Unexpected buy on organic chicken

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I went to ShopRite in Hackensack this morning to buy Readington Farms chicken for my wife and son, who have resumed eating meat. But I bought Coleman organic chicken instead, because it was nearly half the price.

There was nothing in the sales circular about the organic chicken, and I figured it was a misprint. And there were only skin-on legs available. But at 99 cents a pound, a tray of four legs came to around $1.50 or less, so I bought seven trays, most for the freezer.

Readington Farms legs were selling for the usual $1.89 a pound. And the store was having a 40%-off sale on crappy Perdue chicken. ShopRite rarely has a sale on drug-free chicken.

Both Readington Farms and Coleman raise their chickens on vegetarian feed and without antibiotics. All bets are off on how Perdue chickens are raised, but the parts are much bigger than their naturally raised cousins -- likely as a result of the antibiotics they receive.

My wife likes to rub drug-free chicken legs with Grace-brand jerk sauce (hot), put them in the refrigerator for several hours, then roast them in the oven. We use a meat thermometer, because they take less time to cook than conventional legs.

 

Shrill sales circular from Fairway Market

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New York-based Fairway Market has been pushing U.S. prime beef since it opened a store in Paramus this year, but its latest sales circular has a shrill tone and the text is full of exclamation marks. I guess all of this is designed to distract shoppers from knowing how the cattle were raised.

"This is what we're talking about!" and "Great food! Great prices! Only at Fairway!" are two of the large-type sentences displayed around a seasoned USDA prime porterhouse steak with grill marks, on sale Jan. 1-7 for $8.99 a pound. 

Prime is the top grade assigned to beef by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (choice and select are the other grades) and signifies that this meat has the highest fat content.

But that's it. Prime can be raised conventionally, with growth hormones, antibiotics and animal by-products -- bits of dead animals -- in the feed. The circular is silent on how the cattle were raised. 

The ad text says, "This is serious steakhouse steak! This ain't no supermarket steak! Could there be anything more glorious on the face of the Earth! We think not." 

Well, little, old me thinks so. The cattle could be free range, rather than being confined in enormous, manure-filled feed lots (the animals are usually covered in manure when they enter, or are dragged, into the slaughterhouse, and feces often gets into ground beef). They could be grass fed, instead of being pumped full of grain, which can make them sick, and animal byproducts could be banned from their feed.

I'm sure this prime beef tastes good and $8.99 a pound is a great price, but you can find grass-fed beef on sale at Whole Foods Market, also in Paramus, for around $9.99 a pound. What do the arrogant New York owners of Fairway have to say about that?

What are oxymoronic shrimp?

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The latest sales circular from Fairway Market in Paramus offers jumbo shrimp for $6.99 a pound. They are described as U.S.A. caught, 16/20 count, "sweet and succulent," "super-fresh" and "oxymoronic."

Oxymoronic? I Googled the word and came across a discussion on line that it's an oxymoron to describe shrimp as jumbo. But not all shrimp are jumbo, as you quickly learn if you order a shrimp dish from a Chinese takeout restaurant and don't specify "jumbo."

So maybe Fairway is trying to distract us from noticing that these shrimp likely are farm-raised, which also may mean habitat destruction and unwholesome additives. It's always best to buy wild-caught shrimp and other seafood.

Fairway Market's latest sales circular

Fairway Market in Paramus, grand opening (Wikipedia)

There isn't much of interest to me in the Fairway Market sales circular I got with today's Record. Prices are good from today through Sept. 11 in Paramus.

USDA Choice beef brisket is selling for $2.99 a pound -- no extra charge for the antibiotics, growth hormones and animal by-products that were probably used to raise the animal. Yummy. 

If you want kosher brisket, the price is $9.99 a pound, but there is no mention of whether the animal is raised the same way as for the cheap stuff..

Want some kosher, artificially colored farmed salmon? Only $6.99 a pound, compared with $8.99 for fresh wild sockeye salmon at Costco. Artificially colored, smoked farmed salmon is selling for $16.99 a pound, compared with $13.99 for a pound of Costco's smoked wild salmon.

Refrigerated Sabra hummus is $1.99 for 7 ounces and $3.99 for 17 ounces. I'll stick with the canned Libano Verde brand hummus I get at Fattal's in Paterson, $1.09 for 15 ounces. (You add olive oil, powdered garlic and lemon juice.)

Fairway does have good prices for organic milk: $2.99 for a half-gallon of kosher, grass-fed milk and $5.99 for a gallon of Organic Valley milk.

You'll also get a deal on a Murray's rotisserie chicken for $5.99 (weight not specified). Whole Foods Market in Paramus charges $7.49 for a similar rotisserie chicken, though it is probably larger.

Murray's poultry is hormone- and antibiotic-free and is raised on a vegetarian diet, and takes less time to cook than ordinary chicken. Let's hope the Paramus store doesn't overcook them, as the Harlem store did when I first tried a Murray's rotisserie chicken years ago.