joints of meat and multiple meals, any tips to share?

[wannabedomesticgoddess]

Does anyone have any tips or recipes on how to make a cheap joint of meat last for maybe 3 different meals?

Mainly thinking of pork shoulder or beef brisket. We have a slow cooker so any recipes using that would be good.

Also, are butchers cheaper than supermarkets?

I had a thread in chat a couple of days ago asking what to do with extra roast beef. You should look it up as the posters came back with a superb range of fantastic ideas!

The only way to compare cost is to ring the butcher and compare price per kg to the supermarkets website.

You can buy slicing machines like delis have to slice home cooked gammon etc when cold but our electric knife is good for slicing hot chickens or pork loin thinly.

If you get a bacon joint cheaply - sometimes £3 per kilo in Aldi/Lidl - cook an slice it is so much cheaper then sandwich meat. Bought precooked and sliced it is somewhere in the region of £10 per kg at least.
We have it hot the first day with peas pudding and dumplings, ham egg and chips, mixed rice etc. Can do a few days on about a fiver.

This is how Wilena Hitching coped with the problem in 1910.

Sunday - Large joint of beef
Monday - Mince some of remains for Cottage Pie
Tuesday - Stew with chopped up remains, onion and carrot, Serve with dumplings.
Thursday - Fish
Friday - Steak and Kidney pudding
Saturday - Live and onions

Liver

I've just switched to doing two roasts a week for this very reason.

Today I'm doing roast lamb (NY treat as half price), tomorrow we will have the same meal again. Leftovers should give us two more meals which will be hot lamb pittas with lime and yogurt dressing and lamb pilaff. The lamb for these will go in the freezer until I need it.

On Saturday I am roasting a ham joint. We will have roast ham then and ham and mushroom risotto on Monday. Leftover ham will go in the freezer and give us about twelve sandwich portions and some ham for slow cooker broth. I might possibly get a little extra ham off this joint to put with leftover turkey for a pie.

I find I can often get 5 meals out of a leg of lamb (there are 4 of us) and 4 meals out of a £6-£7 joint if beef or pork. I usually get three meals out of chicken, although one of those would be soup.

Cooked meat works fine in a curry or stir fry, in an open pie with some short crust pastry or in a sauce of some sort. I don't usually serve it up as another roast if it's been frozen as it can go a bit dry.

I think "steaks" of meat and diced meat is a very expensive way to buy meat.

I've got a list on the side of my freezer where I note down what I've got to use up which helps me to use stuff up before it deteriorates from freezer burn.

Lots of replies! Great ideas here!

I was looking at meat prices on asdas website last and the markup on pre cut pieces was astounding.

We have the slow cooker now so buying a large joint would make a lot of sense!

Just recently Sainsburys and Morrisons have had one type of meat on half price from their butchery counters. I've had beef and pork joints for a fiver that have done three meals each!

I've also switched to drumsticks and thighs for chicken casseroles. Tastier and cheaper.

A separate issue but I've also stopped buying packed ham for sandwiches. Asda do 2 small ham joints for £6. I cook them in the slow cooker with a bit of sugar and some marmalade and we have a fortnight a worth if ham sandwiches for 4 of us. Half the price of "naice" ham!

I menu plan weekly. We have roast every Sunday, rotating meats and chicken or whatever is on offer.
I plate up a roast on Monday (although DC eat at childminders) so DH and I have roast two nights running great as I don't get in till DC bedtime.

Then there is always a third meal from the joint.
Chicken supreme or chicken pie or stir fry or chicken wraps
Cott pie, lasagne, beef strips into taco etc.
Lamb pilaff, shep pie,
Not so good with pork I'm afraid, usually leave DH to have it in sandwiches as I don't like it so much.

Then we try to have fish once a week, tinned salmon usually

And that's four dinners done!

I do meal plan already but really feel that the larger joints stretched will save even more money! The SC will take some getting used to.

Thighs and drumsticks are a lot tastier to me aswell as being cheaper. I dont really like chicken breasts unless they are off a whole cooked chicken.

We dont have a freezer right now but plan to get one soon so I can batch cook!

Can I add that if you are doing a roast, a cunning wheeze is to fill every corner of the oven with things like crumbles, rice puddings and so on for later in the week. It saves time and fuel.

If you have a slow cooker you could try doing rice pudding in it. It's delish!

It depends on how many of you there are in the family too. Here 2 adults and 2 five yr olds.
A very large chicken will go like this
Roast on day one - kids have drum sticks and we have the thighs.

1 chick breast and some wing meat will do a pie with mushrooms and bacon. Use any left over gravy to moisten the chicken (breast is blaaaand)
2nd chick breast will make a curry or stew with loads of veg or lentils.
Boil the carcass and strip it for soup with dumplings or crusty bread. You can throw in some left over rice from yesterday if it was curry day. Reserve some stock.
With the stock make a risotto. I f you have any frozen peas and bacon left over it is really nice.
This can work out about £2/3 a day when you factor in the veg etc.

I do a Roast Chicken (almost) Week probably once a month. I buy as large a chicken as I can afford - usually reduced and always free range/gold ribbon whatever as the meat is very dense so well worth the extra expense as it goes so much further. We are 2 adults and one 3 year old. The week follows roughly this pattern:

Sunday - Roast chicken - I divide one breast between us and spread it out so it looks like there is more meat. If I have some sausagemeat I make patties to pad it out and serve lots of spuds, yorkshire puddings, roast onions and veg. DH has never noticed that we share one chicken breast !!
Monday - Chicken, Mushroom and Sweetcorn Pie with the other breast made with sainsbos frozen mushrooms and frozen sweetcorn. I make shortcrust pastry for the top and make a gravy sauce
Tuesday - Oriental Soup with veggie oddments, noodles and the meat taken off the carcas
Wednesday - pasta dish involving tinned tomatoes, herbs, onions, maybe a handful of frozen roasted vegetables (waitrose) and the meat off the legs
Thursday - Chicken rissoles with the wing/thigh/remaining leg meat
Friday - Boil up the carcass and make a thick broth with pearl barley, the meat that comes off the carcass, finely diced carrot and suet dumplings

Great idea Boffin Mum about the crumbles/pies etc. going to nick it :)

Another good tip for using up odds and sods of meat leftovers is special fried rice. We stick all sorts of stuff in it, it's one of our fave dinners and such a good way of using up leftovers.

Share a chicken breast! Wow. Just wow. I eat both wings (cook's treat) and a leg. Easy. I don't really like big chickens though. I don't feel they have the same flavour. But then I can easily eat half a chicken in nandos. I am a pig and not good at economical cooking. I am in awe of a chicken lasting a week. One night only here. Sometimes I even cook two chickens if there are more than 4 people.

We are trying to cut back on carbs so sharing a chicken breast and bulking it out with spuds isnt going to help :o

Though the breasts on large chickens can be really huge! I couldnt eat a whole one

Our family is DP, me and 4 yo DD1. DD2 is still ff. DD1 dislikes most meat. Its very rare she will eat any.

bamboo - trust me, with me at a size 20 and DH in a 40" trouser, we don't exactly starve ourselves.....

The thing is that the chickens you get in places like nandos/rotisserie counter really don't have much flavour - which is why you feel you need to eat more. A bit like the idea that you can eat a bar of dairy milk and not feel as if you have tasted chocolate but eat a square of 70% and get that chocolate hit

wannabe, what about bulking it out with roasted vegetables instead ? Or you can always pick up chipolatas on the reduced counter - you could bulk your chicken out with pigs in blankets [num num]

I love veg but DP is a man child doesnt. So I tend to not bother. But Im starting to again because I miss veg!

Pigs in blankets are a good idea!

I'm considering buying half a cow for the chest freezer.

wannabe, would he eat disguised veg like cauliflower cheese ?

Nope. Nothing. His veg eating extends to bigga peas

If theres tiny lumps of onion in something he will be bringing them back up for hours after.