Yep. For example, one staple dish of Cajuns is called "rice and gravy." Essentially, you sear thinly cut 7-steaks, remove them, cook down some trinity, then add the steaks back with some water or broth and seasonings. That's it. The steaks simmer in the broth for hours and create their own gravy. We serve it over rice, usually accompanied by some roux peas (tres petit pois cooked in a roux with onions and bacon) and cornbread. Simple, easy, flavorful.

But I live in Texas now, home of all the cattle, if you believe the marketing. And I can't find 7-steaks unless I go to a Mexican meat market, because the DFW area is so bourgeois nowadays that the steaks simply don't pass muster for the local market. Hell, I'm more likely than not to end up in a Mexican market simply because the produce is better and cheaper.

Same with beef shank. Osso bucco is traditionally made with veal shank, and oxtails are all the rage, but I can't find beef shank unless I go to an HEB. Most places don't carry the cut. And if I couldn't find beef shank, I could always go with beef neckbones, but uh... HEB is the only place around me that sells that either.

As someone who’s not American, I’m unclear; is going to a butcher not an option? Have they been competed out of the market by supermarkets?

from a google search: "A 7 bone steak is a cut of beef from the chuck section of a cow's front shoulder, which is considered a tough area of the animal.". You're not going to find that in a regular grocery store because not many people will buy it. You will find every other cut of beef, pork, and poultry considered edible though.

You can go to a butcher but they're less common than a regular grocery store. Also, butchers usually have less selection since they're a smaller operation.

EDIT: i live in Dallas, Texas and "HEB" is just another brand of grocery store so "having to go to HEB" just means having to go to the grocery store.

In most places I've lived, including Seattle, butchers typically buy the whole animal. They move smaller quantities but every possible cut of meat is available, you just have to ask. They may run out of a cut, since availability scales with the number animals they butcher and demand is uneven over the entire animal, or you might want something unusual outside the scope of their default breakdown of the animal, but you can always ask them to reserve that part from the next animal and they've always been happy to oblige in my experience.

> Also, butchers usually have less selection since they're a smaller operation.

That’s curious; I’d have thought you’d have more selection since the butcher is, y’know, doing the butchering, so any cut is possible. In the past if I’ve needed an “exotic” cut, the butcher would be where I’d go.

Boston here. Market Basket always has 7bone, Costco never does.

Different stores, different clientele.

lol Dallas is the only major city in Texas where "going to the store" doesn't almost always means HEB, too

also, complaining that you can't find Thing unless you go to a Mexican meat market is a weird way to boast that your area has specialty grocery stores.

Yes, exactly. Because when I want to talk about food issues, I "boast" by talking about the scarcity of what is perceived to be a lower quality cut of meat near my location, and how I'm driving to find a shop in a poorer neighborhood to meet my food demands. You nailed it, champ.

I didn't take what they were saying as a slight.

HEB "just another grocery store". Hoo Lordy, better not say that in the South! HEB is ultimately a corporation, but as far as corporate ethics exist, they're a good place and the stores are great.

I don't have many butchers within 30 miles, and their selection is almost always a subset of what I can get at the larger grocers.

The selection they have pre-cut and on display is a subset.

But unlike a supermarket, you can just ask a local butcher to save you some of whatever off-cut the next time they're trimming it. Normally they'd just throw it away.

And you can explicitly request that they some particular cut in for you and they'll oblige. Might take a few days.

That might be possible in some supermarkets.

> That might be possible in some supermarkets.

Yeah, I was going to say, it's worth asking.

Butchers are less common than supermarkets, and generally more expensive, but most places have them.

There are butchers in the supermarkets (at least the one I go to)

Walmart is 25% of grocery sales in the US and they only have pre-packaged meat because 22 years ago, some butchers tried to unionized.

I won't buy meat at Walmart. The couple times I have, it looks great in the package, but when you open it, half the weight is a big fat cap on the bottom. I've seen it happen several times. It's often cuts that should go to a grinder or other use, but not fit for use as a steak.

I avoid fresh produce at Walmart as well, mostly in that the selection usually kind of sucks. There are more and better options around. As to Butchers, there isn't really a dedicated one near me, have to drive halfway across town. But a local grocery chain does have Butchers, but special cuts usually take a few days to get in.

> cook down some trinity

I've never heard that term; does it refer to mirepoix?

Close. It substitutes green pepper for the carrots. It serves pretty much the same culinary purpose as mirepoix.

Yes. “Holy trinity” locally.

Are 7 steaks the same as hamburger steaks? e: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/7-bone_roast

I guess I’ll know now what it means to miss New Orleans when I leave. And here I was worrying about not being able to find collards and turkey necks.

Yeah, that's a 7 steak. I guess most people sorta see it as a trash cut, but it's got enough fat in the spaces between muscles that it ends up being a nice gravy. Collards and turkey necks are not hard to find out here. Just don't ever expect to find any good hoghead cheese. I tried some Boar's Head recently and that reminded me of the 1970s era images of stuff suspended in aspic.

I have looked a few times in Walmarts and not found duck breast, which is something I eat in Australia once every 2-4 weeks. And also noticed particular cuts of beef that I'd expect are missing. I have been to the US 10+ times, usually 1-9 week roadtrips, and can't remember ever noticing an independent butcher (though sometimes there is an equivalent within a non-Walmart grocery store).

Duck just isn't commonly eaten in the US. You probably won't find it at butchers either.

Independent butchers aren't all that uncommon. Though, for example, my town has 3-4 grocers that sell meat without having a counter (but I expect you could talk to the butcher at a couple of them), a grocer that does have a counter, and then a couple of independent butchers.

Duck probably isn't eaten here all that much, but at my local supermarket there'd be breasts, Peking Duck flavoured breasts, confit legs, and another Peking Duck kit.

In that not-overly-large shopping complex, there are two supermarkets (one of which has loads of European smallgoods, like 40+ types of cheese) and also: independent greengrocer, butcher, fishmonger, bulk grains store, bakery chain, etc. Used to be a poultry-specialist butcher too. Most shopping centres I can think of here will have an independent butcher, plus more separately outside those. There'd be dozens of butchers in a city of about 1 million.

My (relatively large in area) county has about 35000 residents.

Your best bet for duck related products in the US is probably either an upscale grocery store or an Asian grocer like HMart. They tend to carry a lot of meat and offal products that most groceries in the US don't normally carry.

If it weren’t for HEB (CM) and La Michoicana the earth would be a food desert.

https://www.lamichoacanameatmarket.com/en/our-company/

I think we’re backsliding on choice, if anything.

It gets even worse if you look at packaged stuff. “Look, twelve brands of coffee!” but actually it’s three because some of them are owned by the others, or by the same parent company.

Do those twelve brands taste different from one another?