22 July 2011
The Better Supermarket Beefs In The UK - More Thoughts On Burger Making
For the supermarkets, I have reviewed their offerings (see below) and made an initial selection of meats, going for beef from Booths, Sainsbury's, Tesco and Waitrose.
Next, we needed to make some burgers from these suppliers, so I chose the following: from Booths, chuck and rib eye steaks; from Sainsbury's, rib eye steak and braising steak; from Tesco, rib eye steak and casserole steak; and from Waitrose, rib eye steak and braising steak. To these, I then made simple burgers following my core recipe from my blog earlier in July 2011 without the onions to let the meat speak for itself. The meats were ground through a 4½mm mincer and shaped using the Italian burger press from Weschenfelder.
They were lightly fried in deodourised sunflower oil then tasted with fork & knife rather than in bread rolls. We tasted them en famille so the results are across ages and sexes and the ranking was Booths and Waitrose first equal then Sainbsury's and last Tesco. However, it is important to state that Booths, Sainsbury's and Waitrose were clearly good with Tesco's quality lagging a long way behind.
As for Booth's and Waitrose, the differences were that Booths had the best general flavour and mouthfeel, while Waitrose had a deeper, richer flavour. I reckon this was because the Waitrose meat was hung for longer and so had more beefiness coming through whereas for Booth's I was able to get exactly the cuts that I desired, so perhaps the ideal is as I argued in my previous blogs for a 1:1 mix of chuck and rib eye that has been matured for 21 - 28 days rather than a relatively quick 14 days as was the case for Booths.
As an aside, we also taste tested Sainsbury's versus Waitrose dry aged sirloin and the Sainsbury's beef was a clear winner, so it is not a case of Booths & Waitrose being clear winners across the board nor was the older beef the better as Sainsbury's was 21 day and Waitrose 28 day aged.
Review of supermarket beef
At Asda, the choice of beef was from British or Irish meat with most coming from Ireland. Mince was Irish beef and £6.08 for 1kg (in 500g amounts) or 2 for £5, braising steak was £8.75/kg and rump steak £7.00/kg (currently down from £11.48/kg) and from Ireland. In ribeye steak there was the biggest choice - organic (£16.99/kg), Irish 14 day matured (£14.49/kg), British (£15.00/kg) or Yorkshire Dales steak (£21.94/kg). Overall, I was impressed that they had Yorkshire sourced beef and some organic, but too much was from Ireland rather than Britain and very little provenance was given.
At Booths, they have a good minced steak at £4.00 for 700g which is very good value compared to Morrisons in spite of Morrisons claiming to be the value store and Booths having the reputation for being expensive. They have a much smaller selection than the big highstreet multiples but the quality is much better, and I went for a mix of traditional chuck steak (£8.00/kg) and rib eye steak (£20.00/kg) with marbling a little light at around 10%, but I compensated with some beef fat that I took off another sirloin steak. The beef at the butcher's counter is hung for 21 days, but the instore staff did not know whether the steaks in the chillers were the same age, but presumed they could be. If you go to one of their stores, try and get their 28 days National Trust beef, which often comes from Fountains Abbey for the Ripon store - it is just amazing kit and the best beef in any supermarket but that is for another blog.
At Morrisons, you can get either minced beef or steak, where I suggest that minced steak at £5.56/kg for 720g is a good bet or for the Butcher's Mince at £6.99/kg. Alternatively, you could buy from the Family Butcher rib eye steak (£14.49/kg) and braising steak (£7.99/kg) then cube them both up and grind them at home. We tried their The Best Scotch Beef Quarter Pounder Burgers and they were tough, rubbery and full of gristle, plus lots of liquid came out during the cooking process, which left me feeling mighty suspicious. Anyway one of the key reasons to make you own burgers is to look at the ingredients: beef (86%), breadcrumbs, beef fat, roasted onions, seasoning, then the horrors of sodium metabisulphite (horrible stuff!), sodium ascorbate and trisodium citrate. Note that all supermarkets use heavy preservatives as they need to maximise the length in store to minimise wastage, so all superamrkets use these nasty chemicals.
For Sainsbury's, there was beef mince (£4.40/kg), braising steak (£8.75/kg), Taste the Difference rump steak (£13.99/kg), sirloin (standard = £19.99/kg; 21 day dry aged Taste the Difference = £21.99/kg), rib eye steak in various guises - scotch beef (£16.30/kg); North Highland rib eye (£20.40/kg) and 21 day dry aged Taste the Difference (£23.99/kg).
At Tesco, there was steak mince (£5.74/kg) or organic beef mince (£5.75/kg), casserole steak from Britain or Ireland (£8.00/kg or £9.00/kg at the butcher's counter even though it looked the same style of beef), rump steak (£11.79/kg for standard and £13.49/kg for Tesco Finest), sirloin (standard = £15.97/kg; Tesco Finest = £15.99/kg; organic sirloin £17.99/kg), rib eye steak in various guises - standard beef (£14.49/kg); Tesco Finest (£13.00/kg - should be £15.99/kg per www.tesco.com but was mispriced in store at £13.00/kg so I got a bargain) and organic rib eye (£16.00/kg).
At Waitrose, there was beef mince from Aberdeen Angus cattle in 10% fat and 20% fat forms, with the 20% being £6.58/kg and the most appropriate for making burgers; there is a beef mince that is organic at £13.16/kg for their Duchy Original brand. There is an organic rump steak from Duchy Originals (£16.49/kg) and sirloin (£21.99/kg). Non-organic beefs are Hereford diced braising steak (£10.47/kg), 14 days aged sirloin (£23.99/kg) and rib eye steak (£26.99/kg), plus 28 day dry aged Aberdeen Angus beef from the butcher's counter - sirloin (£25.99/kg) and rib eye steak (£26.99/kg). The butcher at the counter in Harrogate was really helpful and the best of all the supermarkets for knowledge and courtesy.
I make no warranties or claims on pricing or availability in store. They are provided as guides, but as I visited the supermarkets at different times and in different places, these could have gone up or down or done some somersaults while some products may even have been delisted. Booths prices at 28/6/2011; Morrisons prices at 26/6/2011; on 1 July 2011, I got prices for Asda, Sainsbury's, Tesco and Waitrose. I went to Harrogate for Asda, Sainsbury's and Waitrose; Ripon for Booths; Morrisons in Boroughbridge; and Tesco in Thirsk.
