Meat Know-How, Part 4: Is It Better to Buy Large Packs or Small Packs?

Myth: Bigger packaging means cheaper?

In recent years, large-capacity packaged products have emphasized that the "average price is lower than the retail price," selling a larger amount at one time. Consumers may feel pleased with themselves, thinking they really got a bargain, but is it actually cheaper this way?

Take meat as an example. Suppose you buy 1kg of ground pork. For a family of 4, the table may also include white rice, vegetables, fish, soup and so on. Although meat is essential, it should be impossible to consume 1kg of meat in one meal. One stir-fried meat dish might need only 300g of ground pork, so what about the other 700g?

The leftover portion can be stored in the fridge, but the next time it is thawed, its freshness will certainly not match the quality when it was just opened, and its texture will be greatly compromised. Perhaps by the time you remember this pack of meat, it is already several weeks later. If the packaging and storage were poor to begin with, the meat may become dry and dark, and in the end you can only choose to throw it away, which also causes waste. Worse still, if you eat spoiled meat, the health risk makes the loss outweigh the gain.

Have you had this experience? When the Lunar New Year comes and you do a big cleanup, you often clear out bag after bag of plastic bags from the fridge, filled with a pile of dried-out meat. At that point you can only ask your other half, "Darling, what is this?" Needless to say, the final outcome is always to throw it away.

Many clever mothers have also noticed this. They buy a large amount of chilled or shelf-stable meat at one time, divide the meat directly into several small bags, and finally freeze it all in the freezer. But in this process, aside from the meat already having undergone oxidation for 7 hours to more than 2 days, it is then portioned again after getting home. In fact, when meat is left at room temperature for too long, its quality deteriorates. Moreover, this extra step is only for cooking the right amount next time, so why not just buy small packages of meat from the start?

In today's society, households usually have 2 to 4 people. The old situation of more than 10 people at a time is no longer seen, yet our consumption patterns remain stuck in our grandparents' era, often asking how much a jin of meat costs. Ask yourself, can you really finish a jin of meat? At present, meals for a family of 4 are usually centered on 3 dishes and 1 soup. For balanced nutrition, 3 dishes and 1 soup are usually meat, vegetables, seafood, plus a meat or seafood soup. It is impossible to eat only meat. If the meat is also stir-fried with vegetables, for example: onions stir-fried with shredded pork, tomatoes stir-fried with free-range chicken tenderloin, pickled mustard greens stir-fried with duck breast, scallions stir-fried with ostrich fillet slices, Kung Pao diced turkey breast, and so on, how much meat do you think is needed in such a dish? As for the soup, if it is mainly meat, will there also be vegetables? For example: radish and pork rib soup, borscht-style ostrich rib soup, shiitake and free-range chicken drumstick soup, pickled vegetable and duck leg soup, ginseng and champagne bird soup, and so on. Wouldn't this portion size and combination be more just right and richer?

For modern people, food is no longer scarce. Buy just the right amount, and every meal can taste fresh ingredients. You can also balance deliciousness and health, and try a variety of meats. In fact, all kinds of meat, and even different cuts, have different nutritional values. "When we were little, Mom always told us not to be picky eaters so we could have balanced nutrition, but we only thought of not being picky about vegetables and fruit. If we could also eat more different kinds of meat, I believe it would achieve an even better balanced-nutrition effect.