Yum! Bison Tacos!

Just thought I would report on a meal I made with some of the ground bison that I got for such a deal last week. The other night, I made tacos using one pound of 94% lean ground beef and one pound of bison. I used 2 packets of Taco Bell taco seasoning mix. The unanimous verdict: DEELICIOUS!!! My family of 4 devoured this. We barely had any meat left over. You don't taste these and say "oh, this must be bison." The bison, to me at least, tastes like beef should taste. Very flavorful without overpowering the seasonings. Add taco shells, grated cheese, shredded lettuce, tomatoes, etc. Perfect-o!

On a side note, as I was surfing the web to find the image of the taco mix, I found that amazon.com has them for much cheaper than I can get in my grocery store. I bought them at Safeway last week on sale for 99 cents each. On amazon, I got a pack of 24 (which will last me about a year, considering we do tacos about once a month and use 2 packets each time) for $15.71, or $0.65 per packet. And, because our household has a subscription to Amazon Prime (which I will discuss in more detail in a future post, I got 2-day shipping for free).

A Great Time to Buy Meat

The week after Christmas, when I went to the grocery store, I hit a jackpot in the clearance meat department. I picked up nine 1-lb packages of 94% lean ground beef for $1.99 each (a savings of $3.50 per package), and seven 1-lb packages of ground buffalo for $1.99 each (an unbelievable savings of $5.00 per package). I unashamedly took all the marked-down packages of each that I could find and filled my freezer.

Clearance meat is one of my favorite ways to save. It doesn't take advanced math skills to figure out why. I think saving 68% speaks for itself. The trick is knowing what time of day, as well as what time of year, your particular grocery store marks down their meat. Since going back to work, my grocery shopping time has switched from 8 or 9 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. I have definitely seen less in the clearance section when shopping in the afternoon. On the shopping trip where I scored all the meat after Christmas, it was about 10 a.m., which is probably the ideal time at my particular grocery store.

Historically, I have been able to get great meat deals the week after major holidays like Thanksgiving and Christmas. I suspect this is because we are buying turkey, ham, and other holiday trimmings and not our usual everyday groceries.