Silly Things About Soaping You Hear On The Internet

[DianaMoon]

This may sound petty, but I have come across several times self-promoting soap experts say this: "You can pick up beef fat for free from your local butcher" and it annoys me.

First of all, in many locales, the local butcher has gone the way of the dinosaur. This is 2018, not 1918, or even 1958. In many areas, a butcher is a high-end specialty shop.

It so happens there are several butchers in my area (Manhattan, NYC) and most of them do have that snobby whiff. One joint calls itself "meat purveyors," and I want to boycott them for that reason alone. Others are survivors from the old days but they don't give anything away.

Beef tallow is now a somewhat expensive specialty item and no one is going to give away even the fat for free. Rendered beef fat in my area goes for $5-$8 per pint - not pound, pint. One guy sells the fat for $3.99 a pound, but I don't think that after rending it's much cheaper than the rendered, so I might as well buy the rendered.

Sillier than that was that curing isn't necessary.

I'm sure there are many more.

 

[jcandleattic]

Oh man, that's too bad.
We have several butchers here, (of course some people still think this is the Old West so maybe that's why?) and pretty much as long as you tell them what you want the tallow or lard for, they will just give it to you. The catch is, if you want it rendered, they will charge for that, otherwise here you can get it free if you render it yourself.

 

[SudsanSoaps]

Same here. I bought beef fat for $2 a pound or so and after rendering in had lost roughly half the weight. So ended up I think around $4 a pound for tallow.

 

[toxikon]

Yeah I've looked around for local free beef/pork fat... no dice. I bought some just to try out the whole rendering process and I wouldn't do it again. So much time... and it made my house smell awful LOL. I'll stick to buying commercially rendered animal fats from Walmart and Soapers Choice!

 

[dixiedragon]

Our local butcher - a specialty meat shop - uses their suet in their ground beef and sausage. I did have some luck getting ground suet from Earth Fare grocery, but now they've gone out of business. I've gotten fatty beef scraps for free from Winn Dixie. To get it free, you need to find a grocery store that still does some butchering. But whether or not they are willing/able to save them for you - that's something else.

 

[cmzaha]

We have a very large Hispanic population in So Cal who use lard in much of their cooking so the stores sell all their tallow and lard trimmings to a rendering house. They will not even sell it to an individual in any appreciable quantities. For tallow I purchase 50lb blocks of Beef Shortening from Smart & Final which is pure beef fat. It soaps beautifully, is pure white with no smell or at least I do not smell anything.

 

[CTAnton]

There's 1 non chain supermarket locally noted for it's better than average meats.They bring in 50 pound boxes of suet for people feed the birds..I'm thinking last time I checked it was somewhere in the neighborhood of 2.99USD

 

[DianaMoon]

Oh man, that's too bad.
We have several butchers here, (of course some people still think this is the Old West so maybe that's why?) and pretty much as long as you tell them what you want the tallow or lard for, they will just give it to you. The catch is, if you want it rendered, they will charge for that, otherwise here you can get it free if you render it yourself.

Any butcher who gave away something for free in Manhattan would be a fool. Space is horribly expensive. They're not being greedy, just being sensible.

I remember being shocked that in upstate New York, which is totally different from NYC, you can rent a car for $10 a day. Obviously they want to move their inventory. In NYC, weekends are the premium rental time.

There's 1 non chain supermarket locally noted for it's better than average meats.They bring in 50 pound boxes of suet for people feed the birds..I'm thinking last time I checked it was somewhere in the neighborhood of 2.99USD

Wow.

 

[Moebym]

We have a very large Hispanic population in So Cal who use lard in much of their cooking so the stores sell all their tallow and lard trimmings to a rendering house. They will not even sell it to an individual in any appreciable quantities. For tallow I purchase 50lb blocks of Beef Shortening from Smart & Final which is pure beef fat. It soaps beautifully, is pure white with no smell or at least I do not smell anything.

I had no idea Smart & Final had such a product in stock. I'll have to go there again sometime soon and get a block for my attempt at making shaving soap.

 

[SaltedFig]

It seems that's the way it's going in an ever increasingly competitive world ... yesterday's waste is today's resource.
(in some ways that's a great thing, but in others, like getting free "waste" product, it isn't so great!).

Sorry to hear that your market has closed up.

Where I am in Australia there is a strong paddock to plate culture, and with that a good amount of independent growers and butchers who don't always have the waste chain systems in place like the more densely populated/competitive markets do. It's a bit like that in NZ too, but I could well believe that NY would be a lot more competitive.

Even here, there'd be no hope of getting free suet around Christmas time

 

[Misschief]

We have one (that I know of) butcher here in town. I drop in there occasionally for tallow but they don't always have it. Apparently, the local hunters buy it up. The only way I can get it is if I put my name on the reserve list. It costs about $7.00 for a 1 kg tub.

All the other meat vendors are in the large chain supermarkets and their meat comes pre-butchered. They're nothing more than meat cutters.

 

[Dahila]

No butcher will give you fat for free, they mince this with beef so it is ie; medium ground beef. I buy it too

 

[jcandleattic]

No butcher will give you fat for free, they mince this with beef so it is ie; medium ground beef. I buy it too

There are several butchers in my area that will give free beef tallow and lard - unrendered. It really depends on the area you are in.

 

[SaltedFig]

No butcher will give you fat for free, they mince this with beef so it is ie; medium ground beef. I buy it too

Dahlia, that may be true where you are. It's not like that here.

 

[jules92207]

I know they aren’t cheap but I really like fannieandflo for tallow on Etsy.

 

[IrishLass]

I know they aren’t cheap but I really like fannieandflo for tallow on Etsy.

Another fannieandflo fan here. I love their leaf lard for making pie crusts.


IrishLass

 

[Dahila]

Salter Fig I am in Canada and I do not think anyone gives tallow for free , It is an awesome fat to fry french fries

 

[SaltedFig]

I'm in Australia and we must really be the lucky country

Here the fat from grass fed beef is prized, but not so much the ordinary commercial farm fat.

Salter Fig I am in Canada and I do not think anyone gives tallow for free , It is an awesome fat to fry french fries

Frying potatoes in it once makes the fat better for soaping too.

 

[Jayne]

I'm in Australia and we must really be the lucky country

Here the fat from grass fed beef is prized, but not so much the ordinary commercial farm fat.

Wait, are you able to buy tallow or lard from somewhere at a reasonable price? 'cause everywhere I've looked is crazy expensive. EVOO is cheaper. Granted I haven't tried any butchers (non-existent).

 

[SaltedFig]

Wait, are you able to buy tallow or lard from somewhere at a reasonable price? 'cause everywhere I've looked is crazy expensive. EVOO is cheaper. Granted I haven't tried any butchers (non-existent).

Jayne,

There's no point trying the supermarkets, the big guys have their waste chains in place.
If you're going to have any luck, it will be an independent, preferably one that you know
I don't know about lard, never tried to get any.