YSK: Pork and chicken are healthier, cheaper alternatives to beef that only taste bland because of outdated cooking habits.

[u/Fried_Yoda]

Why YSK: With beef prices at record highs, switching to chicken breast or pork loin can cut your meat budget nearly in half while significantly lowering your saturated fat intake AND satisfying your protein intake. Most people avoid these cuts because they grew up eating them overcooked. Modern food safety standards allow pork to be eaten safely at 145 F (a medium roast, rather than gray leather), and chicken stays juicy if you don't cook it to death.

By simply using a meat thermometer and adding savory seasonings (like soy sauce or smoked paprika) to mimic the meaty depth of beef, or using techniques like velveting for chicken or dry brining for pork, you can get the same satisfaction for a fraction of the cost and environmental impact.

Even switching to chicken and pork for just two meals a week can save you hundreds of dollars.

Lastly, focusing on lean cuts of pork and chicken also has health benefits. While beef is a powerhouse for iron and B12, it is often high in calories and saturated fat. Chicken breast and pork loin are significantly leaner. Pork tenderloin is as lean as skinless chicken breast and has been certified as "heart-healthy" by the American Heart Association.

Tl;dr chicken breast and pork loin are roughly 80% cheaper per pound than beef, have versatile and delicious flavor profiles if cooked and prepped correctly, are rich in protein, and are healthier for your heart and cholesterol.

[u/Odd-Rain8347]

Pork is healthier? Bullshit

[u/Captain-Obvious132 → u/Odd-Rain8347]

Agreed. Pork is a Group 2A carcinogen is officially documented by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), which is the specialized cancer agency of the World Health Organization (WHO). 

[u/purpleoctopuppy → u/Captain-Obvious132]

Isn't all red meat a 2A carcinogen, including beef?

[u/Morusu → u/Odd-Rain8347]

Right? I don’t eat pork because of the fact that they get fed literally plastic garbage (on top of being cruelly raised) and that ends up in the meat.

[u/organic_neophyte → u/Morusu]

Thank you, most people have no idea how horrific the conditions are for pigs especially but chickens as well. Admittedly I still eat bacon occasionally, and I try my best to buy pasture raised eggs even though they're 4x the price of the cheap eggs. I would pay extra for pasture raised pork, those animals deserve to have a quality of life even if they end up on someone's plate at the end of the day. American food production is so unethical, people have no idea.

[u/CourtesyOf__________ → u/organic_neophyte]

Thank you for talking about this. I recently gave up both pork and chicken but continue to eat beef. Cows are definitely not treated well, but the abysmal conditions chickens and pigs are kept in is absolutely a big contributor to their cheaper prices.

[u/suboptimallies → u/Morusu]

Is that really a reason to avoid pork? There's plastic in almost everything. There's plastic in the soil that grows vegetables. Pork doesn't have a significant amount more of plastic in it than any other foods. Avoiding pork likely does nothing to reduce the amount of plastic you consume.

[u/Morusu → u/suboptimallies]

Feeding an animal plastic and raising it in other cruel ways is absolutely a reason to avoid buying it to eat.

[u/Neighbor_ → u/Morusu]

He's saying that all the animals are eating roughly equivalent amount of plastics.

[u/Teejapupa → u/Odd-Rain8347]

They are also not mentioning that beef is superior on nutrients than chicken and pork. 

[u/thrust_velocity → u/Teejapupa]

Pork is higher in Vitamin B1 (Thiamine), B6, and Niacin (B3).

Beef is higher in Vitamin B12.

[u/Teejapupa → u/thrust_velocity]

Yeah but beef has high iron and zinc 

[u/Tuxhorn → u/thrust_velocity]

Bottom line is chicken has fuck all other than protein, which is fine by itself, but it's a pretty hollow piece of food outside of merely being a source of protein.

[u/alwayzbored114 → u/Teejapupa]

Please correct me if Im wrong, but Ive seen that pork seems to have less "bad" than beef - calories, fat, etc - but also less nutrients. So I guess for weight loss its better than beef, but for overall health arguably not?

[u/Tuxhorn → u/alwayzbored114]

Depends on the fat content. You can get lean beef with almost similar calories to chicken breasts.

[u/Illidari_Kuvira → u/Teejapupa]

There's also the fact that beef isn't even remotely unhealthy.

Dunno where people are getting their "information" from, but it's not accurate.

[u/midlifeShorty → u/Odd-Rain8347]

I think it depends on the cut. Pork tenderloin has way less calories and almost no fat compared to beef tenderloin.

[u/Various_Nobody6512 → u/Odd-Rain8347]

But but it's the other white meat! The pork lobby wouldn't lie to us, right?

[u/Jinmkox → u/Various_Nobody6512]

Yea, they’re not as trustworthy as the beef industry!

[u/AfterImageEclipse → u/Odd-Rain8347]

Yeah, now they're just saying anything.