price of steak

A fair price is whatever a willing customer will pay a willing cow. .

In Baltmore, the price for the same cut of mean can vary from 10 to 13 dollars per pound, maybe 15, depeinding on the supermarket. One chain is always cheaper.

Supermarkets often carry the lower grades so unless you know the grade you really can't compare prices. Same with color. Well aged beef tends to be darker. Even the breed of the steer makes a difference.

My wife does all the food shopping and shopping two different supermarkets has complained about meat prices jumping up and down between the two. I suspect most of the price disruption is due to the virus shutting down restaurants and meat being shuttled elsewhere.

Small towns may have excellent specialty meat markets but in general they aren't a place to find bargains. The same goes for entire states that are sparsely populated. When I traveled a lot I wished I had a way to bring a lot of groceries back from major metropolitan areas like Seattle, LA, or Phoenix.

It can be even more local. In the '80s there was a coffee shortage due to a failed crop. I was in Fort Wayne and the shelves were almost bare and the prices were doubled. On weekend I went down to Indianapolis and, voila, no coffee shortage and normal prices.

Now, if you're talking about Walmart meat prices, I hope you like your steak really, really juicy.

You were likely getting well aged steak at the little shop - much more tender than the "pink" steak at your supermarket. A good steak is almost purple.

These days the best chance of getting an aged steak is to buy a big chunk of meat and age it yourself. Just be prepared to throw away some of the outside, you wouldn't even feed the dog.

Just don't buy Canada's madcow beef.