to ask MEAT EATERS if you buy free range or standard chicken?

[Granllanog]

I got attacked on my last thread for saying I buy standard supermarket chicken. Considering only 4% of all of the chicken produced in the UK is free-range and only 1% is organic I don't think I am unusual in doing this?

YABU = I'm a meat eater and only ever eat/buy free-range chicken.
YANBU = I buy standard chicken.

I buy all of my meat from either Morrisons or Aldi except for the turkey at Christmas which comes from the butcher and I buy whatever is on offer/the best value for money.

I honestly only know one person who says they 'only buy free range high welfare' meat. In my social circle/family we're all feeding families with multiple children on budgets. None of us is struggling for money but we probably would be if we only bought expensive meat!

OP your last thread got ridiculous, and I don't mean your posts!

I buy standard I’m afraid. Mostly because I can’t afford free range and also because free range isn’t exactly free range anyway.

One of my children has a Saturday job in the village butcher, so all the meat we eat comes from there. We know who the farmers and suppliers are, so we're sure of what we're buying, although none of it is organic so it's not the very most expensive. Even with the staff discount it's an expensive source of protein though! We choose to eat better meat less often than buy cheaper meat for 7+ meals a week (having unfussy children does help a lot towards this, no doubt about it).

I don't think it's true to say that intensively-rearing chicken is as ethical a method as free range etc. Asking whichever pp questioned it - have you seen firsthand the environments different types of rearing provide?

[quote ouchmyfeet]**@Lavender24* your response to @HarrietsChariot* is actually far more disgusting than what she said.[/quote]
I don't know, I think they're probably equally as awful as each other.
Staunch meat eaters with zero ability to see any kind of ethical nuance are just as bad as militant vegans in my book 🤷🏼‍♀️

Yes, free range and organic wherever possible.

Depends who's shopped. DH buys supermarket cheap chicken, beef etc; I go across the road to a butcher who can tell me what local farm raised the birds or beast. You can 100% taste the difference!

And it's also about animal welfare and food miles, of course. But it does cost more.

If it came to it, I'd eat meat even less often (we're currently at 2 or 3 times a week) to afford the butcher rather than be part of the supermarket-led meat production system.

Interesting voting split 49/50. Personally I wouldn’t buy chicken (or any other meat) if I couldn’t afford organic/free range. But I know I am in a fortunate position to have that choice!

We are not militant but I dabbled with vegetarianism when younger so I try to buy the best I can afford. That means free range chicken from the supermarket or barn-reared with some outdoor access from the butchers, and outdoor reared pork. And the best mince we can afford (the one thing I do sometimes buy organic). I don’t tend to ask questions about provenance when eating out and the kids do have things like chicken goujons sometimes.

Like everything, it’s a balance. I do what works for me and what I can live with conscience-wise and afford financially. Others do otherwise. I wouldn’t judge people making different financial choices though I do find my DM’s attitude odd in that she’s been saying they should buy free range for about 30 years now but never does! Either you’re bothered or you’re not.

I only buy British meat for the family (I am vegetarian) whilst I know this isn't free range it does have higher welfare than European meat .

I agree with a pp - these types of threads are unlikely to give a representation of what is known to be true. Most people who buy chicken buy intensively-reared, but perhaps they're less likely to want to think or talk much about it.

I bought a lidl extra large £5 chicken once. It was truly vile. There was so much water in it it boiled in its own juice in the oven instead of roasting. Even the cat wouldn't eat it. Id rather not eat meat at all than cheap stuff.

I try and buy meat reduced and freeze and will buy organic if it’s there but day in day out I buy from Lidl, Aldi or the 3 for £10 type meat in Asda or local butchers - so a chicken, 5% mince etc. The majority of chicken we eat is standard.

@Shehasadiamondinthesky

I bought a lidl extra large £5 chicken once. It was truly vile. There was so much water in it it boiled in its own juice in the oven instead of roasting. Even the cat wouldn't eat it. Id rather not eat meat at all than cheap stuff.

I tried Lidl chicken once too and it was pretty unplesant.

I'm a single mum on a low income. I buy free range or organic, I just buy less of it and less often.

@RobertaFirmino

Is there a minimum standard that has to be met before chicken can be described as 'free range'? I've always wondered what these birds have free range of. Do they have free range of a tiny yard or a massive field?

Yes, there are standards There is a minimum amount of space per bird that they have to have access to, so many hours per day where their hatches are open to let them out into the field (they are obviously closed at night to stop foxes getting them)

Just like free range eggs…
Organic means they get fed on organic corn and feed, plus have to access to more space per bird in the field

I’m sure the full list of rules is available to Google but it’s a balance between keeping birds safe from predators but allowing them to express natural behaviour and have space to roam around

‘Standard’ chickens never see daylight and have lamps on all the time to make them think it’s daytime so they eat more and put on more weight

It’s a grim existence, compared to their free range cousins

@AuntieMarys

Always free range. Would do with out otherwise

Same here.

I buy both, depending on where I am shopping. If I buy from a butcher’s or somewhere like M and S or Waitrose I buy standard. I know that the welfare for these birds will still be high. Yesterday we had a free-range corn-fed chicken from Aldi which cost about £6. I occasionally buy the organic chicken from M&S because they are incredibly good.

ALWAYS free range. Organic if I can. Never battery chickens. We'd rather eat less meat than buy caged animals - on our non meat days we eat lentils or something similar for protein.

I don’t eat meat but I buy normal chicken for the family.

I always snap up free range/organic if it’s reduced but unfortunately we just simply can’t afford to replace all our meat with FR.

We do however eat substantially less meat as an entire household than we did 5 years ago so I suppose every little helps.

Free range or organic. If I could not afford it, I wouldn't eat chicken.

Aldi do cheap free range chicken, about £6 a chicken. I have bought it in the past but I don't entirely trust that is really is properly free range at that price, does anyone know?

Spottybluepyjamas we eat a lot of lentils I love them, so versatile.

Free range if I am buying fresh chicken on its own, but various ‘standard’ chicken slips through in ready meals, food boxes etc.

But it’s hard though - if I don’t eat chicken, I might eat beef, but then think of the carbon footprint. Or fish but then worry about over fishing. Or veggie/vegan but worry about how highly processed most meat alternatives are. Or try to persuade my fussy kids to eat actual vegetables which they won’t and then I worry about food waste. You can’t win.

It depends. I will only buy higher welfare meat, which generally means organic or free-range. The only exception I make is Waitrose whose welfare standards are high anyway, even for their Essential range. Having looked into their policies, including those relating to slaughter (so often people look at how an animal has lived and not how it has died), plus their Good Chicken awards from Compassion in World Farming, I'm happy to eat that and support a shop that's making the effort on the animal welfare front.

I'd love to buy from our local - and excellent - butcher but they can't always tell me what living/slaughter conditions the animals had (and I get the impression they'd rather I wasn't talking about slaughter methods in front of other customers!) so I limit meat purchases to schemes that are guaranteed.

I've seen poultry farms and as long as the overall standards are high enough I am OK with chicken not necessarily being free range (the birds I saw regularly were in huge airy barns with open sides, so plenty of natural light and air, but the farmer couldn't call them free range as the birds were never technically outside).

Yes only organic here and don’t eat meat in restaurants for that reason.

@Claudethecat Aldi meat is RSPCA Assured so is ok.