MEAT PRICES—SUMMER 2014
A recent newscast made me take a long look at my motto: “Making wonderful scents, while saving cents by using sense” and realize it’s becoming more appropriate with every passing week—or should I say price hike? The news item was like all the others I’ve written about, short and buried deep within an off prime-time program, but on a major network. The report stated that the government had issued its semi-annual statement of food prices and declared that there had been an 11% rise in beef, within anticipated range, but several other products had risen above the 5% predicted as well, mostly in the meat category. No surprise there!
Several weeks ago I mentioned a report that beef prices were going to rise due to new culling. When I repeated this to my friend who works in the Department Of Agriculture, I said that with no new droughts affecting grain I had expected the herds to be on the comeback. Her reply was that the only reason she could figure for beef prices to rise now is not culling but that we are exporting more than we ever have. We, in the U.S. have to equal what foreign markets are willing to pay to keep supplies at home. For a beef oriented nation that’s tough.
It reminds me of what I discussed during that same posting a few weeks ago. I live in a poultry producing state, but many of the small farms are closing because of unnecessary and expensive regulations being imposed upon them. This isn’t a case of consolidation where the large corporate farms are usurping the smaller ones. The large ones are expanding, true, but the small ones are simply folding unable to face the increasing cost of operation.
I’ve been told that a similar situation is occurring with the pig farmers in the Midwest. It’s rather scary to contemplate how many of our purse strings, when shopping, are being pulled by special interest groups.
So what can we do? Well another program I happened upon dealt with large food suppliers’ hands on the customers’ pulse—specifically Walmart—and willingness to adjust to any changes they detected in buying trends. In the end though, it seemed that the changes were directed to say, adding more organics and whole foods and weeding out the junk. In case anyone hasn’t noticed they’ve also eliminated the majority of their value bulk items, such as cereals. The program didn’t address prices.
To be honest, the only time I can remember consumers affecting prices was many years ago when first sugar and then coffee suddenly spiked. People refused to buy, and both items returned to “normal” within a month. But sugar and coffee aren’t vital nutrients and have many alternatives. Furthermore, the U.S. didn’t have the same interaction with foreign markets it does now. How can we move to lower costs when others are willing to pay full price? Answer: we can’t, but we can learn to cope with the situation and possibly, by buying less send a message that we are not compliant with what is happening.
In the past twenty years, we have unknowingly affected a huge change in beef marketing. In the early ‘90s packages of hamburger meat were still labeled “chuck” or “round” and flank steaks, briskets and even hanger steaks were found in the meat counter. As the premium cuts escalated in price, round and chuck cuts were featured as roasts and steaks and the lesser cuts disappeared, to be replaced by “ground meat” sold not by cut name but by fat content. Unbelievably, these packages of “ground meat” currently cost more per pound than the premium steaks did back then. The reason is simple, as beef prices went up we looked for options and focused on hamburger as a way to get the taste without the expense. The message was sent that hamburger was a hot ticket and the price went up—again supply and demand—or should I say it’s a case of playing to the customer’s demands.
Poultry, specifically chicken has undergone a transformation too but not exactly for the same reasons. Until recently, the full breast, the bone-in breast and the breast quarter with wing were always available. Now only the bone-in breast can occasionally be found, leg quarters are still there, but above the waist it’s only the boneless, skinless breasts, or tenders in the market cases, and of course wings—lots of wings. Unlike beef, we did not elect these cuts, we were lured into accepting them. They suddenly appeared, usually in B.O.G.O.s in the midst of our first rush of the “Eat lean, Eat healthy, Cook fast and fresh” movement. The boneless breasts and tenders fit all the criteria, and we hardly noticed the disappearance of the traditional cuts. Of course boneless breasts were accepted as being more expensive because they were more labor intensive but, oops, when we want something more flavorful, and economical like a bone-in breast to poach, or roast, for a special dish, they don’t measure up because they can’t deliver the flavor, and the old standbys that do were gone. This is why so many recipes require extra broth.
Pork has remained relatively untouched by this consumer-marketer dance. Certain cuts, however, have gained new prominence: the Boston butt also called the picnic or arm roast has a whole different level of respect, because loin cuts or roasts have become more expensive. I wrote about this on a recent blog on using one dish five ways and proved a pork roast can stretch farther than chicken. Ham is, and always has been a terrific investment although like everything else the price is up but if one watches for sales it’s still the best bargain per pound in the meat category and provides the most leftover options.
So what are we to do? Well we can’t affect overall prices so long as there’s another willing market out there as with beef, but we can affect the cuts we’re offered by buying or requesting the traditional ones such as flank steak brisket and even hanger steak and buying less bulk ground meat. We can ring the bell in any market and ask for whole chicken parts rather than boneless, skinless ones, and that bell may be heard.
Mainly we can learn to cope. The first step is to open your recipe box to other cuisines which are not so meat oriented. The Indian, Asian Mexican, Italian and most African kitchens produce very tasty, nutritious dishes that use less meat. Many compensate for the lower meat protein by adding ingredients like beans, nuts, eggs and cheese, but their real secret is in the use of herbs and spices as flavorings; flavorings that can become almost addictive and your family will request over and over. You can learn to combine them with different ingredients and your family will welcome each rendition as new, not as boring repetition.
In other words, to save cents, you have to use good sense in plotting your menus too. Plan the meals in sequence. If you’re interested in buying a featured roast, outline a variety of meals for leftovers. It’s usually cheaper to add a bit more poundage to a cut of meat on sale, than to buy other pieces of meat for separate meals. By using the leftovers in different cuisines, you get variety and escape family boredom. I know a woman who counts on buying a roast per week, getting 3-4 meals, and filling in the other dinners with lower priced items such as hot dogs, canned tuna, or even ground meat she has bought in a bulk pack and frozen in meal-sized portions. Incidentally, she also has a large collection of international recipes and her family loves her cooking.
Freezing ground meat in individual portion sizes is a great way to deal with it for those with smaller families to feed. I find my Mother’s practice of forming the meat into hamburger balls of about 1/3rd pound each is the most practical. It allows for shrinkage due to fat content and still yields an ample serving. They can be thawed to use in a casserole, broiled or baked and served as an entrée, cooked and cut into quarters, alternated with tomato and topped with onion served on a roll, cooked and served on top of pasta with plain tomato sauce. This last is a real winner because it offers the advantage of the taste of rare beef instead of the rather dry well done texture of meatballs. Best of all, the meat is portion ready and can be cooked quickly, so it’s perfect for a busy night’s dinner.
In fact, this week I put into practice what I’m preaching. My favorite market had two great sales: ground 80% beef for $1.98 lb. and chicken thighs for $0.88 lb. I bought a package of just under 5 lb. of the meat for $9.84 and one of about 31/2 lb. chicken for $3.20. They yielded 15 balls of ground beef and 8 thighs. That’s 23servings of meat for $13.04 or about $0.56 per serving. By learning to prepare the meat in different ways this can provide a week’s meals for a family of 4, two weeks’ for a couple and a month for the single person, more if they include an alternative or two. In today’s economy, that’s a saving both in money and time, when you consider how much meal planning and shopping is done.
As for recipes that use less meat I posted several for chicken and pork on my two recent discussions of one-meal-five–ways, and I have many more on holiday leftovers for turkey and ham; too many to post here or we’ll have a whole book, so I’ll just give postings and some recipe titles:
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April 2014
Five In One Dinners –Chicken
Chicken Chili
White Pizza
Chicken and Pepper Sauce over Pasta
Five in One Dinners –Pork
Pork Paprika over Pasta
Pork Tangier
Pork in Cranberry Wine Sauce
April 6, 2012
Easter Recipes for Ham –This includes several recipes for leftovers which can be made with slices of Deli ham as well.
Check out May 2014, June 2014 and 2013 and all the holiday leftover recipes in the archives. There are plenty there to work with.
