Waitrose Wagyu

[.:ian:.]

WTF is going on at Waitrose. They must have scored a job lot of wagyu beef.

Burgers, steaks of all sorts, meatballs! cottage pie, beef pie, (£40! For a pie!) beef bourguignon. And just now while browsing, wagyu beef dripping potatoes and Yorkshire puds.

I haven't found the wagyu beef ice cream yet, but its there I'm sure.

The cottage pie is a particular war-crime as its 15% wagyu and 13% beef.

[abzmike]

I'd ahad couple of the sirloin streaks and they were very very nice...
Not doorsteps, but decend size, couple of minutes each side and a rest... lovely.
As it happens, have a dozen of thier wagyu meatballs for tonight... yum.

[21TonyK]

The whole point of a premium beef like any of the Wagyu breeds is a muscle cut such as a steak where the quality of the meat actually makes a difference. Makes me laugh when I see Wagyu burgers et all.

But, I guess its no worse than any other food marketing scam.

[Caddyshack]

21TonyK said:

The whole point of a premium beef like any of the Wagyu breeds is a muscle cut such as a steak where the quality of the meat actually makes a difference. Makes me laugh when I see Wagyu burgers et all.

But, I guess its no worse than any other food marketing scam.

Aren’t those burgers made from the exact same price of steak though? That’s how I would understand it?

[Caddyshack]

.:ian:. said:

WTF is going on at Waitrose. They must have scored a job lot of wagyu beef.

Burgers, steaks of all sorts, meatballs! cottage pie, beef pie, (£40! For a pie!) beef bourguignon. And just now while browsing, wagyu beef dripping potatoes and Yorkshire puds.

I haven't found the wagyu beef ice cream yet, but its there I'm sure.

The cottage pie is a particular war-crime as its 15% wagyu and 13% beef.

Wouldn’t the 15% and 13% both be beef though? So, that should be 28% beef of which 15% of the total is wagyu or roughly 50% of the beef is wagyu?

[a340driver]

I've tried Waitrose Wagyu burgers on discount in the past (I'd never have bought them at full price).

Whilst I'm not a fan of wagyu steaks, these burgers were so fatty as to be quite sickly. I wonder if they're cheap cuts with added beef fat?

Really unpleasant and I didn't look at the label properly.

[CoolHands]

Who’s gonna buy a 40 quid pie

[Caddyshack]

CoolHands said:

Who s gonna buy a 40 quid pie

I would guess lots of Waitrose customers and if they don’t then we won’t be seeing them for long.

Probably a good idea for people looking for a special meal at home. £40 wouldn’t buy two good steaks in many good pubs now.

[21TonyK]

Caddyshack said:

21TonyK said:

The whole point of a premium beef like any of the Wagyu breeds is a muscle cut such as a steak where the quality of the meat actually makes a difference. Makes me laugh when I see Wagyu burgers et all.

But, I guess its no worse than any other food marketing scam.

Aren t those burgers made from the exact same price of steak though? That s how I would understand it?

No, they'll be made from all the same cuts they make normal burgers from. You are not buying a ribyeye or sirloin burger, it will be all the cuts that cannot be sold as identifiable beef.

[a340driver]

21TonyK said:

Caddyshack said:

21TonyK said:

The whole point of a premium beef like any of the Wagyu breeds is a muscle cut such as a steak where the quality of the meat actually makes a difference. Makes me laugh when I see Wagyu burgers et all.

But, I guess its no worse than any other food marketing scam.

Aren t those burgers made from the exact same price of steak though? That s how I would understand it?

No, they'll be made from all the same cuts they make normal burgers from. You are not buying a ribyeye or sirloin burger, it will be all the cuts that cannot be sold as identifiable beef.

As I said, I seemed like they just added more fat.

[normalbloke]

Wagyu. The new salted caramel.

[21TonyK]

a340driver said:

21TonyK said:

Caddyshack said:

21TonyK said:

The whole point of a premium beef like any of the Wagyu breeds is a muscle cut such as a steak where the quality of the meat actually makes a difference. Makes me laugh when I see Wagyu burgers et all.

But, I guess its no worse than any other food marketing scam.

Aren t those burgers made from the exact same price of steak though? That s how I would understand it?

No, they'll be made from all the same cuts they make normal burgers from. You are not buying a ribyeye or sirloin burger, it will be all the cuts that cannot be sold as identifiable beef.

As I said, I seemed like they just added more fat.

Possibly, and like you say while it will be "Wagyu" beef it will be all the stuff they cant sell at a higher value. One step up from MRM.

Anything other than a premium Wagyu cut is just marketing.

[DodgyGeezer]

had Waygu at a Japanese steakhouse - really didn't like it. Over-priced and over-fatty

[TheHeadhunter]

I agree with everything said on the proliferation of Wagyu at Waitrose.

But, just to add the Wagyu Cottage Pie, Wagyu or not, is bloody delicious.

£10 and big enough for me and my daughter (£15 all in if you add a side and a desert).

[48k]

normalbloke said:

Wagyu. The new salted caramel.

This. Not that long ago Wagyu was a rare highly coveted Japanese beef with very distinctive fat marbling. It was frighteningly expensive, due to the special diet and way the cows were looked after, with the Japanese government enforcing strict standards on what Wagyu meant.

Now the word Wagyu has just become a ubiquitous marketing word to try and infer premium quality and supermarkets are banging out shoddy nonsense like this:

[zetec]

I always thought Wagyu was meant to be quite fatty. If you look at a proper Wagyu steak it's almost white due to the level of marbling through it. Cooked properly though I would imagine the fat melts and tenderises the beef.
The Tesco example above is nothing like a Wagyu steak, have a look at the fresh meat counter in Harrods to see proper Wagyu and see the difference in price too!

[FredericRobinson]

‘Wagyu’ in the UK doesn’t have to mean anything other than semen used comes from a Wagyu bull, same requirement as ‘Aberdeen Angus’, it’s pretty meaningless

[loskie]

I just came here to post that. Yes the term Wagyu is a bit misleading here. Same with other breed specific meats.
You'll find a lot of these "Wagyu" cattle reared it large feed lots, fairly intensively.

Nothing wrong with that. It's agriculture. What is wrong is misleading marketing.

[Caddyshack]

48k said:

normalbloke said:

Wagyu. The new salted caramel.

This. Not that long ago Wagyu was a rare highly coveted Japanese beef with very distinctive fat marbling. It was frighteningly expensive, due to the special diet and way the cows were looked after, with the Japanese government enforcing strict standards on what Wagyu meant.

Now the word Wagyu has just become a ubiquitous marketing word to try and infer premium quality and supermarkets are banging out shoddy nonsense like this:

This seems to be the modern way. The IVY used to be an exclusive restaurant with a long waiting list and celeb diners, they then rolled out IVY to the masses and we got every wannabe posting pics of their date night in “The Ivy”…we generally see the masses wanting to live the rich life and there is a whole economy around it.

I had true Wagu in Portugal about 15 years ago and it was very expensive and very special, now we have it in Tesco and it isn’t.