Stumbled on a stat about dry-aging losses that blew my mind

I was reading through some USDA meat science papers last weekend and found out that dry-aging can lose up to 20% of the original weight just from moisture evaporation over 30 days. That means for every 100 pounds of primal cut, you're basically throwing 20 pounds in the air. I work at a shop in Denver that dry-ages prime rib for events, and I never realized how much we're actually losing until I did the math on our last batch. Has anyone here tracked their actual yield numbers and found ways to minimize the waste?

2 comments

2 Comments

josephl671mo ago

I read in a food science blog that some places are vacuum-sealing after a shorter aging period to cut down on that moisture loss. Might be worth testing on a small batch.

vera_campbell1mo ago

My 3-week aged ribeyes came out looking like beef jerky last time, so I might just try vacuum-sealing at 2 weeks and call it a day. At this rate, my short aging experiment is gonna end up with me eating shoe leather or something that tastes like a science fair project. If it works, great, if not, I can always tell people it's "artisanal dried beef" and charge double.