Here's The Best Way To Get Cheap Beef In Bulk

As the cost of food keeps going up, it becomes harder and harder to stretch a dollar and feed your family the same way. It's always a good idea to look for sales, but that's not a consistent way to do your shopping. As a result, if you want to be able to get a reliable, good-quality product for a good price, you may have to start thinking outside the box. When it comes to buying cheap beef in bulk, there's a great solution ... as long as you've got the space for it.

Tasting Table spoke with Scott Thomas, the owner of The Grillin' Fools, about getting the most beef for your buck. "The best way to buy in bulk is to find someone who sells whole, half, or quarter cows," Thomas explains. "The larger portion you purchase, the cheaper it gets per pound."

The exact amount of beef you get will vary slightly depending on the type of cow and how the butcher prepares it, but from a whole cow, you can expect to get around 350 to 450 pounds of meat. A side of beef will give you about 160 to 250 pounds. A quarter cow can yield around 110 to 130 pounds. One thing to keep in mind is that this is the final weight of the meat delivered. The hanging weight of the beef before trimming and processing will be nearly twice as much.

Buying a whole cow is obviously a big deal. You can definitely get the meat at a big discount compared to supermarket prices, but if you're buying 400 pounds, this is still going to cost thousands of dollars. Not only that, you need significant freezer space, as a whole cow can take up as much as 20 cubic feet. 

"If a whole cow is out of the question due to price per cow, or the freezer can't hold that much meat, consider splitting one with someone else so you get the full cow discount rather than just the half cow price reduction," Thomas suggests. Of course, going this route still means that you'll have to take care of meat-cutting yourself; while visiting a butcher shop costs more, it can provide almost any cut of steak you want, plus lots of ground beef, ribs, roasts, and more.

So is buying beef in bulk worthwhile? Impossible to say. Prices change by region and over time, but this is the most economical way to do things. Thomas recommends you ensure proper storage since it's such a high volume of meat. "Try to vacuum seal as much as you can. This cuts down on freezer burn and extends the edible life of the beef by a whole lot."

With so much meat, it can be easy to forget things. "So be sure to inventory the contents of the freezer, updating often," Thomas recommends, "and be sure to pull from the bottom or back of the freezer to make sure no portion of beef is forgotten and ravaged by ice and time."