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Mince Question

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catsrcool | 15:05 Sat 17th Jan 2015 | Food & Drink
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My girlfriend bought me a mincer attachment for my Kenwood Chef Major. What cuts of meat would you use in it for best results? I want to mince beef,lamb and turkey mostly.
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I just want to bump this up, in the hope someone will see this and answer.
It depends a bit what you are going to do with the mince. I have got no opinion on lamb because I don't eat it.
For turkey I prefer the dark meat to the white because it has more flavour, although breast mince makes a decent meatloaf. The dark meat has more fat than the white, the white can be a little dry when minced. If you want to make a turkey breast burger, then you need to add some moisture and some flavour, also double or triple flour and egg them to stop them falling apart.
For beef again, it depends what you are going to do with it. I'd probably buy decent quality ready minced beef tbh and for a luxury home made burger, i would rather chop the mince with a knife than mince it.
We always mince our own meat as I like to know what I'm eating so here are a few suggestions

lamb: for both cooked mince in sauce dishes (sheperds pie,mousakka) the shoulder is the best cut it has flavour and less fat that the flap or belly

beef: cooked long and slow: any meat sold as casserole/stew beef
burgers meat balls etc: rump,topside, sirloin

turkey: leg meat or leg and breast. If you want to make turkey breast(or chicken) burgers add a very finely chopped RAW mushroom to the mix it will give incredible moisture.

Pork: makes lovely mince to add to turkey or beef for meatballs -use shoulder or belly but cut most of the fat off the belly

Would never ever eat shop bought mince there are brains and all sorts in it. My eldest son once worked in a supermarket butchers in the holidays from Uni and it was not that long ago -they bring in from the shelves all the meat just before its 'display until' date and mince it -they have big blocks of fat and 'lights' which they add in certain proportions depending on the quality of the mince.
Most of the answers on here are complete rubbish
The best cuts to mince are in Beef are the cheaper cuts like clod or sticking generally sold as stewing beef. There is also skirt which would be my favourite. Do not go wasting your money on sirloin,rump or fillet.
Turkey -the best cut and one of the cheapest is the thigh which also would apply to chicken. It has a better flavour than the breast
Pork. Boneless Spare Rib or even a thick end of belly
Lamb is more difficult as it contains a lot more fat,certainly not shoulder. For least fat either the leg or probably the neck fillet.Both are fairly expensive though
The main thing for all these cuts is go to a proper butcher because most supermarkets will not know what you are talking about and another big thing is it will be cheaper
gollob its you talking 'a load of rubbish' I doubt you've been within 2 feet of a mincer. If you mince stewing meat and try to do burgers you will be chewing on them for hours.Minced skirt and shank is great for anything slow cooked but you need a good quality steak to mince for burgers. Shoulder of lamb makes superb mince as you need some fat for flavour and lamb fat melts at low temperatures and can be drained off easily for the cooked mince -no one in their right mind would mince a leg of lamb!
Retrochic
I find your comment as naive and offensive
As I had a butchery business for 40 years I think I know what I am talking about. In the summer I used to make 6000 burgers a week . The reason the cheaper cuts of beef are minced is because the mincing breaks down the fibres of a course cut of meat. This is generally minced twice on a course plate then a fine plate then formed into a burger. The cheaper cuts of meat is what the main companies still use today. If sirloin ,rump or fillet were used by Macdonald they would be four times the price. By the way there is no such thing as shank of beef
Lamb Fat never melts at low temperature . If you cook lamb and you have some left over the lamb fat will still be there. Mind you I never ever minced lamb as it is always too fat or too dear
Hope you might learn something from this
I asked my Mum about this. She said my Gran (who raised Devon Ruby cattle) used to use cheaper cuts from the lower end of the cow such as skirt or shin. No point in using the better stuff - it`s too good for mince.
237SJ That's what my mum told me, too.
I have a mincer attachment for my KitchenAid and regularly use it. One point I've found is to cut off the gristle as it can block up the plates and blades. Also It's a good idea to use the meat virtually freezing as then the fat minces more easy. I always mince everything twice.
Cut off the membranes too.
gollop Firstly it was you who started your post with 'most of the answers on here are rubbish' so pot calling kettle black springs to mind. Secondly English is not my first language and shank should have read shin. Thirdly Lamb melts at a lower temperature than other meats meaning it cooks out quicker -fry lamb mince and the fat melts out quicker than beef mince and you can drain it off. Because it melts quicker it solidifies quicker . We are talking about HOME MINCING not commercial mincing and MacDonalds use most of the beef -they grown beef through franchising, they slaughter beef and I KNOW they use all of it in their burgers they do not sell off the premium cuts to supermarkets it all goes in their burgers -how do I know this? family in USA who have beef lots franchised to MacDonalds. and finally -because you made '6000' chewy shin/offal/ sinew burgers a week when you had your 'butchery business' has nothing what-so -ever to do with home mincing which is what the OP is about. Hope you have learned something.
237SJ it depends what yo are using the mince for -think about it -mince in sauce or gravy is slow cooked like a stew so you can use cheaper bcuts. Burgers are cooked quickly so the meat has to be of good quality or it will be hard and chewy. Mincing up 2 pounds of rump steak with herbs and onions will make 8 quarter pounders and will feed more people than 2 pounds of flat steak so it does not work out that expensive. Why do you think they have minced STEAK in butchers? -if they did not use steak they would be prosecuted under the trades description act. Minced 'meat' can be anything.
Retrochic - I think that your idea of mince and mine are two different things. Burgers and the like were not known in my Grandmother`s time. I do agree with gollob though - you don`t seem to know what you are talking about. Sorry.
Retrochic
It's really a waste of time trying to educate you . Do you seriously think Macdonalds put fillet steak at £38.00 a kilo in the burgers to sell at 99p each . Get in the real world. It's not very hard to work out that Restuarants or supermarkets do not use rump,sirloin or fillet steak. You only have to look at the price.
If your family raises cattle in America you should be ashamed of them as they all use growth hormone promoters to make the cattle put on more weigh quickly. This is forbidden in this country.
I dont think you even know what the word Steak means. as many cheaper cuts of meat like Braising and Stewing have the name steak as well as frying steaks.
Quite funny that you quote mince with lites(not lights) and brains in them yet are not prosecuted .Why is that.
Of course more fat comes out of Lamb. That's because lamb contains more fat than Beef or Pork.






























I love this site, people will fight over anything....I mean a mince fight, how funny is that?
"People will fight over anything" Who`s fighting? I don`t think anyone is.
You need a fatty cut for burgers, and a cheap cut for flavour:

" ...... avoid anything marked as lean, prime steak cuts like rump; Heston recommends a 2:1:1 combination of chuck, short-rib and brisket, but in my experience, plain old chuck will do nicely. "

http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/wordofmouth/2010/aug/05/how-to-make-perfect-hamburger

The only reason one would mince fillet steak is to make steak tartare

http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/steaktartare_88981
gollob -you really are quite obnoxious -all this over someone wanting advice on mincing meat. As for correcting my English - perhaps when you can post in near to perfect French I may just correct you on the odd word you get wrong. You make burgers out of trash -I make then out of steak -maybe we should have a 'cook off' and see which one people prefer -the 'rump' burger or the sinew cheapy burger.
Why would anyone mince up a steak to make a burger? Just asking (I don't eat a lot of meat)?

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