“The price for this cut today is—”
A great hustling for seats and advantageous positions, whipping out of note-books and pencils, then respectful silence.
Deftly one helper cut and sawed while the butcher held up cut after cut and explained their food values and their prices. Invariably he said: “The price for this cut to-day is—” showing the variability of the market.
Mrs. Larry listened almost breathlessly, glancing now and then at the oblong diagram of a side of beef furnished by Mr. Richard Webber, the dealer who had arranged the demonstration. The different sections of the beef were colored like states on a map.
“This, ladies, is the chuck steak at sixteen cents a pound.”
Mrs. Larry looked at it with disapproving eyes. That would not do for Larry. He must have the best and most nutritious beef.
“Just as tender if properly cooked and just as nourishing as sirloin,” announced the butcher. “But it lacks a certain flavor which both sirloin and porterhouse have.”
He was handling more familiar cuts now.
“First and second ribs, twenty-four cents a pound because they are most in demand. But I consider the second cut, third, fourth and fifth ribs just as good at twenty-two cents a pound. The seventh and eighth ribs, known as the blade, have a fine flavor and are more economical at eighteen cents. Use the bones and blade for soup—and have the rest rolled and skewered.”
Mrs. Larry nibbled her pencil and frowned. A difference of six cents a pound between the first cut and the last—and she had never asked her butcher which rib it was. Last Sunday’s roast had cost twenty-six cents a pound, and she had not known whether that was the right price on beef or not.