I thought this might help some people take the plunge we weren't sure about until recently.
A coworker raises cattle and has been trying to sell me a half or quarter cow for some time now, but we've been too chicken to go for it. We don't really eat much beef compared to chicken or pork, and we didn't have a chest freezer. A quarter cow will take up pretty much the entire freezer section of a normal fridge freezer combo.
Well about a month ago we decided to just go for it. We bought a 7 cu ft. chest freezer from a local hardware store for $170, and then paid $420 to him and $130 to the butcher. Now I know this is r/frugal and $720 does NOT sound like frugal, but hear me out.
First of all, we were a little nervous about what cuts we would want, but the butcher was EXTREMELY understanding and asked us all sorts of questions about what we liked and didn't like to eat so he could try to get us the cuts we'd actually use. Next year we'll have an even better idea.
Now for the math! We got 188 lbs of beef for $550. That's $2.92/lb. regardless of the cut. $2.92 per pound for ground beef is a pretty decent deal around here let alone beef that I know where and how it was raised. This really starts to make sense when you start to cook something like the 4lbs of sirloin we had the other night with the neighbors, which cost us $12. Our local Kroger sells sirloin for $11 for one pound! We also got cuts of chuck roast, beef tips, round steak, and t-bone.
Now just to make the math clean let's assume I used to spend an average of $5/lb of beef at Kroger. 188lbs would have cost me $940! That means at $550 the freezer including electricity has paid for itself right about twice over!
Now maybe I'm not taking every possible variable into account, but all in all I'd say this is a win considering I should be saving about $400 a year(ish) on food I'd already be buying, and I know where it's from. Plus gas and time at the store!
April 13, 2019 at 08:44AM
