Stretching your dollar on meats

Probably the most expensive thing I buy at the grocery store is meat. I have not eaten red meat since 1989 for personal reasons, but my husband enjoys it quite often. Usually, the only time I buy beef is if we are grilling, and my hubby gets a nice bone-in rib eye for himself and boneless skinless chicken breasts for me and our daughter.

We still love tacos, meatloaf, hamburger helper, spaghetti and chili. I used to make it with ground turkey, but it seemed to lack some flavor. I started buying ground pork. Now I use half and half ground pork and ground turkey in a meatloaf, but most everything else is ground pork.

Buying ground pork in the package with the name brand on it is quite cost prohibitive. I learned a little trick when my husband worked as a meat cutter, and I will share it with you. :)

Wait until the boston butts go on sale. Our local Piggly Wiggly store has them for 99 cents a pound about every 8-12 weeks. Ask your friendly butcher to do you a favor***....most of the time they will cut anything for you. Ask the butcher to cut the boston butt in half. He can grind the boneless half for you and make nice juicy country style ribs from the other half. I bring this meat home and package the ground meat in quart size ziploc bags and the ribs in gallon size ones. Some stores will have a policy that you can only buy one of the boston butts at this price, so make a couple of trips or ask your hubby or sister to go through the line for you so you max out the savings.

The ground pork has a very nice taste and texture, and when it browns you will find that very little fat is left to drain off. NICE!

Enjoy!

***Some stores, such as WalMart and our SavALot do not have a meat-cutter on staff. They have meat stackers, which are employees who wear white coats like a butcher but all the meat comes into the store already cut and wrapped. They just stock the case. These employees cannot cut or grind meat, and most stores do not even have the equipment for them to do it if they would.
However, in a regular grocery store, a meat-cutter can cut and grind just about anything you want. Sometimes they get an attitude about it because they have to clean the grinder after grinding one kind of meat before switching to another (this should be a no brainer right? Who wants E coli mixing with your Trichinosis???)
If your local grocery store meat market employees refuse to grind the meat, contact your district office. This is their JOB!!!! They can and should grind it and most will, but some days I run into Mr. Attitude which can quickly be adjusted with a quick phone call. :)