with moderate marbling). Thing like chicken thighs are more like $2 a lb. this is bulk buying from supermarkets or Costco, in the US.

The cheapest vegetables are thing like carrots which also cost $2 a pound. As soon as you want something tastier like bell peppers, asparagus, kale, spinache you are hitting $5-6 a pound. Slad related things are even more expensive, things like cherry tomatoes radishes etc. Furthermore, you have to more weight of vegetables to get equivalent nutrients and feel full for the same length of time as with meat.

Add in the costs of fruit, they seem to be in the $4-6 a pound range.
I definitely spend at least as much on fruit and veg as on meat, probably more.
 
mpledge52 said:
How much of that 200-280 is on meat?

It's not really relevant what your friends are eating. They might be eating beans on toast at home and eat out every other night which they don't include in their food bill.

One huge saving I make meat wise is to get frozen chicken breasts from Tesco. There's nearly always a half price offer so is usually £3.99 for 600g. Yes it's not as good as the stuff you'd get from a butchers. I've sometimes had to buy fresh from the supermarket and I really can't taste the difference, yet it's nearly twice the price fresh. Also, 90% of the chicken I cook will be in a curry, stir fry or in some kind of sauce, so I doubt I could even tell the difference between that and a nice organic piece from the butchers.
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I Pay £5/kg for chicken breast @Premier Meats proper size too not these little pidgeon fillets you get in supermarkets.

Local Asian shops tend to have very good butchers too as well as some cuts/meats you may not normally get. I've recently been buying sheep (not lamb) chops £4 a kilo, marinade them and theyre fantastic, seem just as tender as the lamb chops I've had and at a decent saving too.

Don't rule out cheaper cuts/meats


Glaucus said:
I go high end, which is a bit more expensive. But not insane.

I find fordhall exceptionally good value, cheaper than the other two by a fair bit.
...snip...
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Dude really???

£99.99 for a 3 bird roast
£14.25/Kg for Chicken Breast
£10/kg for liver/kidney

Not insane? :confused:
 
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That's normal for a three roast bird at Christmas.
Geese are not cheap, unless they are mass produced.
Offal I think is down to supply and demand, no one shopping at tesco wants offal. Generally people buying high quality meat will be far more adventures/old fashioned and they don't have huge herds.


However

Mince beef £7.49kg that's very comparable to tesco (excluding value range) tesco finest £6.00, tesco organic £7.50 tesco healthy living £8.00
Rib roast £12.69kg tesco counter £16kg tesco finest counter £18kg
Rump steak £18.39kg tesco medium and tesco organic rump £15kg, tesco finest £16kg

Lamb neck £5.79kg tesco £7.70 or £14 even taking into account weight of bone, your still far better off.
Lamb mince 10.34kg tesco £8.00kg, tesco organic £15.71kg, tesco counter £12.99kg
Lamb leg 12.69kg tesco organic £12.99, tesco £10.99

Chickens can be absolutely mass produced far more than most other meats.
Even then tesco normall range is still £11.67kg and their organic is £16kg. So still sound really high?

So yes I think it's exceptionally good value, for the different in feed, welfare etc.

If you want bargain basement, then supermarket still doesn't make sense as the bulk buying places still massively undercut them and quality will be the same.
 
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Guess I was just looking the expensive things :p Didnt relise they were xmas price either lol

Still say the chicken breasts are way overpriced tbh.
If I buy in bulk at the local Asian supermarket can get as low as £3-4 a kilo (haev to buy 20 tho lol) ad the chickens are fantastic too.

Might try lamb neck tho, never had it before.
 
Lamb neck is well the best lamb for stewing.

Chicken you pay for what you get. It's one of the biggest flavour and texture differences between cheap and good quality. Supermarkets even for the cheap stuff as you've found out, isn't the best value.

What's better still is the crap supermarket scams. Their two chicken breasts are several pounds per kilo cheaper than their 4 chicken breast pack. Despite being the same. How nay just buy 4 pack thinking its better value.

Yeah some reason they still have the Christmas meat section up. Unless that's pre order for this coming Christmas.
 
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smit101 said:
Couldn't agree more but unfortunately people don't seem to want to hear this, they seem to like their skimmed, trimmed, fat free, low fat tasteless foods "cholesterol kills don't you know?", "cholesterol causes CHD/CVD!"

Yeah sure, a substance that is so important to our very existence that every cell in the human body is capable of synthesizing it, every cell requires it! is lethal and kills us!:rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes:

No cholesterol = no life.
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Exactly, it's completely bizarre, I don't get why so many people are so obsessed with low fat and so clueless about it.

krooton said:
I didn't way it was, but all the negative stigma around red meat is due to sat fat and cholesterol, which pork doesn't have the same abundance of compared to beef, yet is still lumped in the same group.
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There isn't a negative stigma, there's basically people who are completely clueless who think dietary fat = body fat, and the same with cholesterol. It's all BS, but I think the fact that you've mentioned lean low fat meat strongly implies you are of the same beliefs.
 
Glaucus said:
Lamb neck £5.79kg tesco £7.70 or £14 even taking into account weight of bone, your still far better off.
Lamb mince 10.34kg tesco £8.00kg, tesco organic £15.71kg, tesco counter £12.99kg
Lamb leg 12.69kg tesco organic £12.99, tesco £10.99
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Yeah on the face of it the price doesn't seem a million miles away. The trouble is Lamb is not very often the prices you quote at tesco or any of the others. I buy a lot of lamb and never pay more than £12-13 for a full leg over 2kg at a supermarket or my co-op when it's on offer. For the life of me I can't remember the last time I had to buy anywhere near £10.99 a kilo.

I do have a few freezers and fill up. I will try a few of these places in this thread and some of the others especially for other cuts but with lamb so far I've not tasted anything from a cambridge butcher to warrant twice the price per leg :(
 
Goberpiles316 said:
All the supermarkets knock out 3 meats for £10 for £150 you could buy 45 packs of meat, most of which contain enough for two meals, that's 90 days worth
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My local butchers are quite cheap, pretty much £5 for a kilo of most meats. Chicken breast, minced lamb, minced beef and so on.
 
So I asked the question on Facebook about the price of Chicken breast and belly pork to the two local butchers one has replied with:

Chicken £7.95 Kg
Belly Pork £5.95 Kg

The cheapest fresh at Tesco is £9.35 kg for chicken and Pork £6, maybe I should be going to the butchers.
 
@OP - that doesn't seem too bad.

I spend around £60 a week on average (if you average it out over a month) for 2 people. Now I eat well, and I'm quite particular about what foods I eat (I don't buy low quality stuff). Have meat/poultry/fish every day - breakfast/lunch/dinner will have either one. As well as several kilos of fruit and veg too over the week. We don't eat cereals, sweets or crisps or crap food. It's boringly healthy but I'm a fitness fanatic and a gym and nutrition nut ;)

However, I used to buy meat boxes online, which I will be going back to as it's such good value.
 
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