Our Most Recent Beef Delivery
I know that many here read my posts not necessarily out of desire to do what I do, but instead out of curiosity of what something looks like in someone else's life. Since I know many have not bought meat regularly from a rancher, I thought I'd show you what it looks like for us.
What this post is not:
This is not an endorsement or sales pitch for the rancher that I contract with, nor is it a pitch to get you to buy your meat from a rancher or small farmer.
What this post is:
Showing you what we receive in each order, and how the arrangement works for our family
I was sick last week. Right in the middle of my sneezing fits, sore throat and fatigue, my beef delivery arrived. Like a big girl, I put on some real shoes (but still in my pjs and robe) and dragged the box from the kitchen door to the garage. I then sorted, listed, and marked each individual packet of beef before freezing.
Some points about how this works for us
- I signed up for the least often delivery but with still the lowest price per pound, which is once every 3 months. The rancher appreciates that I'm a regular customer, and he can count on me to purchase a set dollar amount/weight amount on a regular basis.
- The rancher decides what goes into each delivery. There's a good balance of cuts each time. And it's a set amount of weight for every delivery, 30 pounds.
- Our arrangement can be flexible. I can temporarily suspend deliveries, if our family becomes deluged with beef and needs to catch up. I can also request specific cuts or grind. For example, if our family really enjoyed a lot of ground beef, I could specify X-pounds of ground every delivery. Or, if I wanted additional roasts, steaks, or briskets for specific times, I can put in a request for that. Otherwise, I leave it up to the rancher to choose what I will receive. Within that framework, I know that I will never receive any organ meats or too many bony cuts.
- The meat is packed directly out of their freezer and arrives at my house still frozen solid. It's packed in a styrofoam cooler with dry ice.
- The box is shipped to me. I don't pick it up.
- Each cut of meat is wrapped in butcher's paper, with no plastic, and is clearly marked with what type of cut it is.
- The cuts vary a little each delivery. Sometimes I receive more steaks, other times more roasts.
- 1 large heal roast
- 1 arm roast
- 1 large rump roast
- 4 sirloin tip steaks
- 2 sirloin steaks
- 2 rib steaks
- 1 porterhouse steak
- 1 New York steak
- 1 large skirt steak
- 1 package fajita meat (about 1 pound)
- 2 packages stew meat (about 1 pound each)
- 9 packages ground beef (about 1 pound each)
In previous deliveries we've received briskets, filets, short ribs,English roasts, and kabob meat in place of some of what we received this time.
Thirty pounds may sound like a lot of beef. We're a household of 4 adults. As we receive 30 pounds every 3 months, that works out to 10 pounds per month, or 2.5 pounds per adult per month, which is about 2/3 pound per adult per week. But that would only be if we ate all of the beef. We don't. We also share some of the beef with our son and daughter-in-law and other guests. So I guess we each consume closer to about 1/2 pound of beef (meat, bones, and fat) per week.
How I handle and manage each delivery of beef
- I itemize our delivery on a pad of paper as I unpack the cooler. I consult this list regularly as I plan meals.
- I mark each packet with an initial for the month (in this case a "D" for December) and the year. This way I can ensure I'm using up the oldest packages first.
- Although I have four different freezer spaces, I store all of the meat in just one of those spaces. So after itemizing and marking the packets, I put them all away, still frozen, into the 0 degree F stand alone freezer. By keeping it all together, I can quickly see how we're doing on meat throughout the period, and we don't "lose" any meat in one of the other freezers.
Leftover styrofoam coolers
I'm not thrilled to be amassing styrofoam coolers. But I have been putting them to good use. When we cleaned out the deep freeze this summer, I packed all of the freezer's contents into these coolers to keep it all cold/frozen. I also used one cooler to make my fall floral displays for the wall pockets by the front door, cutting down one cooler to fit the planters, then poking floral picks into the styrofoam slabs. This coming spring, I'll put some of them out on a free pile. I'm sure someone can find good use for clean, good condition coolers. I will hold onto a couple of coolers for my own use, though.
My thoughts on our choice
I'm pleased to be doing a part in keeping a small independent rancher in business as he works to support his family. The quality of the meat is higher than what I was buying in the grocery store. It simply smells better when cooking, and the taste is better. It's more expensive, but that is the tradeoff for making this sort of choice.
So, that's what buying beef in bulk looks like for my family.
Have you ever bought beef directly from a rancher? What was your experience?
Great post. I had a share in a "meat CSA" years ago, when I was married. On a specific day, I would go pick it up at a local house, where your packaged beef/pork/chicken was stored in coolers on the porch and marked with your name. I can't remember if it was monthly or quarterly. The meat was excellent. And all the different cuts made me a more creative cook, because some of them were things I would never have purchased. The meat was from a family farm in the eastern part of WA state, and they would deliver it to several pickup locations in the Seattle area. They eventually stopped the CSA option due to financial concerns/life changes on their end, but as far as I know, their farm is still around.
ReplyDeleteHi Tina,
DeleteI've found the same to be true with my cooking. I've received cuts that I previously wouldn't have bought. And now I think my family is enjoying eating beef in many new to us ways. I've certainly become a better steak master.
I'm glad you had the opportunity to try a meat CSA.
I agree with Tina, Lili. Great post! I remembered you were getting local beef, but hadn't quite realized it was a CSA. I'd actually never heard of that for meat, though farm CSAs with vegetables/fruit/sometimes dairy have been available the past couple of places we've lived. This seems like a great idea to me, because one of the drawbacks of the veggie ones is that you have to eat and/or process the produce so fast. It's both use-it-or-lose-it and feast-or-famine, if you know what I mean. With the meat already frozen, there's really no chance of waste at all, and so many more options for how/when to use it. I love that!
ReplyDeleteWe've bought local beef five or six times, but always a half or whole one. The first time we went in with friends on one from a rancher they knew. When the guys brought it home, it had cuts the other wife and I had never HEARD of! LOL So, as you both mentioned, it was really great for expanding our recipe horizons. :) Like Lili, I make a complete inventory, always, because what you get is always a little different (even from the same butcher), and I keep it all in well-organized and in the same spot, so I can see the size of our inventory at a glace. The last time we got one, I went one step farther, analyzed our inventory, grouped the meat by "steaks", "roasts", "grind", etc., and calculated how it would spread out over a year. Then I actually made a generic calendar page showing a "for instance" of what we can/should use each month. One day a couple packages of grind for hamburgers or burritos, a few days later a pot roast, another day some kind of steak, etc. Some categories I have enough for one a month, others might be every 2 or 3 months, and prime rib, last time we had that, we got two. I don't have to stick to exactly the projection each month; but following it generally means both that our meals will be varied, the meat will last the year, and I won't be left with a couple of months of less-favored cuts. ;) Sara
Hi Sara,
DeleteYour "one step further" sounds like a good plan. I could probably group like cuts together to make retrieving what I need that much easier. And creating a plan to use it over the period would ensure we don't end up with a glut of one cut/grind as we finish up our current delivery. I think utilizing a plan like yours would be almost a necessity if we were buying a side of beef all at once.
Very interesting! I have remembered you mentioning getting beef from a rancher a few times but didn't realize it was shipped. We've been buying local or local-ish beef in bulk for about 17-18 years now and it has come to us in various ways. The first place was about 4 hours from us so they met us in the middle for delivery. I love the way their processor cuts it and they now offer individual cut orders as well as 1/4, 1/2, or whole orders, so I have sometimes filled in with specific cuts, for instance, when I ordered a bunch of stew meat to can. Since that first half we ordered in 2007, we have primarily gotten in from people within a 50 mile radius, and they usually just drop it off at our house. Like you, I sort it into a chest freezer, grouping roasts, steaks, ground beef, etc... . Last December, my husband bow hunted and got his first elk, so we only filled in with 1/4 beef this summer as that ran low.
ReplyDeleteHi Cat,
DeleteThat is great news about your husband's elk! Filling in with less beef will be quite a savings for your household. The only game I've ever had was moose. The woman who prepared the moose said she needed to increase seasonings to cover the gaminess. I thought it was fine and didn't notice any other flavors in the meat. (It was ground and in spaghetti sauce.) Do you need to alter recipes to make the elk taste less gamey?
Hi Lili, just now seeing this way late. I really notice little-to-no gaminess with elk. It tastes very similar to beef to us. Even the kids can't tell which I'm serving (unlike venison, which we ALL notice). So I don't really change recipes. With venison, I do use the ground meat only in highly-spiced dishes such as tacos, chili, and such. Last year's elk is mostly gone, but there's still a change of him getting one this month, so here's hoping.
DeleteThanks for adding this info, Cat. Yes, I hope your husband gets another elk for your family this month.
DeleteVery interesting! We don't eat a lot of beef, but the paper-wrapped meat packets put me in mind of when my husband has processed venison. I enjoyed reading about your experience.
ReplyDeleteHi Kris,
DeleteI am just old enough to remember the meat my mother and grandmother bought from the local market always came wrapped in paper. I don't know if the whole meat dept of the market worked this way or if my mother was asking for something to be cut a specific way. I also remember a time when you could ring the bell at the butcher counter and request something particular. They's cut something or grind fresh some meat for the customer at no extra charge. I also remember meat packed on paper/cardboard trays instead of on styrofoam. I know that the plastic wrap keeps juices from dripping onto other foods, but I do with they'd go back to the cardboard trays in place of the styrofoam ones.
We occasionally buy beef from a local farm, but not on a regular basis. When I was growing up, when we didn't have venison, our family would go together with a couple of others and butcher 2 or 3 cattle and process it together and share. We would go to the farm after school and work on it all evening. At the end of the night, they'd fry up fresh hamburger for all to eat. I wasn't a big hamburger fan, but that meat was delicious. Better than anything I've had since then. Fresh really does make a difference.
ReplyDeleteHi Live and Learn,
DeleteYour recollection of helping with the beef is interesting to read. I can imagine the freshness of that ground beef added to the tastiness. For many years, the smell of grocery store beef cooking really didn't appeal to me. This beef that we're getting now, frozen from butcher time till I thaw it to cook, seems to make a difference for me.
I have been buying beef from a local guy for a few yrs now. I’m currently out, and planned to get a half, but my darn Dh got an elk so until I make room in my other deep freezer no beef for me lol. I have wanted to buy beef from a local rancher for years, but never could afford it. It’s a big chunk of money at one time, and when the kids were home big chunks of money were nonexistent lol. My fil was a farmer in Iowa so when he was alive, and still on the farm, we bought beef from him because they let us make payments. I gotta say, iowa beef is better than Montana beef, but Montana beef is better than grocery store beef. I can still remember the flavor of my fil’s ground beef-it tasted like butter-sooo good. We prefer grain finished, and in Iowa that means corn, but in Montana it means very little corn, and mostly things like barley, which grows here. Our guy knows my Dh has very high expectations for beef so he’s good about picking out the best he has to butcher at the time lol.
ReplyDeleteIsn't that interesting about the regional beef taste differences? We are from the west and once visited friends in the Great Lakes, and brought elk with us for them to try. We were chatting away blithely about the comparative "game-i-ness" between elk and venison, when we realized they were looking puzzled. Talk about "grain finished"... they were hunting venison in their own cornfield! No gamey flavor there! LOL Sara
DeleteOh yeah deer in Montana tastes nothing like deer from the Midwest. I really don’t like deer from here, especially mule deer, but most of the elk is fine. I like it ok, and we used to eat a lot of it because we had to, I tell Dh now we don’t have to eat elk, and I like beef better lol
DeleteDiane
LOL Yes, elk IS much less gamey, all across the west than deer. And I agree, mule deer's worse than whitetail. Luckily, my DH isn't machismo, so he'll hunt cow elk/doe deer, when that's an option. He's also taken a lot of young bulls/bucks who weren't trophies, so less testosterone and milder taste. One guy he hunted will gave his ENTIRE cow elk to the other guys, because he couldn't bring himself to bring it home. TASTIEST elk we ever had! The other guy's loss, IMO! Sara
DeleteCongrats on the elk! My husband got one last year, and can try again in January. We think it tastes pretty darn close to beef (we're in Oklahoma) so are hoping he can get one. He and my son have each gotten one deer so far. I don't love venison but will use it more highly spiced dishes like chili or tacos. And he processes some of it less carefully that we use for making our dogs' food (he's less careful removing silverskin in what he grinds for the dogs).
DeleteHi, Cat. I remember when your husband got his elk. We think it's the Cadillac of game meat. :) Like you, I like venison better in seasoned dishes, even our tasty local whitetail. It's interesting, though, how much what they eat -- and how carefully you process it -- makes a difference. We fed someone game meat once, who had grown up being "forced" to eat it, and hated it. They liked ours, and eventually we figured out that their family had been pretty sloppy about hair and silverskin, etc. We've always done the pre-butcher clean-up of the family's elk/deer, so lots of hours with a garden hose, picking off hair and grass, though DH also has a pretty clean way to field dress. The past 2 years, the BILs have had sweat equity in that part of the process for the first time, and surprise! they've decided it's a long and arduous process! LOL I'm afraid I DO sort of snicker behind their backs at their grousing over it, after all these years. (wink) Congrats on the deer, and good luck during elk season!!!! Sara
DeleteHi Diane,
DeleteThat's so interesting about the flavor of the beef from different regions. I never gave a thought to that before.
Yeah, when my kids were younger (and we were actually eating a lot more food as a family), the cost of buying a side of beef was more than our monthly budget could absorb. It's only been in recent years that we could afford to buy beef in a larger chunk. I wouldn't have space in our freezers for a side of beef or even a 1/4, but we can accommodate a 30-lb delivery. Well, I'm just glad that at this point buying beef in bulk is a possibility.