Beef provides essential nutrients that support a heart-healthy lifestyle including protein, zinc, iron and Vitamin B.  However, beef costs continue to increase making traditional muscle cuts cost prohibitive for many families.  Knowing the best cut for the desired recipe or how to buy larger cuts that can be divided and saved or the preferred cooking techniques for tougher, less expensive cuts are all stategies that can be used to help consumers contain costs and stay within their budget.

To accomplish these goals, the Simpson County Extension Agent for Agriculture and the Agent for Family and Consumer Sciences collaborated with the Simpson County Cattlemen's Association and the Western Kentucky University meats Professor, Dr. Hunter Galloway, to provide programming that would address the needs. With our objectives in mind, a program featuring a beef cutting demonstration designed to teach skills that would take a large cut of meat and subdivide it into several smaller cuts that could be preserved for later use; and a cooking demo with a Sous Vide appliance that took a tougher cut of beef (flank steak) and produced a tender, consumable product were combined. The Family and Consumer Sciences Agent gave the demonstration and  provided samples for tasting. 

Written evaluations following the program indicated that participants were now able to:

More appropriately select beef at the grocery store-97%

Correctly store and preserve beef cuts-69%

Better understand recommended cooking techniques for various cuts of beef-90%

Know how to maximize their food dollar when purchasing beef-93%.