OT: Supermarket meat vs butchers

[R D S]

I'd always used a local butchers (I passed there daily, while going to the post office) until he retired some years ago, then sadly soon after passed away, top bloke, well missed.

Anyway, after he retired I would but meat from the supermarket, Lidl specifically, and I was surprised at the quality, I was sure it must have improved over the years because I had it in my mind that it wasn't very good.

These days I have more time on my hands so have been shopping on our local market, today I threw away 2 chicken thighs that were stinking, I bought 4 on Thursday and cooked 2, was planing to use the others today. Is that normal?

I can think of other situations where i've thrown meat away, one conclusion I can draw is that whatever else, supermarket meat is a lot cheaper and keeps for longer.

[Brian]

I like CostCo meat but only buy it when we are in the area.

Aldi is good, we have a large one nearby.

Ditto Tesco.

Asda are good as are Morrisons.

I like to use a traditional butchers but finding one which has the stock etc isn’t easy.

Lidl seem ok but have only recently opened nearby.

Personally, I avoid markets for meat. Ok for fruit and veg but not meat.

Supermarkets tend to have a good turn over of stock so freshness isn’t normally an issue. We did have some drumsticks which seemed ‘off’. I’m not sure where from. We just binned them.

[Joe]

Agreed, Costco meat quality is better than that of the supermarkets (I don't know about Waitrose, I'm not overpaid) and their Aberdeen Angus beefburgers are definitely the gold standard.

Indeed, the few remaining butchers have had to be pretty good to survive.

Generally, yes, but there is a butcher who tours the larger local markets with an artic with a sales counter built into the side, and does the old market spiel about his stock while he has a couple of assistants who circulate and take the money. He has a very good reputation, and it's always difficult to get close to the truck because of the crowd.

Supermarkets also have to make good anything that's bad before the use-by date. I suppose market traders must also do this, but I bet they don't do it easily. Supermarkets can't afford to get a reputation for quibbling.

[SteveW]

We are lucky enough to have an award-winning butchers just 100yds from home.

Supermarkets certainly can supply good quality meat these days, but the local butcher is still better. The butcher also makes all sorts of sausages, burgers, marinaded meats, etc., even pies and sells vegetables, eggs, dairy products, sauces, stocks, gravies - so you can buy pretty well all you need from a simple almost ready to cook meal, to all the ingredients for a, from scratch, meal.

It's always busy there!

[alan_m]

Not all "independent" butchers make quality sausages or burgers nor is the marinated meat of good quality.

Friends of mine live in a rural area where the supermarkets are a 10 mile drive. There are also four butchers shops within the same radius, mainly selling meat from know local sources. At least two sell meat from farms owned by the same family. Friends have tried all of the butchers in the area and found the products to to be somewhat variable between shops. They have settled on two but things like sausages and bacon will only come from one of them and things like pies will only come from the other.

[Owain Lastname]

Apart from the quality of the meat and the sourcing, supermarkets should be on top of keeping an intact 'chill chain'.

Market traders might not be. If your chicken was in the back of a transit van for a few hours that might be enough to tip it over the edge.

Owain

[alan_m]

+1 Plus all day being displayed without any refrigeration.

[Brian]

I missed Waitrose, we don’t have one nearby. That said, when we travel and find one ( in our motorhome), we like to use them. The price difference isn’t that much.

The same goes for M&S, we do use the local one - which has one of their new ‘upgraded’ food halls.

We have a local one which will order meat in but you need to plan ahead. Sometime I decide I’m in the mood to cook ;-)

One thing I’ve struggled to find is Ham Hocks - to make soup. Being a Northerner, I like thick, hearty soups. I make some using chicken or Turkey stock. I sometimes use the water from boiling a ham / gammon but I remember a soup I had has a youngster made using Ham Hocks.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Waitrose lamb is twice as good as the butchers.

[R D S]

Do I eat the bacon that smells OK but was adjacent to it?

[The Natural Philosopher]

To be brutally honest, you get sick from bad meat in two different ways

If it isn't cooked properly the organisms that were on it mayu procreate in your gut and give you a hard time

If you DO cook it properly, there may be residual toxins in it if you didnt wash it well first.

I've washed mould off stuff, cooked it and been fine, the more immediate problem is the taste has changed to 'not very nice'

But furry bacon spruces up well after a wash and tastes good. Furry cheese that you *dont* cook is an issue.

[Rod Speed]

When I was working for the govt in a holiday job doing scientific research in our Kosioscko National Park with us camping in a old house and a small caravan with no refrigeration at all, in summer, we used to have fresh meat delivered weekly by the mail carrier. As you can imagine by the end of the week the chops were usually a bit green. We never bothered to wash them, just grilled them as usual and never had any gut problems and they tasted fine.

Dehydrated Surprise peas and dehydrated potato flakes which turned into mashed potatoes when heated with water.

For some odd reason I'm not partial to mashed potatoes anymoe.

Chop and frozen peas are fine tho.

Bullshit. Plenty of cheese like blue vein and cambert etc is furry deliberately.