Free-range beef is ready for its close-up

The grass-fed, free-range beef from Australia is going on sale again at ShopRite. The deep discount, $3 off per pound with a Price Plus Club, will be available tomorrow through next Saturday (Oct. 4-10). The final price, $3.99 a pound, is not the lowest of the year; I bought some for $2.99 a pound. 


The color photo in the ShopRite circular shows slices from the Nature's Reserve "whole beef tenderloin for filet mignon," prepared medium rare. In truth, you'll have to do a lot of trimming to get the steaks to look like that. The tenderloins come in a plastic sleeve with some blood, and weigh 6 to 8 pounds. The beef, raised without antibiotics and growth hormones, is chewy with a pronounced beefy flavor.


I cut a bunch of small steaks from my tenderloin and sliced the rest thin for Korean barbecue (it went into a freezer bag with Korean marinade you can get at H Mart).


ShopRite will also be discounting USDA Select whole beef tenderloin for $4.99 a pound with the store card. This is a rare case where a naturally raised product is sold for less than the conventionally raised one, complete with antibiotics and growth hormones. Imagine the Australian cattle roaming grassy fields and the USDA animals confined in feeding pens in an effort to get them to market as soon as possible.

Good supermarket buys

Today through Saturday, ShopRite supermarkets are knocking down the price of free-range Australian beef tenderloin to $3.99 a pound with the Price Club Card. It's sold under the Nature's Reserve label.

The whole tenderloin is shrink-wrapped, but there is usually a lot of blood and you'll have to trim some fat. But you'll get a dozen or more small steaks and, sliced thin, some Korean-style barbecue meat. The meat, raised without antibiotics or hormones, is chewy and has a nice beefy taste.

Live lobsters are $4.99 a pound at ShopRite with the club card.

My wife picked up a seedless watermelon this week at Costco in Hackensack for $4.99. The next day, Tuesday, I shopped at H Mart in Little Ferry, where they were going for $3.99 each.