How cost effective is it buying the beef fat and doing the process?
I've never done tallow, but done plenty of other DIY projects. I know sometimes it can be great and either save some real cash or get a much higher quality product. Other times it is more of a novelty the amount of effort you put in just isn't really worth it to do regularly. Just curious as to your thoughts where tallow stands on the time-money-quality scales.
Yes, 100% worth the effort. We cook almost exclusively with animal fats and use them for our soaps and body butters/sunscreens/lip balms. Store bought or even Farmer's Market tallow is ridiculously expensive. DIY nose to tail/rooter to the tooter is the way to go if you're comfortable processing and butchering animals.
The nutritional profile for beef tallow is phenomenal. And, by virtue of using pastured domestic pigs, the lard is laden with Vitamin D. I have a rancher who raises a variety of gorgeous breeds that I use for the beef fat. I have another farmer for the pasture raised piggies. Wild pigs comparatively are way too lean to bother with, fat wise.
I honestly cannot tell you how much they charge me per pound. I buy 10-20 lbs at a time and deep freeze it. Will pull out batches to render when the larder is running low and place another order when the freezer stocks dwindle. The beef fat is obviously more expensive than the pork fat and the beef leaf fat is more expensive than the regular beef fat. I usually buy 2 or 3 times a year. I use the non leaf beef fat for our cooking tallow and deer sausage. Leaf fat for the body products. Piggie fat for soap and lard.
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