OTish - sourcing lamb shanks ....

[Jimk]

On a pallet with 999 others?

[Jethro_uk]

Tried an ASDA own brand sous-vide style lamb shank in mint gravy last night. Very nice, and at £5 for the pair, a damn good bargain.

Hmmmmm

A little basic maths makes it £2.50 shop price for each shank. If we accept the supermarket makes at least 10%, then they are buying them in for c. £2.25 each.

Obviously the supplier has to get their wedge - say 10% again.

So each prepared, cooked and packaged shank costs c. £2.00

If we shrink by 10% again, that suggests the raw shanks can't be much more than £1.80 each before the whole thing becomes a money pit.

So if I wanted to experiment sous-viding myself, WTF do you get raw lamb shanks at c.£2.00 each ?

(I'm not going to comment on the fact that the labelling said it could be British or New Zealand lamb ...)

[alan_m]

No, the clue is in the first line of the OPs post - "in a mint gravy"

Processed meat is only flavoured or marinated when it is second/third rate and just above the standard required for pet food.

[Jethro_uk]

Perfectly acceptable when cooked sous vide though. (In fact the whole point of sv cooking is to make cheaper cuts of meat palatable).

[spuorgelgoog]

That's where they come from before they go into the mint gravy.

If you want to know where the mint gravy comes from, in a tanker :-)

Owain

[spuorgelgoog]

Try shoulder shank from a butcher. Cheaper as not trendy.

Owain

[Bob Eager]

My son does brilliant sous vide turkey. Actually makes it palatable.

[Jethro_uk]

Hmmm

Of course there are butchers and "butchers". We are exclusively served by the latter, sadly.

[Jethro_uk]

I've had variants of sous vide cookers (already have a vacuum sealer) on the backup wish list for a couple of years now. But there's zero point getting one if it turns out you end up paying hipster prices for the scraggy cuts that are supposed to work best.

Personally I wouldn't have thought turkey would benefit from sv too much ? Besides which, we (SWMBO in total agreement for once :) ) think turkey is just a waste of space. Bland as f*ck.

I suspect the alleged upswing in game meats is a reflection of the fact that anything else is BAF these days.

[Chris Hogg]

Tesco do something similar, and very nice they are too. But £4.50 for a single shank - I think I'll go to ASDA next time! Do you get two separate bags within the one box at ASDA, or are there two shanks in the one bag?

But I suspect there are only one or two mfrs, who then supply the supermarkets wholesale. I think your idea of a 10% mark-up by the supermarket is a bit short of the mark, but what do I know?

You could try a local traditional family butcher's for the shanks themselves. I like lamb's hearts, but I have to ask for them specially and they take a few days to get them in so I have to go back. I usually buy more than I want and freeze the rest, as I also do with the lamb shanks from Tesco, but they should be well thawed before re-cooking.

[Ray]

I get them for free off the legs of lamb I roast every couple of weeks.

[Jethro_uk]

Two separate bags.

Even if it's 1% and 1%, it should be possible to buy the raw shanks for c. £2.50 each ?

Of course googling "raw lamb shoulder shanks" doesn't return anything of use because google doesn't understand anything.

I've given up trying any of the traditional local shops for anything.

[Chris Hogg]

+1

They seemed to lose flavour when white turkeys were introduced. The old-fashioned brown turkeys had much more flavour IIRC, but they are more expensive at this time of year, in part I think because the white ones fatten up quicker so require less effort by the farmer.

A farmer near where I used to live had a brown turkey as a pet - massive bird it was, used to challenge any visitor - quite intimidating!

[Brian Reay]

I usually get them from a local butcher. Tesco sometimes have them but the supermarkets aren't reliable - you need to ask at the meat counter, they are rarely on display. Getting ones which are 'serving sized', so you can serve them on the bone, is the biggest problem- often they are too large- at least for the size of servings we can cope with these days.

Cooking them with red wine and anchovies gives excellent results.

[newshound]

I'm quite keen on sous vide, when Lidl had vacuum sealers I made up my own by adding a proper industrial temperature controller to a standard slow cooker (thermocouple in the water, of course). Unfortunately the sealer failed after a year or so and I couldn't be arsed to chase Lidl. I really ought to buy another one.

Real lamb seems to have got expensive (and my wife isn't keen anyway) but lamb shank is reasonably priced at some local restaurants and usually reliable.

[Bob Eager]

For a start, it's properly moist. I don't know what he does, but it also has a great flavour.

He is a trained chef.

[Thomas Prufer]

Use a ziplock bag.

Place food inside, immerse in water to press plastic against food, seal bag.

Works.

Thomas Prufer

[Jethro_uk]

Following on from this, SWMBO noticed that you can get 2x gammon shanks in Sainsburys (own brand) for £4.

So where in the UK could I source the uncooked shanks for use myself. Let's push the boat out and say that I would be happy to pay £5 for two. So well over the mark up that must be involved in sourcing 2 for £4 to the end consumer ....

[The Natural Philosopher]

Waitrose do em at about £4 each. Ouch!

[Scott]

This certainly represents lateral thinking with regard to OP's question.