To ask how many grams of meat you cater to each person?

[froggygroggy]

On the back of the thread about Hello Fresh/Gousto portion sizes I'd be interested to know when you buy meat in the shop and serve for dinner how many grams you work it out as per person.

I tend to buy 500-600g of meat (mince/chicken/gammon etc) for three people.

That works out 160-200 grams per person.
I'm now thinking I should downsize to the lower size pack to get to around 125g per person. I guess with mince it tends to be 250g or 500g so would probably need to stick with the 500 unless just catering for two.

Just made me think really.

I bulk everything up with veg. We can make 500g mince feed 4 of us for 2 meals (so 8 portions), sausages I cut up and make sausage pasta so nobody knows how many sausages they're getting! Chicken tends to be one thigh per person. Salmon I also cut up for a Thai style dish so two salmon fillets will feed 4 of us.

Its a best guess. I know the pack size, i know i seperate it into 4 portions, i know my husbands portion is a bit bigger than mine and eldest sons and my other sons is a bit smaller cos i split it 4 ways then nick a bit from my youngest plate to add to my husbands. I dont weigh it, but id be amazed if it was much out.

If we're specifically talking mince, I would be buying the 750g pack and making six portions - 3 for now and 3 for the freezer. Mince-based dishes tend to freeze well.

Loads as my kids don't really eat vegetables and often won't eat potatoes or rice either. They're okay with pasta and bread. If I was making beef stew I would cook at least 250g per person. If it was a roast it would have to be a 2 kg joint for six of us and, if that was lamb or chicken, there wouldn't be any leftovers. They'll each eat half a pack of sausages which is 200g each. We're a family that likes meat though. My youngest will happily eat a couple of chicken legs for breakfast but won't touch toast or cereal.

500g makes 5 portions for me of chilli or cottage pie
It's not that I purposely do it but I batch cook and everything makes 5 portions even when I don't measure stuff
I weighed the cottage pie after cooking and portioning and it was 400g per portion so sort of ready meal size

@00100001 the butcher concerned is regarded as high class, wins prizes for his own sausages, etc - that's why I was surprised that his chicken was no better than supermarket.

@Pothoswithasparkle
Doesn't halal = left to exsanguinate? I know our meat production leaves a lot to be desired, but exsanguination has always seemed a step too far to me. Happy to be educated though...

Same. And I ate a 300g steak last night without a problem. Generally for anything other than mince a portion would be around 200g per person.

That said, I like to keep my protein intake high due to my exercise habits and our evening meal tends to be the only one with meat in it.

These posts are always full of loons.
I don’t eat massive portions but like 50g of meat is not an adult portion in the real world!

Absolute most, nearly all is stunned before it. But yes, you need to drain the blood like with kosher.
The point even without stunning is to kill animal as fast as possible so it doesn't necessarily suffer. Knives are sharp and it shouldn't be done by some random dummy.

I never had shrinkage issues from halal butchers like I had elsewhere. Plus they usually have bones for broth. Winner

I am fine with it. I grew up with animal for food.

Pigs in butchering (generally not in the above mentioned) are also drained (black pudding). We used to shoot and within seconds it was hanging upside down and cut. Abattoirs should stunt first.

No one is saying 50g of meat on its own is a meal, but if you get your protein from other sources too I don't see the issue.

Meat is expensive, so lately I halve it and make up the protein with things like lentils and cheese e.g. in a bolognese. The fat and fibre keeps me fuller too than just meat.

They're at least stunned if done in UK.

People seem to give a shit about how they're killed, but couldn't careless that they're eating caged/barn reared chickens that love in such small spaces they're stressed and hen pecked etc.

But no. Halal meat is awful because if the slaughtering method...?

I am a MN chicken person, for whom ‘a piece of meat’ is rarely, if ever, the main part of a dish.

On average, if a recipe uses chicken breast (eg curry, stir fry et al) , half a breast per person. If thighs in a casserole, one or occasionally 2 per person as some are small. A good free range supermarket chicken will do 3 meals for 4 - roast, salad, pie.

If pork, one thin cut chop or steak per oerson.

If bacon for flavouring - pasta sauce like carbonara - 1-1.5 back rashers per person. On a rare occasion gammon steak, half per person.

Mince - a 750g pack does 3 meals for 4 people (shepherd’s pie/ spag bol / chilli or spag bol / chilli / lasagne)

I don’t bulk out with lentils, much more often with vegetables , and the meat is a flavouring.

We eat a lot of vegetarian food, so in some ways tge meat is an addition to a largely vegetarian dish, rather than the other way round. So 500g of mince for spag bol would also use 4x tins of good tomatoes.

I don't find this to be an issue with free-range chicken tbh Not that I usually weigh it post cooking!

At home on a normal day 100-125g pp.

I could easily eat larger portions e.g. special steak, or large indian meat out but don't feel its necessary or healthy for a standard imd-week meal.

To those posters who say 'we need to eat a lot of protein' - we really don't. Have a look at this:
onlinedoctor.lloydspharmacy.com/uk/lifestyle-advice/macronutrients-micronutrients-explained

NHS recomments around 50 g protein per day for an adult.
Just this list (for example) is more than the recommended amount:

one egg (7g)
one chicken breast (30g)
some milk (100ml) (3.5g)
bread (wholemeal, 2 slices) (8g)
cheese (25 -30g) (8 g)

Other sources of protein, examples, all approx:
lean mince (5%) 100g (20 g)
lentils (cooked, 100g) (9g)
kidney beans (125g) (10g)

Too much protein can be really bad for health (increases risk of kidney stones, colon cancer etc):
www.health.harvard.edu/nutrition/when-it-comes-to-protein-how-much-is-too-much

I wonder about muffin portions now😂
And now i fancy muffin

100-150g of meat or fish, depending on what's being served with it and if it's for a smaller meal or a more substantial one.

However, for some meals I also add more than that - often with the thought of freezing a portion, but it then gets eaten at the time anyway!