buying a cow or shares for meat

[the simple life]

Thanks for all the great ideas. I will look into them.
I think it would still save money after comparing the prices around here.

$1.79 lb would be a steal.

Cooking with less meat is not a problem, I have been a vegetarian for almost 20 years and have endless recipes.
However, my husband and sons are meat and potato types and I don't put my preferences on them, so I would like to make it possible to still feed them beef.

I am sure they would deal with it if I cut back even further than I have, but thought I should look into other avenues first.
Its getting more expensive all the time, so I have been skipping the steaks and getting more hamburg and incorporating that into meals, ya know beef enchiladas, american chop suey etc.
But now the hamburger has gone up in price as well.
I ran into a friend at the grocery store last night and he held up a package of hamburg griping that one small package was up to $10.00 and I had to agree because I just left the meat dept and spent over $20.00 on a family pack that is only going to last one night.

Its obviously not the only meat that has gone up in price, I made chicken parm last night and just the chicken cost $20.00 for it.
I don't even bother with pork anymore, other than the bacon I bought to make corn chowder with this weekend.

Well, we'll see how it goes. If I find something then great, if not I will just keep buying it as I can.

Thanks for all the ideas!

 

[poppycat]

There are a few places you could check. I've seen smaller outfits advertise in the classified section of the newspaper or craigslist. You could ask a farmer you like at the farmers market if they know anyone who is raising beef. They are pretty plugged in to what other people are doing. You could also do a google search and see what you come up with.

I'm pretty sure you won't save much money over the grocery store. You will get a better quality product, but you will also have to figure out what to do with some of the more obscure cuts.

 

[roosmom]

I do not know how 4H works, but could you go in with a few people and buy one of the cows from a 4H'er? That would be a club you could contact.

 

[foalfan]

I went on line to that Farm Swap America web site and even though I was able to join fine, I cannot get access to post a question, it keeps telling me that my password and name do not match their records even though they have confirmed it to be correct.
After much frustration and attempts to fix it I gave up.
It doesn't look like too many people post there anyway so maybe it wouldn't have helped me anyway, I don't know.

I am the founder of Farm Swap America and I am sorry that you had problems registering. It is a fairly new site, so no, not a lot of people are posting as of yet.

If you wish to try again and have problems, feel free to email me at foalfan at yahoo dot com and I will see what I can do to help you.

Libby

 

[Henrietta23]

I was just thinking of this thread the other day as I was sitting in the lunch room at work. Another BYC member works there too and we were talking chickens and goats and somehow the subject of buying beef by the side or part of a side came up. Turns out she had done just that from a woman who works at the school! Then she said if I didn't have room to store a quarter side myself she knew of another co-worker who might be interested in splitting a quarter with me. So what I came away with was the suggestion that you should let everyone you can know what you're looking to do! Someone is bound to know someone who will have your answer.
And then as I was sitting reading last night and the power went out YET AGAIN (that's a whole other thread.....) I realized I probably ought to buy a generator before I go spending hundreds of dollars on meat.....

 

[roosmom]

And then as I was sitting reading last night and the power went out YET AGAIN (that's a whole other thread.....) I realized I probably ought to buy a generator before I go spending hundreds of dollars on meat.....

Or you could can it........canned beef......canned stew......canned roast beef hash.......LOL

 

[Henrietta23]

And then as I was sitting reading last night and the power went out YET AGAIN (that's a whole other thread.....) I realized I probably ought to buy a generator before I go spending hundreds of dollars on meat.....

Or you could can it........canned beef......canned stew......canned roast beef hash.......LOL

That's a whole lotta cannin'!

 

[simplynewt]

Another good thread from the Archives. Thanks for the links and info.