Unfashionable cuts of meat

[BMII]

Just looked at an old post and it made me wonder about cuts of meat you don't see anymore or the butcher keeps for his "perks".

Being on a limited budget now I recently asked my butcher about some of these and was surprised when he said, "Yeah, we've got those out the back."
He keeps them for special customers or request only as I suppose they don't look as attractive on the shelf as prime rib!

One I discovered and pardon my ignorance of it was a beef "oven buster" aka "Jacobs ladder", I asked for it by another name I forget but it was about £6 for a huge joint of very tasty beef!

I also discovered he does loads of other cuts nobody bothers with now, you just have to ask!

All these people going to food banks and complaining they can't afford meat gets my goat(I haven't asked him if he sells goat yet!)and feeding your family well doesn't mean buying cheap supermarket junk!

One thing he advertises is lamb chump ends, I'd never seen or heard of them before but it's that bit between the loin and the leg after the chump chops have been cut out, some butchers wrongly sell them as chump chops, others put them in the mince, but each time he gets one of his lambs in the saves the cut and freezes it, it's not a pretty cut and is a good 25-35% bone, triangular in shape and like a huge fist but for £7.50 you get 5lb in weight of lamb!
Average 6 pieces but if it's underweight he just chucks another one on, ideal roasted or stewed, my last bag was only 5 pieces but they were big and one easily serves one person, my mate got 7 in his bag!

He's started putting some of the lesser cuts like beef skirt in the window now but I was just wondering if anyone else has a butcher who happily sells the not so well known cuts, and yes he does sell oxtail etc.

http://www.appleyardsbutchers.co.uk/

He's not all cheap but is the best butcher in my area, well, the end of my road!
My mate and his sister have a meat budget of £20 a week, not bad, but for that they get most of their veg there as well, I can feed myself on meat and veg in there for £10 a week easily.....unless I go for a steak, one of his ribeyes costs me about £10 on it's own!

But he does lovely big pork chops with the kidney on, I bought three for £4.50, £1.50 each!

[wheels]

I buy from a butchers attached to the only abbatoir in the area, so can get whatever I fancy.

I'd encourage members to buy from their independent local suppliers. Don't assume that they're dearer: that's often not the case. Also, prices can drop dramatically when buying in 'bulk', which for many items may be as little as 5 - 10lbs.

Phil

[BMII]

I buy from a butchers attached to the only abbatoir in the area, so can get whatever I fancy.

I'd encourage members to buy from their independent local suppliers. Don't assume that they're dearer: that's often not the case. Also, prices can drop dramatically when buying in 'bulk', which for many items may be as little as 5 - 10lbs.

Phil

I sometimes manage to get out to the only butchers left in Kent with it's own abattoir but it's 45 miles away!

http://swdoughty.co.uk/

I use another butcher in Sussex if I'm out that way about 8 miles up the road and everything comes from his own farm, his wife even makes the pies in her kitchen!

And my local butcher at the end of my road has a lot of his own meat and everything else from local farms including the one mentioned above, the eggs come from a farm two miles away and the large ones nearly always have double yolkers, I've had at least 3 boxes all double yolks, I know one bloke had a whole tray and he's got a photo up in the shop of a customer cooking breakfast one Christmas morning with three eggs in the pan, a single, a double, and a triple yolker!

I used to go down the road of supermarket offer meat but no more and he does discounts as you say on even small bulk orders and it's all good.

There are a few dodgy ones round here though, one is basically a catering butcher and not brilliant, another I'm surprised his meat is passed fit for human consumption, even one of his own employees told me not to buy the meat!
And another does 5lb of sausages for £4.....no ta!

Andy

[wheels]

That butchers looks the biz. I have one near me that's a butchers shop with an abattoir - primarily for his own use - he's only licensed for beef and lambs.

The one where I tend to go is primarily an abattoir, but has an attached shop. It's a far larger concern.

Phil

[BMII]

That butchers looks the biz. I have one near me that's a butchers shop with an abattoir - primarily for his own use - he's only licensed for beef and lambs.

The one where I tend to go is primarily an abattoir, but has an attached shop. It's a far larger concern.

Phil

It's pucker and not expensive either, people travel miles even down from London to go there and last time I was in they were taking a phone order from Hungary!

Right beside the shop they have their own flock of geese and you can choose one to have fattened up for Christmas, locals go along and say "right, I'll have that one!"

Sadly all these little places are disappearing, there's another well known village butcher in Kent, tiny shop, still has it's own abattoir but not allowed to use it after the last foot and mouth scare, all the livestock was from within a mile or two, sometimes just walked across a field to the shop, but now it has to be brought in by lorry from a slaughterhouse miles away.

A few years ago I worked next door to the widow of H E Bates of Darling buds of May fame, I was working on the oast house where the cricket match was filmed in what is now a paddock, it has a lot of history in my game that's too long to go into and I know I do go on!

The whole local village was a huge farm estate but the bit I was working on was on the forstal, now the village green/cricket pitch surrounded by thankfully original old houses, the forstal was where the farmers took their livestock the day before market and kept watch on it overnight.

When you see a lot of village greens that still exist that's what they were used for, forget food miles!
Everything was local produce.

A big bone of contention of mine is Romney Marsh Lamb, living right next door to it we hardly ever see it, all we see is the lorries shipping it out to France, while, unless you know the little butchers and farm shops that get some we get meat of unknown provenance, if you shop in the supermarket or cruddy butchers that is.

I'm a fussy git and make sure I know where all my meat comes from now, even which farm.
I know everyone can't do that and modern shopping trends make people care less about what they eat but for example, last year I bought what looked like a nice spatchcock chicken from Asda, it was about £5 and I was in a rush, ingredients etc looked okay on the label, no added water, but it was crap!
For the same price I got a chicken from my butcher that was bigger and tasted like chicken!

I'd better shut up, going right off topic and on one of my rants about crap food
I will just add this though, we have an abattoir nearby where smallholders send their animals and they're never sure what they get back!
One bloke used to grind his own pork for sausages he sells from his driveway, now he lets them do it and they're dreadful, last batch I tried had an eyelash in!
Another woman sent some goat there and it wasn't goat that came back!

Andy

[wheels]

I don't think that you'll find many here that would disagree.

Phil

[jenny_haddow]

My dear old gran used to cook oven buster. It's short ribs of beef and difficult to find here now. I can always buy it in France, it's cheap as chips there, just as it should be here. I often bring it back for the freezer. Cooked long, low and slow its superb, I have photos of my nephews devouring it, they would have eaten the bones if they could have done!
With you all the way on the butcher front. Our very good village butcher closed last year. He retired, but also the competition from the supermarkets was a deciding factor. I'm fortunate to live in an area where pigs are raised out doors in the fields. You can see where the expression 'happy as a pig in muck' comes from, as they seem to love rolling around. I can get great pork at a reasonable, not cheap, price, but the flavour is worth the extra pennies. Sheep aren't so plentiful here, the fens don't have a lot of grazing, but those that are raised are huge. As a spinner, I'm also interested on what they grow on their backs, so I get a great lamb/mutton and a sweater thrown in!

Cheers

Jen

[BMII]

That's a problem we have here too, the old butchers retire and nobody takes over so all that knowledge is gone forever.
One old boy went recently who was brilliant but now the shop lies empty, another was taken over and run by a young cutter who stood outside smoking all day, it closed in weeks.

I'm lucky enough to live in the "Garden of England" but they keep throwing supermarkets up all over the place where we don't need them, we've got the largest beach launched fishing fleet in the country yet the fishermen are paid subsidies not to fish, I spent 6 months working around the fish market area and never saw a boat go out!
They just got their quota increased but it's made little difference, my butcher is busy though, you can hardly move in his shop sometimes and he does all the stuff you can't get elsewhere, he's on a little parade of shops where we can get anything so a lot of the locals just don't use the supermarkets at all, Aldi have tried to move in twice 200 yards down the road but been knocked back thankfully.

Andy

[onewheeler]

My dear old gran used to cook oven buster. It's short ribs of beef and difficult to find here now. I can always buy it in France, it's cheap as chips there, just as it should be here. I often bring it back for the freezer. Cooked long, low and slow its superb.

Yes, short ribs are wonderful and you seldom see them here. Indeed, I've only discovered them recently. The covered market in Oxford has a stall which sells them fairly cheaply (about £6 / kg). They get 12 hours in the simmering oven of the Aga, having been fried in oil with some shallot, garlic, a pinch of celery salt, thyme and covered in most of a bottle of red plonk. There's usually enough gravy left to make the base for a very tasty soup. I guess most must go to France or the dog food factory.

Martin/

[NCPaul]

Short ribs are a great cut for sausages; I like them for beef hotdogs. Unfortunately, all cuts of beef are high here now. Please don't let any chefs hear about jowls.

[ped]

Too true NCP, the chefs over here have popularised all the what were once cheap cuts

[RehctubUK]

Hi, I run a Butchers shop in the west country and we happily serve all manner of old fashioned cuts.
You would often see pigs cheek, pigs ears, oxtail, chicken carcasses, marrow bones, scrag, bacon ribs, tripe, faggots, chitterling, bath chaps, white pudding, black pudding, pork t bones, chicken Kiev's, among a variety of livers, kidneys and sausages all in on our premises.
You're right, you only have to ask and your requirements can be met the majority of the time.

[DanMcG]

Had to look up Bath chaps....sounds pretty good to me!

[RehctubUK]

Yea, tasty cold cut! There are many ways to do them. We roll them up, cook for 2 hours at 150 degrees, take the skin off while it's cooling, then bread it with the golden crumbs.
I was asked for rissoles yesterday, could be on the cards!

[onewheeler]

I was asked for rissoles yesterday, could be on the cards!

Chap goes into a restaurant and find chicken pissoles on the menu. Unusual, but worth a try. Waiter apologises, "That's a misprint Sir, the "p" should be an "r"".

"OK" says the customer, "I'll have the chicken arssoles".

I'll be getting me coat...