How to identify good beef. How to choose prime meat. Meat - light, fat - white

Meat has been the constant food of mankind for many millennia. The body is able to process animal proteins, lipids and other nutrients found in meat.

Meat contains a huge amount of useful substances, if, of course, it is fresh.

Beneficial substances contained in meat include:

• B vitamins;
• Minerals - selenium, iron and zinc;
• Creatine;
• Carnosine;
• Forms of omega 3 fatty acids.

Poor quality meat not only threatens to ruin a delicious dinner, but also directly affects your health, causing serious illness and poisoning. The skills of choosing a quality product are useful skills that will ensure safety for the whole family.

Determining the type of meat

Meat products are classified by animal type: pork, veal, beef, lamb, poultry.

General requirements when choosing different types of meat:

1. The fat should be white, in some cases a yellowish tint is appropriate (lamb fat). The dark color of the fat streaks indicates an old animal.
2. Fat should be evenly distributed throughout the structure of the meat. This will ensure a pleasant taste of the dish.
3. A good cut will be moist, but without excess water or stickiness. Liquid should not flow under the meat products.
4. For juicier dishes, it is better to choose cuts with bones and skin.
5. Blood in products should be within the limits;
6. The consistency of fresh meat is quite springy. After pressing, the piece quickly regains its shape. There is no sticky feeling.

Veal

The calorie content of meat is low, and the biological value is quite high. Veal provides the body with all the complete proteins. Fried foods tend to be a little dry due to their low fat content. When cooking veal, culinary specialists advise adding a few pieces of unsalted lard or making a breading in batter.

The meat obtained from the slaughter of dairy calves tastes more tender. On the cut you can see a pink color with a creamy tint. If the animals were fed concentrated feed, the color will be more saturated, reddish. This meat is cheaper than dairy veal.

Pork

Fatty, high-calorie meat that is great for fried dishes. Pork tenderloin with minimal veining is an excellent option for barbecue. The fillet should be pink, a little darker in places near the bone. There should be no odors present.

Beef

The leanest option. The color of quality beef can range from light to dark red. Young meat will have a bright red color - this is the meat of bulls up to 2 years of age. The dark shade of beef indicates an old animal. Minced meat has a characteristic red tone without gray shades.

Mutton

The meat of adult animals is tougher with a characteristic light red tint and a pungent odor. Selective breeding has produced some breeds that are devoid of unpleasant odor. These include the Kalmyk breed. Lamb fat has a rich yellow color. It is widely used in the preparation of some oriental dishes such as pilaf. Old lamb has a red-brown cut color and dark yellow fat streaks. It is better to avoid buying such meat.

Bird

When purchasing a bird, inspect the skin of the animal. They need to be smooth, without tears or damage, and there should also be no feathers or fluff. A young bird is characterized by a light skin tone. It feels soft, dry and elastic to the touch. The cut of meat is a little moist.

Chickens are fattier than roosters, whose skin has a characteristic bluish tint. Ducks and geese have red meat, turkey meat is pale pink.

Selecting a part of the carcass

The taste and biological value of meat directly depends on the part of the carcass from which it was taken. Each country has its own characteristics of varietal cutting of carcasses. The most popular is the South American system, where the carcass is divided into 19 bran. Each part is assigned its own number. Italy, Holland, Germany, Denmark and Australia have their own cutting characteristics.

You don't need to know all the carcass disassembly systems. It is important to remember that the most tender part of the animal is in the part that was least involved in the work.

The following parts of the carcass have the most delicate taste:

• In pigs, these are the loin, carbonate and neck;
• For rams - loin and carbonate;
• Cows have sirloin and back with ribs;
• The bird has a breast.

These parts will make excellent shish kebab, tasty roast and juicy steak. For minced meat, cheaper and tougher meat from shoulder blades, breastbone and legs is suitable. For jellied meat, you need to choose parts of the carcass with a large amount of gelatin - low-grade, bony cuts.

Long-term heat treatment can improve the taste of tough meat. To do this, you need to cook the meat for 4-5 hours. You can also use a marinade of wine, vinegar, lemon juice, or try to beat off the meat. The hammer will destroy the tough structure of the cut, and the product will be softer.

Selecting meat by thermal state

The above information is about choosing fresh meat, but you can also purchase frozen products. If the product storage technology is followed, frozen meat is not inferior to fresh products, but still has its own nuances when choosing.

Let's consider the advantages of frozen meat:

1. It is presented in a wide range at all retail outlets. Whereas for fresh meat you need to go to the supermarket or market.
2. Longer storage term. Chilled is suitable for use for two days, and frozen - for six months.
3. The price of frozen meat is lower.
4. The taste and biological value is not inferior to fresh, if, of course, the rules of defrosting were followed.

However, frozen meat also has disadvantages:

1. Greater cooking term.
2. May be dry and hard if defrosting technology is not followed.
3. If transported incorrectly, it may be re-frozen. This is strictly prohibited, as the structure of the fibers is disrupted. But no one is protected from this when purchasing a frozen product.
4. You can be sure of the quality of meat only after purchase.

You can determine whether the place has been re-frozen by tapping the meat. The sound should be clear. Deafness is a sign of low-quality products. Also, the bran should not contain large pieces of snow and blood clots. Testing the aroma is only possible at home.

Selection of meat at the market

Market meat undergoes strict testing before sale. Products must comply with state standards. After washing and cleaning the meat, it is subjected to veterinary and sanitary examination. High-quality carcasses are branded. The seller himself must have the necessary documentation: quality certificates and references.

If necessary, ask to see quality control data. The seller's appearance should be clean and neat: light-colored clothing, collected hair, short manicure. He must use gloves or a plastic bag to handle the meat. Buy products only if they comply with these rules.

It is quite possible to choose quality products. There is no need to be afraid of artificial additives. Their presence is obvious in meat with an unnaturally bright color and a loose consistency. When cooking such meat, an unpleasant rubbery smell appears. Therefore, when choosing, it is enough to burn a small piece of meat.

Choosing the right meat is a whole science that can take a lifetime to comprehend. And if all the meat on the counter seems the same to a novice housewife, then an experienced housewife knows how to not only distinguish beef from pork, but also choose the best cut in the entire market. Precisely at the market, because experts generally do not recommend buying meat in the supermarket. Purchasing frozen packaged meat is like playing Russian roulette. You will never guess whether such meat was stored correctly and for how long, what the animals from which it was made were fed, how many antibiotics and hormones it contained.

Meat on the market

The first thing people usually pay attention to when buying meat is its color. But this approach is amateurish. The color of the meat is very important, but you need to start somewhere else. The most important thing is to choose that part of the carcass, the meat from which will be optimal for the dish you have in mind. That is why butchers are often interested in what you are going to cook, and only then offer this or that cut. Tender tenderloin is an excellent meat, but not if you are going to cook jellied meat. You can buy an excellent piece of beef and hopelessly ruin it during cooking. Therefore, we first look for the desired cut on the counter, and then begin to examine it for suitability.

So, color. Good fresh meat is not greenish or black, it does not have a gasoline stain - it pleases us with all shades of red. Fresh beef is simply red, lamb is a little darker than beef, pork is pink, veal is deep pink. Skilled sellers refresh stale meat by soaking it in a solution of potassium permanganate. This trick can be revealed by looking closely at the color of fat and bones: potassium permanganate will color them pinkish and yellow.

Yellow fat is a sign of an old animal. This means that such meat will be tough and will take longer to cook. Good young beef has white and crumbly fat; high-quality pork has white and pink elastic layers of fat. The highest grade of beef is marbled beef, in which the meat is evenly permeated with fatty streaks. When cooked, this meat turns out to be especially tender and juicy.

The surface of the meat may be slightly weathered if you come to the market at lunchtime, and not in the morning, when the carcasses have just been cut. To the touch, fresh meat has an elastic consistency and is almost dry: it does not stick to your hands and is not covered with mucus.

The smell of meat is an excellent marker of freshness. The presence of even a barely perceptible unpleasant aroma in meat is a reason to immediately turn around and go look for another butcher. But there is a subtlety here too. Meat from uncastrated pigs, for example, can look and smell perfect when raw. But when cooked, such meat will smell distinctly like urine, depriving you not only of a good mood, but also of dinner. To protect yourself from such surprises, you can ask the butcher to cut off a microscopic piece from the selected cut and set it on fire with a lighter or match. It smells like barbecue - feel free to buy it, if it smells unpleasant - the purchase is cancelled.

Meat in the store

Unfortunately, there are no generous butcher consultants in the store. So you have to figure it out yourself. Having fished out a frozen briquette from the refrigerator display case, first of all read the label. It at least says when the product was manufactured and until what date it is good for. A large amount of meat sold in retail chains is imported. Meat is brought from Poland, Argentina, and even Australia. Of course, once frozen, it has made its way to your store shelf. For minced meat, such meat may be fine, but a steak made from it will be like sole.

If possible, choose meat from local producers. It is definitely fresher than imported meat, and our technology for raising livestock is not yet so advanced, so the level of hormones and antibiotics in meat from local cows will not go off scale.

If a package of meat you brought home begins to exude miasma during defrosting, take it back to the store - you bought rotten meat. Most likely, you will get your money back without any dispute.

When buying chilled meat, pay attention to the integrity of the packaging. There should be no cracks in the foam backing or holes in the plastic film. Make sure the meat has not expired.

And finally, a piece of advice: don’t fall for the tricks of marketers. “Natural beef” is a term as meaningless as the “cholesterol-free” label on mineral water bottles. However, beef raised on free range and fed not with fishmeal and animal feed, but with grass and hay, is indeed of better quality and more expensive than meat from cows from a regular farm.

Despite the loud cries of vegetarians, meat still remains the main source of protein for the normal development and functioning of the human body.

But not only that, this product also contains many vitamins and irreplaceable amino acids that have a beneficial effect on the nervous, immune and musculoskeletal systems. Simply put, meat is only beneficial to humans, of course, if it is fresh and of high quality.

Ask: “how can you tell if it’s fresh and what its quality is?” It's actually not difficult with some experience. But if it is not there, use the following instructions.

1. General rules for any meat

If you decide to cook pilaf or some other non-vegetarian delicacy, then the first thing you need to understand when choosing meat is that the market is preferable to supermarkets. Because there the products are usually fresher and in the public domain. Therefore, meat can be easily inspected sensorially using smell, vision and tactile sensations.

How to choose safe meat

1.1. Appearance of meat

Appearance is the first thing any buyer pays attention to. The color of the meat should be bright red, but without excesses in saturation. The last sign is that the product has been processed with various substances to give it a “marketable” appearance.

Depending on the type of meat, the shade of red is:

Just red - beef;

Pink – pork;

Slightly darker than beef - lamb;

Deep pink – veal.

In addition to muscle fibers, you also need to pay attention to bones and fat. If the meat has undergone the previously mentioned treatment with dyes (for example, potassium permanganate), then they will acquire pinkish or yellowish shades. In addition, yellow fat is a sign of a fairly old animal. This type of meat takes longer to cook and will be tough. It is better to opt for the meat of a young animal. Look for white-pink layers of lard for pork, white or marbled for beef.

1.2. Smell

The second sign of good meat is the smell. It should be fresh and slightly milky without any hint of acidity, rottenness or chemicals (smell like a clinic). The presence of even a subtle unpleasant aroma in meat is a reason to say goodbye to the seller. This approach is almost always correct, except for one thing - the meat of uncastrated pigs may have the perfect smell when raw, but after cooking it will begin to smell like urine.

To avoid such a surprise, ask the butcher for a small piece of meat and set it on fire using matches or a lighter. If you smell barbecue, buy it, there will be an aroma of “urine therapy” - continue your search.

1.3. Flabbiness and windiness

When buying meat at the market in the afternoon, be prepared that it will be slightly windy - this is not a big deal if everything else is normal:

No bloating;

There is no mucus on the surface of the carcass;

There is no abnormal pigmentation;

No looseness or hard crust (soft crust is acceptable).

Regarding the latter, we are talking about the “depreciation” properties of the product - elasticity. It is normal for the hole formed by pressing on the meat to quickly disappear. If the hole remains, the product is not the freshest or too many antibiotics were used when growing it. Most likely, such goods will be marked down in order to sell off the low-quality product quickly. But by saving on food, you are putting your body at unnecessary risk.

2. How to choose frozen meat

Frozen meat, unlike regular meat, has different indicators of quality and freshness:

1. The meat should be firm with a uniform structure (hardness) of ice. If it is different, then this is not the first frost. To check, pay attention to the cuts and tactile sensations; if everything is smooth and with the same degree of hardness, buy it.

2. The color of the frozen carcass is red with a grayish coating, which is a consequence of the presence of ice crystals. Place your finger on the surface of the frozen meat and hold for a few seconds; if the color turns bright red in the thawed area, everything is fine. But, if it turns pale red or dark, then it is unlikely that you will be able to make a good hodgepodge from it - the taste, alas, will not be ideal.

3. There should be no bloody ice bergs or swells on the surface or inside the package. This is another sign of repeated (or more) freezing.

How to defrost meat correctly

Important! Frozen meat should not be thawed in warm water, a microwave, or any other warm place. It is best to wrap it in a wet cloth (gauze) and put it in the refrigerator or other place where the temperature fluctuates at 1-4 degrees above zero.

3. Why domestic meat is better

Another important point when choosing meat is that a domestic manufacturer is better than a foreign one, because:

Local producers (CIS) use less antibiotics and hormones;

Local meat does not require deep freezing in order to deliver it to the buyer in good condition;

In the CIS, animals are still fed mainly plant foods rather than animal feed.

4. What cut of meat to cook from?

Even when choosing meat, it is important to understand that the choice must be made, including focusing on what you will cook. So, no one will take the neck or ribs for barbecue; it requires soft, whole meat without bones or cartilage. And so it is in everything. More specifically, the chefs recommend the following cuts:

Neck for chopping and cooking: minced meat, broths and soups.

Spatula for frying, chopping and stewing: meat rolls, minced meat, azu, soups.

Chel (the front part of the brisket) for fatty first courses: borscht, soups and pickles.

Back for baking and frying in large pieces.

Fillet for casseroles and frying: chops, roast beef, medallions.

Rump (part of the carcass near the pelvis) for stewing and frying in small or large pieces: goulash, beefsteak, goulash.

Rump (lower part of the rump) for boiling or frying: soups, beefsteak, rump steak.

Knuckle for chopping and stewing: broth, minced meat, goulash.

Flank (thin cut of abdominal muscle) for stewing and cooking: soups, minced meat, cutlets.

Tenderloin for baking and frying: shish kebab, beef stroganoff, langet.

Thigh for frying, boiling, stewing: broth, chops, goulash, rump steaks, zrazy.

Shank (lower leg) for thick broths, jellied meats and jellies.

Ears and head for jellied meats and jellies.

5. Features of different types of meat: nutritional value and differences

- Beef. This meat contains a lot of minerals, mainly iron and zinc, as well as vitamins B, H, E and PP. It contains amino acids necessary for the human body.

Nutritional value (100g):
proteins – 18.9;
calories – 187;
carbohydrates – 0.0;
fats – 12.4.

Beef is one of the most delicious medicines for those who need to increase hemoglobin. Lean meat is recommended for pregnant women, children and those who have chosen a mono-diet for weight loss (for example, the Kremlin diet low in carbohydrates).

Mutton. Champion in low cholesterol content with a high content of lecithin, which normalizes cholesterol metabolism in the body. Due to this, lamb meat is often used in various diets. It also contains a lot of magnesium, iron, iodine, potassium and B vitamins.

Nutritional value (100g):
proteins – 16.3;
calories – 202.9;
carbohydrates – 0.0;
fats – 15.2.
Lamb meat is not recommended for people with gastrointestinal problems due to the severity of its digestion.

Rabbit meat. Dietary meat with a maximum protein content of 21%. There are vitamins PP, B and B12, as well as Omega-3 fatty acids. Another plus is the best hypoallergenic performance.

Nutritional value (100g):
proteins – 21.2;
calories – 183;
carbohydrates – 0.0;
fats – 11.

The editors of the site wish you that only selected products appear on your table and invite you to read the article about the most expensive dishes in the world.
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A user of the Pikabu website under the nickname ArsenZa posted a story about how to choose the right meat: “When I wrote a post about the tricks of sellers in stores, a lot of negative feedback appeared in the comments about the fact that I was insulting the honest workers of the counter and that butchers in general do not It’s better, but the doctors are ignorant, it’s a nightmare.

I would like to note that these posts do not have the goal of educating vegans, which I have a rather bad attitude towards, or insulting anyone, but are created in order to focus the reader’s attention on important little things that allow you to save money and health.”

So, today’s post is about how to choose meat at the market and in the store. And about some butchers' tricks.

Let me make a reservation right away - there is no consensus on where it is better to get meat. Meat from hand or at the market is often natural and of higher quality, but, on the other hand, there is a higher risk of dangerous infectious diseases. In the store - the larger the store, the safer it is, but at the same time, the quality of the meat and its taste often leave much to be desired, and butt-cutting of meat is also common.

In any case, you should always be careful about your choice, even if the place is “tested” and everything was fine. Here are some evaluation criteria:

Presence of fascia (films, tendons, hymen)

Every muscle in the body is covered with a thin connective tissue membrane. These films are quite difficult to remove, buyers do not like them, but meanwhile this shell is a natural sign of quality. In stores and markets, when a piece of meat is delayed or begins to spoil, the top layer of 1-2 centimeters is cut off from it and continued to be sold (by the way, the cut pieces are often sent to mince, this should also be remembered). And so on until they are sold or until there is nothing left to cut. Of course, employees of any hypermarket will say that this never happens; all unsold meat is written off and disposed of on time. Whom to believe, decide for yourself.

Thus, if you have a piece of meat in front of you, covered on three sides with fascia, and a piece of film that has been carefully cleaned, it is better to take it with films. And yes, it is on these films that a veterinary mark is placed: a piece with an uncut mark is especially good. And yes, I am aware that fresh meat is bad, it must ripen and rest, and nevertheless I think that it is better to buy meat fresh, at an early stage of ripening, it is safer.

Veterinary mark

It is also mistakenly called a seal. Four marks are placed on the carcass. One per shoulder and thigh on each side of the carcass. The brand must be oval in shape with clearly visible six numbers. The first pair is the region number (regional car license plates do not correspond), the second is the number of the district/city in the region, the third is the number of the laboratory/slaughterhouse/meat processing plant. If at least one of the pairs is poorly distinguishable or indistinguishable, the meat is “left”. Unscrupulous traders use stamps with cut-off numbers or ones that deliberately leave a slightly smudged mark.

Some have left stamps with all the numbers, as expected, but the punishment for such a trick is much more severe, so this is rare. The stamp number must correspond to the veterinary certificate in form No. 2 (blue A5 paper). It’s clear that everything can be faked, but judging by the nervous behavior of the seller (if you ask for a veterinary certificate and carefully examine the stamp), you can assume that there is something fishy here, and simply do not buy from this seller.

Bone size and amount of fat

An important point for pork, lamb and veal. It should be remembered that bones that are too small are suspicious. No sane farmer will slaughter young animals - it is not economically profitable. The “culls”, that is, sick, weak, injured animals, are slaughtered. The chances of encountering some nasty thing increase significantly. Too large bones are also bad: the animal is old, perhaps a sow or a cow culled from the herd “due to age.” Such animals are also marked by an excess amount of fat (some savvy beef sellers pass this off as “marbling”).

I would also like to say something about the veal. It is often distinguished by the color of its meat, but this is not very correct. A characteristic feature of veal, in addition to color, will be the absence of fat (it simply does not have time to be deposited), fairly large bones (in a normally developing healthy calf, the skeleton greatly outstrips the muscles in growth) with a noticeably smaller amount of meat on them. I’ll add on my own behalf - good veal is very rare, most often they sell all sorts of crap under its guise, as well as under the guise of “suckling pigs”.

How to recognize a good butcher

A good butcher can be seen by the deck. It is smooth (if you chop it carelessly, a depression quickly forms on the side where you chop it), white - rubbed with beef fat. This is an important criterion: on a well-greased block, the meat will not come into contact with the wood at all, and you will not encounter any splinters. And yes, if a butcher rubs the log with fat in the morning, in the evening he will have to thoroughly clean it and cover it with salt, otherwise it will stink. Therefore, a smooth, greased deck is a sure sign of a responsible person who has an understanding of sanitary standards. You can buy pork ribs from such a person and ask them to chop them “into a bandoleer” - most likely, the result will not disappoint you.

Buying packaged meat

Provided that the packaging is intact and the markings/labels are correct, the safety of such meat is higher (but not absolute, there is no guarantee against the negligence of the packer or temperature violations during storage/transportation). However, there is a higher chance of buying a lot more bone/fat/tendon than meets the eye. There are frequent frauds with the varietal cut - not every person can distinguish a piece of ham from a piece of shoulder, etc. by eye. Therefore, in large stores it is better to buy meat “from the window” and ask the seller to show the meat from all sides.

Poor cutting of meat

Very common in large stores. This is when there are more bones in a semi-finished product than there should be (in entrecote the vertebral body is not cut out, in the loin the vertebral body and a long rib are left), or when a large and seemingly beautiful piece actually has several tendons inside and falls apart into several pieces when cooked . In the first case, you buy a bone at the price of meat, in the second, the culinary value of the meat is greatly reduced and you cannot prepare many dishes from it.

This would also include the disgusting industrial cut of pork ribs, when only the intercostal muscles are left, and the layer of meat above the ribs is cut to zero. Formally, these actions do not violate any norms and rules; in fact, they are deceiving you by selling at the price of meat what should be used for minced meat and soup sets.

Purchasing minced meat

In any case, third-grade meat is used for minced meat. In absolutely any place, no one in their right mind would mince good meat. Minced meat can be fresh and safe - but it is always third grade. If you want good minced meat, buy the meat and make it yourself - this is the golden rule. If you bought meat and ask the store to grind it for you, ask that the grinder be washed and assembled in front of you, otherwise it may end badly.

Today, stores sell meat for every taste and price category: from the most ordinary pork ham to basic veal or, for example, beef striploin steak. You can buy meat from a familiar butcher at the market or in a premium supermarket, paying a lot of money for a quality product. At the same time, the question of how not to make a mistake and choose the right meat still remains relevant. The Village decided to find out from the experts which beef is best suited for which purposes, as well as how not to make a mistake when choosing pork.

Alla Paranyan

seller of the meat department of the Danilovsky market

The principles for choosing any meat are approximately the same. The first step is to decide what dish you are choosing a piece for. If we talk about pork, then the neck, the juiciest part, is best suited for barbecue, the rump is for baking, the ham is for minced meat, and the shoulder is for stewing. With beef, the situation is as follows: the tenderloin is suitable for frying, and also for tartare and carpaccio, the brisket is for stewing and boiling, the ham is for minced meat.

The sense of smell will help determine freshness - there should be no foreign smell other than the natural smell of fresh meat. Next, look at the color: fat should be white, pork should be pink, and beef should be deep red. The brown tint of the meat and gray fat indicate the advanced age of the animal and the staleness of the meat. I also recommend touching the meat: the cut should be almost dry and not stick to your hands. You can also place the meat on a flat surface and press it with your finger - a fresh cut will quickly return to its original shape, while a stale one will remain wrinkled.

What external criteria should be used to choose pork and beef?

There are a lot of criteria for choosing meat, even for each cut they are different. The biggest misconception that I suggest you remove from your head is that meat should be “fresh” and “fresh”. If this is your criterion, then you will choose the most tasteless meat. The meat must undergo a ripening procedure; in other words, it must rest. Therefore, do not be alarmed if the meat is weathered or has a dark color. And this applies not only to beef, but also to pork and lamb. At the same time, it is worth smelling the meat - there should be no foreign odors, except for a pronounced meat taste. There should also be no sticky mucus. And I don’t understand people who buy veal; it’s better to choose beef from meat breeds, it has a dark scarlet color, as well as various layers of fat.

About the pork. I always choose ugly pork, with uneven layers of fat. This almost always indicates that the animal's meat is from a small farm or meat production facility. It is also worth paying attention to the size. The slaughter weight of meat breed pigs is more than 350 kilograms, which means that the same ribs cannot be the size of your palm.

Which parts are best to buy for?

What matters is why you are buying meat. If you want to grill it, it is better to use pork neck, ribs or flank. If you have time for a daily marinade, then take a cut of the hip (in the market it is called butt or rump). If you want to stew, boil, smoke, bake, then ham, shoulder and loin will do. Brisket and carbonate can be dried and salted.

Beef should also be viewed through the lens of “grill or not grill.” There are not many soft parts in beef, so it should not be judged on the basis of softness and tenderness at all. If you don't want to chew, choose the most expensive and tasteless part: fillet, tenderloin. Just tasteless, bland, lean meat. For frying in a pan or grill, thin beef edge, thick edge, shoulder fillet, inner and outer diaphragm, flank and so on are also suitable. For first courses, my favorite is beef neck: the perfect combination of meat and fat. It is better to smoke beef brisket and ribs, dry the rump, or, as it is now called, ramp. But tartar is best obtained from the eye muscle, or, as it is also called, fricandon. Yes, the meat is quite tough, but very flavorful.

Where to buy meat

It is better to buy meat from your own butcher, who is already a member of your family, or, if there is none, products from trusted meat processing plants. Meat at the market and meat in stores are different. Stores mainly sell meat from industrial producers, but this does not mean that it is bad. Just different - in taste, packaging, packaging, appearance, and so on.

At the same time, sellers are deceiving us from our meat illiteracy. Very often, shoulder fillet is passed off as tenderloin or, say, pork tenderloin as veal fillet. There is only one way to avoid such deception: buy meat more often, cook it, discuss it with friends, go to good meat restaurants and read literature. And also ban the expression “fresh meat”.

The first sign by which you should choose meat is its smell and color, since each type of meat has its own. For example, lamb should have a more delicate smell than mutton, and good beef cannot smell rotten: it should smell like fresh meat without any impurities (there’s no way to describe this smell, I’ve been a chef for 20 years and, unfortunately, and I can’t describe what good meat smells like).

The appearance and taste also depend on the fattening: there is grass-fed, there is grain-fed, there is corn-fed or, for example, mixed. Now to the color: veal should be pink, pork should be light. But beef is different from beef. If we take our cow, which we milk all our lives and then kill for meat, then such meat should be bright red, without any foreign odors.

Much depends on what we want from meat. Each piece has its own purpose - stewing, frying, boiling, and so on. If we buy meat to make soup, it should be shanks (if it is beef), as well as all kinds of cuts with bones. If we take our cow cow, then such meat is not suitable for anything other than cutlets and stewing. And if you take the Aberdeen or Limousin breed, for example, then they are more suitable for frying.

There is no such thing as a “best place to buy meat.” For some, the natural option is premium stores, while others prefer markets. Everything is simple here: it depends on what a person is used to. And in order not to buy something else from an unscrupulous seller instead of some cutting, you need to understand and know the physiology of the animal.

It is best if the meat rests after slaughter. Moreover, now there are all kinds of aging chambers that allow the meat to cool, and many farmers began to buy them for aging meat. The post-slaughter aging time depends on what exactly they want from the meat, and in some cases it reaches up to 120 days. In general, the meat is fermented in the chambers, and this gives it an interesting taste.