Cheap Meat Be Gental

Your right you don't know what is in a sale barn hog either. The best way to know what is in a pig is either to grow it yourself or buy it from someone you trust who raises finishing pigs. By the way what parts of the pig did you get at the grocer for .93 cents a pound. Does any of it consist of loins or any prime cuts. If yes then you may have found yourself a good bargain.

 

big rockpile,
I love hitting the stores and burning them on their loss leaders. Our two grocery stores have great sales about every two months. They want to sell me something for less than the cost of my processing, I try to get a six month to year supply. Canned vegetables 5/1$. My canning lids cost 12-17c each.

I've heard the storebought meat vs. homegrown argument before. Storebought, it's already slaughtered, and I can see the meat. I've slaughtered homegrown animals, and after processing, seen problems, and had to do some fancy butchering/processing to try and overcome the problems. And I'll eat anything, save the absolute worst. Yes, your gonna have hormones and antibiotics if you buy live critters or processed. If you raise your own, you'll be lucky if you don't have to use antibiotics at some stage. Or I guess you can be a purist and let your whole herd/flock get sick and die.

 

Rock;

I love those pork steaks but my wife will not let me buy them. She makes me eat those damned dry chops with every bit of fat peeled of them.

Next summer I am going to get me a hog and feed it thru the fall into December and tell the butcher not to cut off even a sliver of fat. If I want the stuff trimmed I'll do it myself! A little pork fat in a vat of venison sausage makes it edible.
Ox

 

Ox - "I love those pork steaks but my wife will not let me buy them. She makes me eat those damned dry chops with every bit of fat peeled of them."

I lost 18lbs eating pork loin, fat and all. We get the grill super hot, grill it fast to sear all the juice in & serve it up! What evers left over goes into the crock pot with sour kraut will it falls apart - good eating!

Last night we grilled up loin strips w/BBQ sauce, told the kids, "This is what BBQ ribs taste like, minus the bone" - they loved it.
Bill

 

I'd be more concerned by the hormones. But thats just me. Everyone must make their own decisions concerning food.

 

Hormones are not used in raising hogs or poultry in this country. It is illegal. Many claim that their pork/poultry is hormone free, but they are supposed to also state that hormones are not approved for hogs or poultry in the US.

Jena

 

I would not count on that myself. It might be a bit like those designer steroids sports figures have been using....

 

I buy my fresh chicken from a processing company in town at 19 cents pounds for quarters....big quarters.

They also have the "injected KFC type" chicken for 29 cents/pound.

The boxes are 40 pounds each. Is that a reasonable price?

 

No hormones in pork. We are hog farmers. Frankly, hogs grow fast enough as it is and there isn't any cheaper to use than just plain old soybean meal and corn. It takes about 7 months from the time they are born until they are loaded on the truck at about 250lbs. Occasionally antibiotics have to be used if you get some persisitant bug but we have withdrawel times on those. The packers check for them and if they catch it in a load of your hogs--- you are toast. Finding antibiotic residues would probably put you out of business because they will pull your contract and there are very few places that an independent farmer can sell his hogs. Most hogs are raised by the packing plants--- they can do what ever they please.
Tana Mc

 

being in Marine Corps housing we live for good deals, the best deal on pork is the commissary 59-79 cents a lb. the only really cheap source of chicken doesn't produce a clean appealing product so we buy that for dog food (right now he is getting tree rats). the commissary has case sales where we pick up things like toilet paper & occasionally food items.