I was surprised to learn it's only a buck and a half a day for the feed.
Meatless in self defense
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I was surprised to learn it's only a buck and a half a day for the feed.
simon1
Self Ignored by Vista
Wow!
It's $2.99 a pound for a full packer brisket here, and everyone is yelling about how high it is.
Easily 8-9 dollars here in cent fl. Should have simon buy one and ship it, it would be cheaper than here even with shipping. Lol[emoji33]
So was I.
This is actually a very good thread, and I think the topics discussed here should be continued. I apologize for somewhat hijacking and that was not my intention. Maybe we can start a new thread.???
In the meantime in the coming days I'll try and post a few inexpensive recipes that may or not include meat or beef.
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I like a ton of recipes that use scant portions of meat, meat sort of as a seasoning, rather than the main ingredient. Classic pasta sauces with a little meat are fabulous (in Italy and in my kitchen), with the sauce serving being rather small as well.
Lots of Chinese food, of course, like Beef with Oyster Sauce, Four to one asparagus or broccoli to cheap chuck steak. Or shrimp with veg. Fried rice is wonderful with just a handful of minced Chinese BBQ pork. Learn good wok technique and then peruse Gloria Bley Miller's "1000 Recipe Chinese Cookbook" for ingredient combinations ideas.
I made tempura the other night, with just veggies; I forgot I had crayfish tails in my freezer. Great.
This is not to say that I'd ever pass up a good fat steak. But for me (retired, limited income) with a great Farmer's Market two days a week, I don't have to eat that much meat.
Lots of Chinese food, of course, like Beef with Oyster Sauce, Four to one asparagus or broccoli to cheap chuck steak. Or shrimp with veg. Fried rice is wonderful with just a handful of minced Chinese BBQ pork. Learn good wok technique and then peruse Gloria Bley Miller's "1000 Recipe Chinese Cookbook" for ingredient combinations ideas.
I made tempura the other night, with just veggies; I forgot I had crayfish tails in my freezer. Great.
This is not to say that I'd ever pass up a good fat steak. But for me (retired, limited income) with a great Farmer's Market two days a week, I don't have to eat that much meat.
With the colder weather, lentils have been perfect. Technically a pulse but they're delicious.
Also remind me of my Nonna
With the colder weather, lentils have been perfect. Technically a pulse but they're delicious.
Also remind me of my Nonna
Exactly...and a great inexpensive choice.
Red Lentil Dal
Total Time: 1 hour
Yield: 8 servings
Makes 8 servings. Nutritional Info Per Serving: 124 Calories, 2.5g Fat, 37mg Sodium, 19g Carbs, 7.7g Fiber, 4.7g Sugar, 6.1g Protein
Ingredients
1 tsp olive, grapeseed or canola oil
3/4 cup dry red lentils
1 cup chopped red onion
1/2 cup chopped celery
3 cloves chopped garlic
1 tsp grated ginger
1.5 tsp sweet curry powder (or use hot, if you like it spicy!)
1 tsp coriander
1/2 tsp garam masala
1/8 tsp crushed red pepper flakes
1 cup vegetable stock (or water)
One 15 oz can crushed tomatoes
1 cup light coconut milk
1/4 cup chopped cilantro
Directions
1. Mix the ginger garlic, curry powder, coriander, garam masala and crushed red pepper in small bowl and set aside.
2. Heat a large soup pot over medium heat. Add your oil, onions and celery and cook on medium high heat for about 2 minutes until vegetables are fragrant and translucent. Stir occasionally to prevent burning.
3. Turn down heat and add the ginger, garlic and spice mix and cook on low heat for about 1 minute, allowing the spices to “bloom” until they become fragrant. Add the lentils, vegetable stock, diced tomatoes and coconut milk.
4. Bring up to a boil, then reduce heat to a low simmer. Cook with a lid on for about 20 minutes, stirring occasionally until lentils are soft. If your heat is up too high, the liquid will evaporate before the lentils are done cooking. If that happens, just add a little bit more stock (or water, if you are using that) and continue to cook. When lentil are soft, turn off your heat and add in your chopped cilantro. Adding cilantro at the end will keep the flavor lively and fresh.
5. Serve as a soup, or over brown rice with some steamed veggies, or with naan or roti!
We go meatless for Breakfast some times but generally we have some kind of meat 2-3 times a day. We been getting 5 pounds of Chicken Breast for 8 bucks. You got to shop smart to get the most bang for your buck.
bumper cars
This.^ A pot of black beans and rice only needs a few ounces of bacon to be awesome. Same for baked beans. As far as fish goes, look for pollock. Super cheap (or as cheap as fish gets), and works excellently with most baked dishes or fried. Where I live a lot of restaurants pass it off as walleye. Tourists never have a clue. And as another member mentioned, if you have any possible access to buying meat on the hoof, look into it. Beef and pork both. Even if you aren't in farm country, most butcher shops will at least sell you bundles at a big discount if they don't want to do quarters or halfs. An investment in even a small chest freezer will pay for itself in months. We buy less live meat now that the kids are bout out of the house, but every year for what seems like forever, we bought a half a beef, a whole hog, and put in for 2 dozen roasting chickens. Then I would put a couple of deer (average) in the freezer and we were set for the year. Between that and the garden, grocery shopping was pretty cheap when about all you ever had to buy was dairy and pantry stock.
I don't know how rural/urban the area you live in is, but you could look into raising meat rabbits. If you pick a "meat breed", (I have American Whites) a breeding quad (three does and a buck) can provide you with as much meat as butchering a calf every year, at very little cost. It is very tasty, very healthy meat, and yes, it does (kind of) taste like chicken. They are quiet, don't smell, and a child (my daughter started at eight or nine) can do ninety percent of the daily chores. I raise mine in a semi rural developement (3 and a half acres) with my hutches surrounded by a sixteen foot square privacy fence. Nobody would ever even know they are there. Upkeep is super cheap: maybe $30 a month for feed, and $50 a year for straw, and that's to keep them bedded outside in MN in the winter. The only downer is that you gotta be willing to bop them in the head and butcher.
it's amazing how much you can save on growing produce. We have a 1/3 acre garden, but my wife uses all of her flowers beds to plant greens. She puts in rows and circles of lettuces, spinach and kale etc,, does it in a decorative way, and all we have to do is step outside for fresh salad.
This is getting long, but canning leftovers is really pretty easy, and saves a,TON on waste. For instance, if I roast a chicken, I carve the whole thing, and the minute we are done, I have the leftovers in jars and in the pressure canner. By the time we finish dishes, I have five or six pints of soup spitting away, and on the shelf in the morning. If others are interested in this let me know, I would be more than happy to help or advise. You don't have to live in the country to do this. Kind of like DE shaving. Good luck..
I don't know how rural/urban the area you live in is, but you could look into raising meat rabbits. If you pick a "meat breed", (I have American Whites) a breeding quad (three does and a buck) can provide you with as much meat as butchering a calf every year, at very little cost. It is very tasty, very healthy meat, and yes, it does (kind of) taste like chicken. They are quiet, don't smell, and a child (my daughter started at eight or nine) can do ninety percent of the daily chores. I raise mine in a semi rural developement (3 and a half acres) with my hutches surrounded by a sixteen foot square privacy fence. Nobody would ever even know they are there. Upkeep is super cheap: maybe $30 a month for feed, and $50 a year for straw, and that's to keep them bedded outside in MN in the winter. The only downer is that you gotta be willing to bop them in the head and butcher.
it's amazing how much you can save on growing produce. We have a 1/3 acre garden, but my wife uses all of her flowers beds to plant greens. She puts in rows and circles of lettuces, spinach and kale etc,, does it in a decorative way, and all we have to do is step outside for fresh salad.
This is getting long, but canning leftovers is really pretty easy, and saves a,TON on waste. For instance, if I roast a chicken, I carve the whole thing, and the minute we are done, I have the leftovers in jars and in the pressure canner. By the time we finish dishes, I have five or six pints of soup spitting away, and on the shelf in the morning. If others are interested in this let me know, I would be more than happy to help or advise. You don't have to live in the country to do this. Kind of like DE shaving. Good luck..
Well done!
You don't have to get the premium priced cuts of beef to have a good time, even in the world of steaks. I was never a huge fan of the strip steak and consider the filet mignon to be a "chick" steak, so I marvel that the porterhouse is considered the king of steaks. Rib steaks taste much better, as far as I'm concerned.
But man does not live by $20/lb cuts alone! Some inexpensive cuts are every bit as tasty, and perhaps more so. Some of them should be priced much higher, as a cow yields hardly any significant amounts of them- you get more filet out of a cow than hanger or skirt, two unbelievably flavorful cuts that are incredible if cooked properly. The flat iron steak can also be a knockout, and a good ***** *** ***** (I am forbidden, under penalty of death, from revealing the cut) can be a dead ringer for a twice as expensive rib steak.
I'm cutting out meat for the month of May (don't ask), so I have another "butcher's cut" marinating in the fridge for the last day of April- bavette d'aloyau, also known as flap meat.
It somewhat resembles flank/skirt/hanger steaks, and needs a good long marinade combined with a quick cook with intense heat. I'm using a sake/vinegar/mirin/soy/hatcho miso/garlic/ginger marinade, and plan to finish in a screaming cast iron pan.
But man does not live by $20/lb cuts alone! Some inexpensive cuts are every bit as tasty, and perhaps more so. Some of them should be priced much higher, as a cow yields hardly any significant amounts of them- you get more filet out of a cow than hanger or skirt, two unbelievably flavorful cuts that are incredible if cooked properly. The flat iron steak can also be a knockout, and a good ***** *** ***** (I am forbidden, under penalty of death, from revealing the cut) can be a dead ringer for a twice as expensive rib steak.
I'm cutting out meat for the month of May (don't ask), so I have another "butcher's cut" marinating in the fridge for the last day of April- bavette d'aloyau, also known as flap meat.
It somewhat resembles flank/skirt/hanger steaks, and needs a good long marinade combined with a quick cook with intense heat. I'm using a sake/vinegar/mirin/soy/hatcho miso/garlic/ginger marinade, and plan to finish in a screaming cast iron pan.
***** *** **** cut of beef is an old CIA deep in the bunker type cut....only to be mentioned or eaten after the shave apocalypse.
Chicken and Turkey.
Nah, just a little known and overlooked cut- chuck eye filet. It's not quite as tender as the rib, but damned near as tasty.
Man, that bavette d'aloyau is looking mighty fine- can't wait until dinner.
I guessed it to be skirt steak. I very flavorful relatively cheap cut.
Veggies are what food eats. Tofu? Who knows what the hell that stuff is . . .
I am only partially kidding. If my wife were to tell me that we were going meatless, I would tell her that she was also going to be going husbandless. I am an omnivore. Veggies have their place . . . it's right next to the meat on my plate.
I am only partially kidding. If my wife were to tell me that we were going meatless, I would tell her that she was also going to be going husbandless. I am an omnivore. Veggies have their place . . . it's right next to the meat on my plate.
It's actually surprisingly easy to go meatless. I hear men saying the same thing as you all the time.
Before I got my new job, I made a lot less money. We were unwilling to sacrifice on the quality of food, so we stopped buying meat. We bought it from the grocery store about once a month. What we did buy, we stretched into sauces or multiple dishes like the old days. It got to be so much of a habit that we now only buy meat 3x a week at the most. Then, it's usually fish or pork. I'm not wasting my time on chicken.
I'm defiantly not willing to just give it up all together.
Before I got my new job, I made a lot less money. We were unwilling to sacrifice on the quality of food, so we stopped buying meat. We bought it from the grocery store about once a month. What we did buy, we stretched into sauces or multiple dishes like the old days. It got to be so much of a habit that we now only buy meat 3x a week at the most. Then, it's usually fish or pork. I'm not wasting my time on chicken.
I'm defiantly not willing to just give it up all together.
