The Lazy Genius Podcast - #86: The Lazy Genius Buys Meat

Episode Date: December 3, 2018

I know, I know. You were probably expecting a holiday-centric episode now that it’s December, but I can’t think of a better way to prepare for the holidays than talking about something that can help make mealtime easier. Even when it’s the holidays, we need to eat regular meals and buy meat. I hope this episode helps give you a clearer path in the grocery store. Links You May Find Helpful Sign up for the Lazy Genius monthly newsletter! The first edition of the monthly newsletter goes out on Wednesday, December 5th. Some of my family’s favorite brainless crowdpleasers that can be made meatless or can help stretch the meat you have on hand: tomato soup and grilled cheese, Indian coconut soup, noodle bowls, bare-bones chicken soup risotto, make your own hamburger helper. Want to look into buying meat at the farmers market? Listen to The Lazy Genius Shops at the Farmers Market. I’ve written many love letters to Kirkland Signature Frozen Meatballs. Maybe you will, too. Download a transcript of this episode This podcast is hosted by Kendra Adachi and executive produced by Kendra Adachi, Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hi friends. You're listening to The Lazy Genius Podcast. I'm Kendra and I'm here to help you be a genius about the things that matter and lazy about the things that don't. Today is episode 86 and while it is a little odd in its title, it is a topic I've been asked about a lot. This is the lazy genius buys meat. Obviously this episode isn't relevant to vegetarians and vegans. And in case you like did click the link wondering if this was like a tricky title. I was going to, you know, No, no, it is, we are talking about buying meat today. I respect and honor so very much the choice of folks who don't eat meat. And I also want to offer resources to those of you who do. But we're going to talk literally about how to buy meat, where you can get it, how you can save money, how you store it, and all the things. Before we jump into that, though, I would love to invite you to join my mailing list. Okay, so giving up your email and knowing that you are going to get so many messages and your already full inbox is kind of the worst. I get it.

I mean, you guys, how many Black Friday, Cyber Monday emails? I feel like I had a part-time job deleting email. I don't want you to feel that way about lazy genius emails. That would make me so sad. So if you do, don't subscribe. But if you are interested, this Wednesday, our lazy genius email situation is going to change. I am going to start sending a monthly newsletter, not a weekly one like I have been doing. And I'm hoping that it is the kind of email that you are really excited to see in your inbox.

It will have all the regular newsletter stuff like content you might have missed since a lot of you don't know that I have a blog and I post things on it sometimes. Books that I'm reading because I read a lot. Podcasts that I love. There's so many podcasts. And I want to help you listen to like the most important episodes of certain shows. And then like words for me that aren't put anywhere else. like I am going to be announcing something in my newsletter that no one else is hearing.

So it's like literal first news. I used to write one of these monthly emails like a long time ago in the early days of LGC, but we've gotten away from it and I miss it. So if you are already on the email list, you probably already know that we're shaking things up in this tiny, tiny way. And if you're not on my email list, I would love for you to go to the lazy genius collective.com slash join or click the link in your podcast app. You probably need to either like swipe on the podcast logo or press the little eye or something depending on your app to see that link.

Our first monthly email will go out this Wednesday, December 5th, and I'm really excited about it. Mostly because I'm really, I'm excited that you're going to be excited. I really think that you're going to like them. And I want to make you happy. That's like my whole thing. Are we in a very codependent relationship? Perhaps. or maybe we're very healthy. Either way, I want you to go to the lazy genius collective.com slash join or click the link in your app. And on Wednesday, you will get a bright and shiny new email for me that will hopefully make your life easier and more fun. Okay, let's talk about buying meat. And here's the first thing I'm going to say. It is okay if you buy meat that is not

organic or grass fed or free range or from the happiest of cows and chickens. I think most of us want to buy the best meat we can, but can't always make that happen for a lot of reasons. So I want to say up front that you are allowed to buy whatever meat you need to. There is no judgment here if you are like sale price at Walmart all the time. That's not like the bottom of the rung. There's no wrong. Everybody gets to decide. It's all right. I think we all really believe in taking care of our planet and everything in it, but most of us can't do it all at once. We can't buy organic produce and consciously raise meat and never buy fast fashion clothes. It's target ever again and only drive electric cars and never use plastic bags and all the things like if you're a regular person with a regular income that's just not really in the cards it's it all matters whatever you choose it all matters and it's all helpful but just know that it is okay if you can't always choose this or like you just choose to not buy meat from consciously raised animals just because that's your choice it's a personal decision and i leave everyone to make theirs with no judgment from me okay now it is

It's hard to talk about buying meat without talking about your freezer situation. I have two fridges and freezers because of do. We buy a lot in bulk on sale because there's space for it. And I make a lot of freezer meals for a family of five. So a second freezer is super helpful to us. Ours was a hand-me-down freezer. Can you get hand-me-down freezers from my parents? But when it dies, we are buying another one without question.

It is so worth the investment in the long run to be able to buy things, especially meat on sale. But that is not a possibility for everyone. So today, we are going to talk about four different topics when it comes to buying meat, freezer or not. Cost, consciousness, convenience, and storage. I really couldn't think of a word for storage that started with a say. So there you go. It just worked out that way. Oh, wait. Containment? Can we stretch? to make containment work. Okay, we're going to go with it. But I'm going to do my very best

to make sure that those of you with extra freezers and those of you with like just that tiny freezer on top of your fridge, you can all benefit from this episode. Okay, so first let's talk about cost. There are three ways, I mean, there are more than three ways,

but there are three ways today that we're going to save money on meat. Number one, eat less meat. I know, right? Come on. But it's a real thing. The more meat you eat in a meal, the more money you have to spend on meat. So if saving money is a priority, which I'm guessing it is, eat less meat.

Now, there are several ways to do this, though. There is the obvious one of like meals that have no meat. Meatless Mondays might be a thing for you. Just even considering one or two meals a week where there's no meat, it will save you tons. All right, let's do some real simple math real fast because math is hard and I don't like it. But even the cheapest cuts of meat are going to be, well, three bucks a pound. Some of them are cheaper, but that's real cheap. So let's say on average, your family cuts out like just one pound of meat a week at three bucks a pound. That is over

$200 a year in savings, which might not seem like much or it might seem like a lot. But stuff adds up and making tiny, tiny cuts here and there can really help a tight budget. I mean, that's only one pound of like a cheap price on meat and it's still $200 a year. Like that's 20 bucks a month close to. I think the math is right. I'm doing the math right, right? It's fine. All right.

So one way to eat less meat is to have meals without meat. Now, from our brainless crowd pleasers, which if you're new here, I talk about brainless crowd pleasers a lot when it comes to meal planning. And I lay out the whole meal planning system, including brainless crowd pleasers, pretty specifically in the meal planning episode, which will be in the show notes. But a couple of our meatless brainless crowd pleasers, like I went through my list. Here's what we have that are meatless. Grilled cheese and tomato soup.

Pasta that has no meat in it, you know, just like noodles and sauce. The cheese tortellini from Costco is a favorite way to like bulk up a pasta dish without having meat. We love that stuff. And then yaku soba noodles, which is a kind of Japanese noodle. And we just add vegetables to it or eat them just as noodles if I'm being lazy. That is all from my list because we eat less meat in other ways rather than like. like having a lot of specifically vegetarian meals, but we do have them. I had three on my brainless crowd pleaser list. And I have like 30, I think about 30 brainless crowd pleaser meals at this point.

So that's not a very high percentage, but like, you know, it's cool. So another way, though, that you can eat less meat is to use recipes that use meat, but that stretch it. So it's not like a big steak or a whole piece of chicken per person alongside a plate of vegetables. This is my personal preferred way of eating less meat. It's just eating less meat in the meal. We do a lot of one bowl meals, like one pot, one bowl meals, which you can find a few on my site. I'll throw some in the show notes. But we will cut up like one steak and make steak stir fry. Like literally that is what we're having tonight. As I have a steak sitting in front of me in a bowl of water like thawing while I record this. And then I'm going to cut it up and put it a marinade. on it and stick it in the fridge for when we have steak store fray later one steak for all five of us and granted you know everyone's like very excited about the bites of steak that they do get but like they'll live a lot of rice it's fine um okay so um i have made like two dinners worth of say um chicken ticcama salad from one pack of boneless skinless chicken thighs so it's possible to choose meals

where you have meat but it's the meat is not the main attraction of dinner. A third way to eat less meat, especially if meat is the main attraction, is just to have smaller portions. Again, it all adds up. So that's a fairly simple way to eat less. Like cut pieces of chicken in half before you cook them. You can cook a big steak and serve it as steak, but like slice it after you grill it and serve up the slices. So it's still a big part of the plate, but it's not as big as like your actual plate. And then the last way to eat less meat is to choose when you want meat to be the star, so you don't always feel like you're lacking, you know, like that you're always like, like on the prairie and like cutting, cutting your meals with like

as little meat as possible. I hear you right now telling me that your husband is weird and wants a full plate with a big piece of meat and three sides for every dinner. I've heard that many times for many of you. My first reaction is that your husband is a grown man and he can deal. But my second reaction is, of course, there is nothing like a big steak and a baked potato and a side of something yummy, like a yummy green vegetable next to it. That is a lovely meal. And it's not like you can never eat that meal again. But if cost is something that you're trying to consider in buying meat, make that meal on purpose when you do make it. Okay, so maybe like one meal a week has meat as the star and then you lean into it.

you get that steak, but then the other meals, not so much. So the first way to save money on meat is to eat less of it. And then our four sub points are you eat less meat by skipping it all together once a week or so, stretch a piece of meat in a recipe, serve the meat in smaller portions, and then make meat the start on purpose, but less often. Okay. The second way to save money on meat is to buy it on sale. I am so smart. aren't I buy me on sale this is very obvious but let us approach this like a lazy genius because here's where you run into trouble here's where you think you're saving money and you're not actually you buy anything that's marked down you see those sale flyers and then those yellow discount stickers

in the store and you just go nuts and throw it all in your freezer when you get home if you have a freezer but if you buy a pork shoulder that's on sale like crazy on sale and you have no idea how to cook a pork shoulder or don't have any brainless crowd pleasers or anything in your dinner queue that uses pork shoulder you just wasted money on a sale price pork shoulder it doesn't matter how cheap it was don't buy meat just because it's on sale only buy meat that's on sale if you already use that cut of meat that is where you get in trouble so yes you know to buy meat on sale but please limit those sale purchases to cuts of meat you're familiar with that aren't going to just sit in your freezer for the next year because you are overwhelmed with just thawing the thing, much less cooking it,

right? Now, the inverse of that, know what cuts of meat you use and buy those on sale. Because let's say you don't have a lot of extra freezer space to use, like to take advantage of sales on meat. Okay. If you buy a few pounds of chicken thighs, let's say there's, you know, there's a lot of chicken marked down. And you buy. a few pounds of chicken thighs are on sale. And you know that you use chicken thighs and several of your brainless crop pleaser recipes and you maybe have some time when you get home.

You make a meal plan around chicken thighs. You'll just eat a lot of chicken this week. But it was really on sale and you're saving money and you're making meals that you already understand that chicken is not going to be wasted. And if you do have freezer space and you see a cut of meat that you use a lot on sale, you snatch it, man.

You grab it up and you freeze it because you know you're going to use it because it already fits into your life. Okay, so to save money on meat, eat less, buy it on sale, and then the third way, pay attention, this is very important, pay attention to cost per pound. We get tricked with this. Man, you're like, this steak is half off. That's amazing.

Instead of $16, it's only $8. And then you buy a couple, and you're right, you just got a great deal. On steak, the steak was $16 a pound, and you got it for $8 a pound. but there is a full price organic chicken right there at $6 a pound. Ground beef is usually around $3 a pound, depending on where you shop and how, you know, premium it is. Don't assume that because something is on sale, even like major slasher prices, that it's a good deal. Aw, isn't something we need to travel for. It's something waiting for us in everyday life, whether in a city street or a moment with a work of art.

I'm Dr. Keltner, host of the Science of Happiness podcast. Join me for Cities of Aw, a special series on how our public spaces can spark awe, wonder, and enhance the quality of public life. You can find us wherever you listen to your podcasts. It's a good deal compared to itself, but it might not be a good deal compared to other options altogether. So just pay attention to cost per pound. I'm not saying don't buy steak. Oh my gosh, buy the steak. but just remember that if you're trying to save money, there might be something cheaper, even at full price,

price per pound. Okay, let's move on from cost to consciousness. If you want to eat meat from humanely raised, farm raised animals, I applaud that decision. It is an investment of a decision. Because one of the biggest reasons most of us don't buy meat as consciously is because it's just a lot more expensive. I mean, that's really what it is. I get it. So when you make that choice, If you decide, I'm going to buy consciously, it is an investment. And it might help you to phrase it that way and see it through that lens. It is an investment in several things, maybe in an actual local farm in your area. You're supporting local farmers.

It is an investment in communicating to stores what you as a consumer want. You know, it's that whole like vote with your dollars idea. It is an investment in what matters to you. We all have those in different areas. So if consciously raised animals is one of your areas, I have a couple of thoughts for you. And if consciously raised animals is not one of your areas, no shame, y'all, it's okay. So there are three ways that you can think about buying consciously without your wallet going up in flames. Number one, find a trusted source locally of you can.

If you have the ability to buy your meat from a farmer, say a farmer's market or even at the actual farm, you will get so much more knowledge about what you can do with the different cuts of meat. You're not just getting meat. You're getting a resource about it. In my experience with farmers, by the way, I have an episode about shopping at the farmer's market. If you're interested, I'll put it in the show notes. Farmers are incredibly generous. They are so excited when somebody is excited about what they have poured their literal life into.

Now, I'm not saying that you establish. establish a relationship with a farmer with like a trusted source in order to get discounts on the meat. This isn't like some sneaky thing. But it does sometimes happen. If you are a regular with somebody and you ask questions and you show curiosity and what that farmer offers, often they might round down a price for you. But more than that, more than that possibility, you don't just get meat. You get a resource.

If this is an investment you're making, you will get way more done. dividends from knowing your farmer, from knowing who is actually raising the animals. The second way, now you don't have to, but you know, if you can, that's a great, great way. The second way to buy meat consciously without spending a million dollars is to choose less expensive cuts to offset the price. Maybe you're willing to spend up to, say, $10 a pound on meat of any kind, okay? Now, if you go to Food Lion, that covers a lot of ground, $10 a pound can get you a lot of cuts of meat. That is not always true when you're buying consciously.

So consider choosing a cap, like a price cap, of what you're willing to spend, and recognize that your selection of cuts of meat, it will be more limited, and that's okay. That's part of the investment. And a way that you can invest in this priority, but still stay within a reasonable budget. All right? So you might not be able to have steak anymore because it's so expensive. But you can choose other cuts and learn how to cook those cuts. And again, if you have a trusted local source, that person can probably give you ideas on how to cook it the best way.

And then the third way to eat consciously without spending a million dollars is to, it's the first way of the last category, which is just to eat less. You'll spend less if you choose to eat less. So if you are buying consciously, find a trusted source, choose less expensive cuts and eat less. and I mentioned several ways that you can do that in the earlier section. Okay. The third category is convenience. We've done cost, consciousness, and now convenience. How many times have we moaned that we forgot to pull meat out of the freezer or we feel

like cooking meat? Like it's so much more of a chore than pasta or potatoes. Meat feels hard. It just feels hard. Maybe it's because it does cost more money and we feel a lot of pressure to do it right. But how can we make meat easy? easier at dinner, more convenient, even as early as when we buy it. All right.

So first, buy meat prepped. I highly recommend depending on like almost ready to go meats for at least a meal or two a week. I really think it's good to depend on those kinds of meats. It just makes things easier. Things like meatballs. I love Kirkland meatballs from Costco. I actually wrote a post about them a long time ago. I will put it in the show notes.

But they're already cooked. So you just have to microwave them straight from the freezer and they're great. And a giant bag, which lasts us for like a solid 10 meals, if not more, is less than $20. Such a great investment in convenience. Targets meatballs are good too. I've had the market pantry ones. So meatballs, rotissory chicken, frozen popcorn chicken and chicken fingers. Some stores sell fresh meat that's like already marinated or skewered or, you know, for kebabs or something.

So consider adding some prepped meat. into your shopping and planning, especially if convenience is important. The second way that you can buy meat with convenience in mind is to cook one protein a week and add it to everything. So you roast a couple of chickens and you just use chicken in all your recipes that week. You make a big pork shoulder and you use it in all your recipes that week. You grill a ton of chicken breasts and you use them in all your recipes that week. Things feel complicated when there are too many choices.

So if you are pulling from a list of every possible cut of meat ever, week in and week out, it is going to feel overwhelming and not at all easy or convenient. So if convenience is really important, pick one protein a week and have it ready. And then finally, and this one kind of like dovetails into our containment category. And that is to freeze your meat in small and or flat pieces for convenience. Let me explain. you put a package of chicken breasts like that you just buy from the store and that you know yellow styrofoam thing um and you put it straight into the freezer which i do and that's fine um

that package takes an enormous amount of time to thaw i mean let's be honest anything more than half an hour when you're trying to make dinner is an enormous amount of time but if you take those chicken breasts when you get home and you cut them into bite size pieces and then you put those pieces in a gallon freezer bag with a marinade of some sort and then you freeze it flat it will thaw in literally minutes in a sink of water or even under running water the same thing is true even if you don't cut up the chicken okay like take out the chicken breasts from their yellow styrofoam home go ahead and salt them if you want to change your life and make your chicken extra juicy pre-salting your chicken is such a good a good idea.

And then put them in a gallon freezer bag, flat. You can put marinade in there too. Like spread them out in the bag and freeze it like on a cookie sheet flat so that can help if you don't have like flat surfaces, put them on a cookie sheet until they're frozen. And then when it's time to thaw, there's way more surface area, which makes it go so much faster. So if you want meat convenience and you are dealing with the freezer, surface area is your friend. You can do that with ground meat, you guys.

Did you know that? Put it in a gallon bag and make it flat. It's all so fast. It's crazy. Okay. So for convenience, buy it prepped. Cook one protein a week and or freeze it flat. Now our final category is containment or storage. This isn't really about tips as much as it is about just a quick perspective on how you use your freezer. I just need you to get a lens. Here's your lens. You can freeze meat in one of three ways. One, you freeze it. hole from the store, preferably out of its package and flat for quick or thawing, as we just learned. Two, you freeze it marinated or prepped somehow, like it's ready to just be cooked, right? That it's, because you could freeze your ground meat flat, but have not done anything to it. You can freeze your chicken pieces in a bag flat, but not have had anything done to them.

So that's the, you can freeze a hole, number one. Number two, you can freeze it marinated or prepped. And then number three, you can freeze it completely cooked. pay attention to what's best for your way of cooking and what frustrates you. Maybe you just haven't thought about it, like from this perspective. And it's not really that you hate cooking and cooking meat, but you hate pulling out whole packages of meat from the freezer because you still have to make decisions about how to use it.

So now that you know that, consider not buying meat at the store unless you know that you have time that day to prep it and freeze it, or completely cook it and freeze it, or prep it and use it, or completely cook it and use it. And when I say prep, I really just mean like putting salt on it

and then maybe like a jar or a bottle of something. Italian dressing, a jar of green salsa, a bottle of terriaki sauce. Don't, you know, don't complicate it. Now, if you currently use your freezer to store meat in marines and it's all prepped, because that's what people tell you to do,

but you don't like being hemmed in by meat that already has a sauce on it when it's time to cook, then now you know to stop freezing meat and marines. Maybe that's not your story, right? So just do what makes the most sense for how you cook and how you eat. We are not all the same, and that is lovely. So for containment, just ask one simple question, have one simple lens and see what makes sense for you.

How do you want to freeze your meat? Whole, prepped, or cooked. Now, of course, you don't have to use just one, right? But just know which one is your favorite and then do that one the most. Okay, so the four meat categories to think about cost, consciousness, convenience, and containment. For cost, your broad strokes are eat less meat, buy it on sale, and think about cost per pound. That's a big one. For consciousness, your broad strokes are, find a trusted source, choose less expensive cuts, and eat less.

And then for convenience, buy it prepped. Cook one protein a week, freeze it flat. and for containment, think about if you freeze your meat, whole, prepped, or fully cooked. And the last thing I'll say, don't be a freezer hoarder. I know that we are talking about meat, but a lot of us use our freezers primarily for meat and freezer meals. One of the biggest problems with having a huge freezer is that we never actually use the stuff we froze.

We keep saving the meat and the meals for that extra busy night and we don't want to use it up. We don't want to use our stash up. for just like a regular Tuesday. But you guys, a regular Tuesday is exactly what your freezer is for. Use the meat. You freeze whole, perhaps are cooked,

but please use it. Reap the benefits of having it. Otherwise, you're going to do all this work to like fully stock a freezer and it'll stay fully stocked and you're still stressed because you're cooking five meals a week or whatever. So don't be a freezer hoarder.

Use what's in your freezer. It will continue to replenish itself. Get in that rhythm. Okay, that is it for today, you guys. Who knew we could spend this long talking about meat? I appreciate you listening. This feels like a very December appropriate episode, doesn't it? Talking about meat? No, it's the holidays.

But we still need to eat regular meals even in December, and you still need to buy meat. So I hope this episode helps give you a more clear path in the grocery store and in your meal planning. And don't forget that the new monthly newsletter will go out this Wednesday, December 5th. So please join the literal lazy genius collective. Be part of the collective and go to the lazy genius collective.com slash join or click the link in the show notes in your podcast app. And the show notes are at the lazy genius collective.com slash lazy slash meet. And you'll find links to like all the episodes and all the things that I talked about in this episode.

All right, guys. Thank you for listening. I am Kendra. And until next time, be a genius about the things that matter. and lazy about things that don't. Bye guys. You ever felt like you were living just a B or B plus life? It's so dangerous to live that. More dangerous than a B minus or a C plus life

because when you're living a B or B plus life, you don't change it. You think it's good enough. Is it? I'm Susie Welch. I host a podcast called Becoming You. People think, okay, an A plus life is not available to me, but there is a way. We are all in the process of becoming ourselves.

Listen to Becoming You wherever you get your podcasts.