Whole Tiny Beef Confusion

[J-Melt]

As I had noted a couple of months ago, my friends and I were looking at going in on a whole cow. We finally got enough people together and took the plunge! We split it into 5 portions and with 3 families splitting the 5th one. The cow was delivered to a halal butcher on February 6th and it was finally ready today. Much longer than the 2 weeks I was quoted, but hopefully that extra time was spent dry aging.

The hanging weight on the cow was 735 according to the rancher and I paid his $3.50/pound on that weight. First confusion is that the poundage I paid the processor was for 725 pounds. Could it be that they re weighed it after the dry age and that's because of water weight? Or we have a rounding issue... Who knows

The real confusion is on the yield. The 735 hanging weight yielded only 385 pounds of meat. This is way less than the 500-600 that the rancher seemed to think I would get. This brought the per pound price to around $8.74 which is way higher than I hoped.

Here now is the upside. The marbling on this meat is absolutely insane. Meat experts, please help me understand if the amazing marbling and super fatty porterhouse has something to do with the low yield.

This first picture is from one of the guys who opened it up and was concerned about the amount of fat. It's a little hard to see marbling, but I think it looks good.


The next two pictures are of the one I currently have dry brining in the fridge. I have never worked with a porterhouse with so much marbling! What do y'all think this might grade as? Prime or higher?

[SheilaAnn]

J-Melt If I remember correctly from my old job (the team used to fabricate for the OC County Fair), 60% ish was about right. He quoted you 500-600#? Hhhmmmmm…. Did you get all the bones, too?

the marbling does look nice 🙌🏼

[J-Melt]

We got a few bones. 4 small packs of dog bones and a couple of packs of strew bones.

[yakima]

Grass or grain finished? I trust that you have a heifer or steer, rather than a cow. Big difference, kind of like frier vs stew chicken. What was the kill weight? Sounds like you got a light weight critter. Meat looks great!

[J-Melt]

He said grass fed with a little grain. I probably should have just said “beef” instead of cow since I don’t know for sure.

[J-Melt]

He also gave be an option between a cow with hanging weight between 800-900 pounds or one cheaper at 700-800. He said the main difference would be bone size.

[Jerod Broussard]

Hanging weight? Is that hide, head, feet, and viscera?

I would hope for about 400lbs of meat cuts at 735lbs.

725-735lbs, that's just over the weight of a gallon of water.

[J-Melt]

Not sure. I thought hanging weight was without hide. Rancher said that live weight was much heavier than that.

[Jerod Broussard]

J-Melt if it is just the carcass hanging sans hide and other parts, than yeah, 500-600lbs of cuts would be expected. I don't think anyone should be dry-aging a carcass.

[J-Melt]

Being a suburbanite turned city slicker, I am new to the whole cow thing. I will ask a lot more questions next time around and try to understand the process better from the people actually taking care of my beef.

[Jfrosty27]

Whatever. Grill up that steak!! Yum. 😊

[yakima]

My brother in law is a jeweler. He knows and can grade diamonds. He has gone to Europe for deals. "If you don't know diamonds, know your jeweler."

Same for beef. I grew up surrounded by feedlots on 2 sides. But I have never purchased bulk meat. Want to see what I am getting, in the quantity I want. Awhile back, on the farm, running fats thru processing shed to load on trucks for sale, a steer got tangled up in steel fence, broke a leg. Brother gave critter to a hired man, who butchered him that night.

For me, unless I am directly involved, not interested in what may come across as deals.

[Oak Smoke]

We have our beef processed every year. As sad as it is to report where you get your beef processed makes a big difference in the yield. I have no experience with Hala processing. There was even once where a processor tried to switch carcasses on us. That got ugly fast. Ask questions and educate yourself. Last year our beef cost of production was about $4.00 a pound on what we got back from the processor. Our daughter uses all the fat to make tallow and I use the bones for making broth so we get a lot of the weight some people wouldn’t want.

[SheilaAnn]

Love this! I make lip balm and moisturizer from the tallow. All bones go to broth.

[J-Melt]

I am kicking myself a bit for not asking for the fat. I just made a batch of tallow with leftover brisket fat that turned out pretty good. With how good the meat is, the tallow would have been great.

[Oak Smoke]

SheilaAnn My daughter makes a tallow-Frankincense mixture for me that is good for several things.

[58limited]

Hanging weight is usually the processed weight: no hide or viscera but with the bones. A lot of places age the hanging carcass for 21 days or so before breaking them down into roasts and steaks. Some of the weight difference is probably due to the trimming of the dried surface of the meat and excess fat - if that was a fat steer there might have been a lot of fat weight removed.

[Jerod Broussard]

If they got plenty marbling you can bet there was plenty extra-muscular fat.

[J-Melt]

Makes sense. My frustration with the timing was that they said two weeks, then 2.5, then it was done after 3. After eating a porterhouse, I’m really glad it got the dry age! I’ll post a full review when I get the chance.

[J-Melt]

After eating a porterhouse from the beef last night, here is my overall review:

1. I think I agree with y'all that this was a crazy fat young animal. I think that is a good explanation for why the meat is so marbled and why it produced so little meat.

Here is the porterhouse after trimming and salting:


My oldest wanted to help, so she was monitoring the hood temperature while it seared! I am excited for how she is wanting to learn. Someday soon, she will be flipping burgers on the weber! Just got to get her comfortable with working with the fire safely.

I made a major mistake and did not fully thaw it, so the meat was at 53 degrees when it was done searing! Glad I use two zone and moved it over to the cool side for about 5-10 minutes (didn't keep track of time). When I went back out to check it, it was right at 137!


Here we have the finished steak! Best steak we have ever had! My wife and I don't usually like the strip side because it is tougher than we like. This one was as tender as butter! It was crazy flavorful and there was NONE left after dinner. All three ladies at the table were raving (including the 5 year old!).


My current verdict is that instead of getting a boat load of lower cost decent meat, we got a decent amount of epic meat. I probably would have done better to go with a rancher who would answer my questions better, but at least the meat is amazing!

[58limited]

That looks great!

[Stuey1515]

That looks awesome, and I love the big toothy grin on the young'un 😁

[fzxdoc]

That steak is beautiful. One plus from your experience is that you learned a lot and the next time you'll be even more prepared, having done some good research up front, based on your current experience. It's always fun to learn something new with research and experience combined.

What a cutie your little one is! She's got pitmaster written all over her.

Kathryn

[Jfrosty27]

Holy Moly! Now that’s what I’m talking about. What a great looking steak. Boy am I jealous. Nice work Pitmaster. 👏👏

[HawkerXP]

Nice hunk o meat!

[58limited]

My first experience with buying a quarter of beef did not go too well. My friend is a grassfed beef rancher and runs a farm to fork operation. He raises the cattle and has them processed to order then delivers them (within 75 miles). The first processing house that he used sucked. The meat was supposed to hang for 21 days to age. I'm wondering if their temps were off a little: The meat near the trimmed edges was very gamey. The steaks were not 1" or more in thickness (my friend told me that the processor basically did what they wanted instead of following directions) and half of my filets, which looked beautiful in the vacuum package, ended up being filet stew pieces that the processor shaped to look like an intact filet. They were good but I had to change plans: I made kabobs with them. Also, seemed like over 2/3 of what I got was ground meat and not roasts or steaks.

My friend very quickly stopped doing business with that processor (they went out of business soon after) and switched to Smithville Food Locker in Smithville, Texas. They do excellent work and the beef I get from my friend now is some of the best grassfed beef that I've ever had. Smithville Food Locker usually has some steaks and pork in stock - swing by if you are ever in Central Texas near Bastrop. Their summer sausage is tops; that is where I get the seasoning for mine - its so good I figured why buy from anywhere else or try to come up with my own recipe?

One thing about grassfed beef: it tastes great (I know, not everyone likes the flavor of grassfed) but it is not known to be the most tender because it is usually lean. Dry brining helps. One of the most tender steaks that I got from my friend was a top sirloin. I started to dry brine it but after 24 hours plans changed and I vacuum sealed it and froze it for three weeks. It ended up being as tender as a prime ribeye. Not sure if salting it and refreezing had anything to do with it or if I was lucky and got a tender steak.

If you have space and time I highly recommend asking for the bones and fat trim: make your own stock and tallow to freeze.

[J-Melt]

Thanks for sharing your first experience with this! I’m definitely torn between how little we got and the amazing quality. As I told everyone who joined in the splitting, this was a grand experiment!

[J-Melt]

I asked chatgpt about why it thinks we were missing so much weight and here is it's response after I told it how long I thought the steer dry aged:

Yes, dry aging for **two weeks** could definitely contribute to the lower weight. During dry aging, moisture evaporates from the meat, which **reduces weight by 5-10%** of the hanging weight.

For your **725 lbs hanging weight**:
- **5% loss** from dry aging = **~36 lbs**
- **10% loss** from dry aging = **~72 lbs**

That means after aging, your hanging weight effectively dropped to **653-689 lbs** before it was even butchered.

### **Revising the Yield Estimate**
If we base your final packaged meat on an adjusted **post-aging hanging weight (say ~675 lbs)**:
- **Bone-in yield (60-65%)** → **405-440 lbs** expected
- Your actual take-home weight: **380 lbs**
- That puts you at **56% yield**, which is slightly below normal but within reason if there was extra trimming.

### **So, was the weight loss normal?**
Yes, **the two-week dry aging process accounts for a good chunk of the missing weight**. If your butcher also trimmed extra fat, that could explain the rest.

It wouldn’t hurt to check with them to confirm their **trimming style**—but overall, dry aging is likely the biggest factor!

[SJUfeller]

Great conversation. The butcher we work with is always happy to answer questions, so step #1 would be to call the butcher to ask about the yield. Along with dry-aging, trimming amount, bones retained, and the animal itself, there are other things that can happen.

First though, you need to know your starting point. Was the hanging weight determined right after harvest (hot weight) or after the carcass was chilled? (Significant water weight is lost during that process, and then more is lost during dry aging.)

Other factors: How skilled was the butcher? Was too much trimming done? Were all of the trimmings sorted and provided to you?

Occasionally an animal was injured (but not detected right away) and some of the meat is damage . . . i.e. some product is lost.

What cuts are selected affects yield. Some people get the cheeks and tongue.

Also, sadly, some butchers seem to help themselves (or their employees do) to certain cuts. I believe this is the exception to rule . . .but it does happen. (Don't assume that this happening in your situation . . . but if you buy again from this same location, find out their normal yield before processing and compare it to what you actually get.)

[J-Melt]

Thank you for your insight! I asked for everything to be included. I currently have kidneys sitting in my freezer that I need to figure out what to do with. Sounds like I need to call the processor and see what they say.