Meating Place

I love Lorigos — they carry meats that are either hard to find or otherwise extremely expensive elsewhere like duck, oxtail, cow tongue and ground lamb.
Their steak isn’t first quality — do not go here to buy cuts of steak, you will not have a good time eating it. The rest of the beef selection is excellent, every permutation of chuck roast, skirt steak in massive sheets, ground beef, brisket, shanks, etc…
Since this place is a real butcher they can and will cut and grind your meat for you if they don’t only carry it frozen. The prices here are the best in Buffalo, especially on chicken. Oxtail is in general expensive these days but their price is competitive.
If you are used to Wegman’s and everybody speaking English and not having to wait forever at times this place is not for you. Its not meant to be a fancy place but don’t let that scare you away, the owner, his family and their employees are nice and helpful. You get amazing deals here and can cut your grocery bill for meat.
Note: Finding the end of the butcher counter line can be confusing if its busy, there are no tickets so just ask somebody in line and they’ll tell you were the end is. Also, space is extremely tight as well between the tall rows of shelves, the aisles are narrow.

I agree that you get great service and quality meats, plus good deals on the frozen desserts and deli items as well. We particularly love the blade roasts. So big yet twice the size you get at Tops. For about the same as Tops charges for a small one. Vinny and his staff will take great care of you.
Don’t want to wait in long lines, get there in the morning, before it gets too busy. we go on Saturday early and have no Issue. Just be patient and you can maneuver around the aisles. If the street spaces are full, there is a municipal lot across the street.
We have been regular customers for years and see no reason to change now. Give them a try. I doubt you will regret it. You likely will become a regular as well.

The physical structure is a challenge to navigate (narrow aisles, slow traffic pattern).
Everything else is fabulous. We get our meats here because we like the local flavor and can walk to it. The staff is really sweet and endearing. I’m not currently a meat expert and I want to be one so I always try to ask a general meat question — I get a thorough and clear answer every time. Moving forward, I’m going to try to *retain* that information!
We’ve gotten everything from standard strip steaks to whole tenderloins here. Always a good piece of meat at a great price.
The 5pm close is serious. And they’re butchers so I wouldn’t gamble with it.

This review is long overdue. I love this place! So why only 4 stars? Let’s start with that: the aisles are narrow and if there are more than a few people in the place, it can be a little annoying to navigate. Also, if it is even semi-​busy, the checking out process can take forever. (There is only one register.) It is a butcher shop so the overpowering scent of raw meat doesn’t exactly make any extended stay more pleasant. But I guess that last point is a personal preference.
HOWEVER: this place has THE most pleasant and helpful staff you could possibly desire in any shopping experience. The butcher counter is amazing. If you have no clue what you are doing/​how to buy what you need, they will happily educate you. The selection is vast, the prices are fare, and you can get anything you want in the quantity of your choice cut exactly the way you want it. I have never been disappointed with the freshness or quality either. I simply don’t buy meat anywhere else since discovering this gem.

The Meating Place («meat,» get it? ha ha) may have started as a butcher shop and deli, but now it’s more of a neighborhood grocery/​restaurant supply place. The store is not supermarket-​sized, but they pack a LOT into a small space with narrow aisles and goods stacked halfway to the ceiling.
There is a pretty complete produce section (generally fresh and well priced) and an extensive selection of frozen foods – many in commercial sizes, so they’re a bargain. Pizza dough, fish fillets, chicken nuggets, poppers, etc. are to be found in abundance along with frozen veggies and fruits.
Bulk nuts, crackers, candies, and more are available nearby, along with canned goods with a a roughly Italian slant. All the staple baking and cooking goods are available – again, at better prices than you’re likely to find elsewhere (especially in the neighborhood).
At the deli/​butcher counter, there’s everything you could want. As a vegetarian, this is not where I spend a lot of time (nor am I especially qualified to review it), but my pretty-​picky omnivore husband has tried a wide variety of their products and felt the quality was very good and the price quite low.
If you have a sweet tooth, don’t miss the frozen dessert case. The Meating Place has a HUGE selection of cakes, cheesecakes, pies, and more – all at shockingly low prices (and usually buy one, get one). The ice cream selection is also good, and they offer ice cream cakes that look great. Again, prices are low.
My caveats are that the store is often hard to navigate and there is only one cash register. At peak hours, you’ll definitely wait in line. Also, there are no carts, just hand baskets.

There’s a classic American dish called «Pot Roast» or «Yankee Pot Roast.» It is a slow roasted piece of beef, usually a cut of chuck that is cooked with vegetables such as carrots, potatoes, onions, sometimes celery or parsnips. If you go to Tops, Wegmans, Dash’s, Budwey’s, etc. the only chuck roast you’ll find is boneless.
Bones are flavor baby and don’t let anybody ever tell you any different. The Meating Place sells what’s called a «seven» bone chuck roast, (which Vinny will cut to any thickness) not because there are seven bones in it, because there is a bone in it that is shaped like the number seven.
If you slow roast this piece of meat in a Dutch oven or a covered roasting pan at 300 degrees for three and one half to four hours with some cooking liquid like beef or chicken broth, some wine, any drinkable red will do, a few cloves of garlic and some vegetables, you will end up with one of the best beef dinners of your lifetime, I PROMISE!
A little fresh horseradish on the side, a simply dressed salad and a glass of red… Fuggedaboutit!
They also have the sharpest provolone cheese this side of Casilli, for those of you who are fortunate enough to know about such matters.

The Meating Place has a great selection of meat and great prices, and is certainly one of the best butchers in Buffalo. That said, shopping here is not without it’s challenges. Long slow lines are par for the course here, and the 5 PM close is no joke — I got there once at 5 minutes to 5 and the kid barring the door projected an attitude that made me feel like an underage kid standing in front of a bouncer who isn’t letting me in all over again.
That said, the Meating Place wins in the end — I live in the neighborhood so avoiding the place with the best prices and selection because it’s not giving me the disney wow factor everytime i go in feels like cutting off my nose to spite my face. If you’re on the West Side, the Meating Place is worth checking out.

The Meating Place definitely has very cheap packaged, preservative-​laden items. If you are in the market for packaged cheesecake or granola bars you are set here. I am not usually looking for these things, but rather end up with them anyway if I go to The Meating Place… They have any meat you need, but the butchers are kind of grumbly. It’s always kind of dirty in there, and I guess that they don’t feel the need to put up a front of sterility but it doesn’t really make for a pleasant shopping experience.
Even though it’s not a FUN shopping experience, and they have unimpressive produce, they do have good prices on some stuff.
I really can’t go there that often, at least Guercio’s is open for a LITTLE while after I get home from work. They close at 5pm on the dot.
It’s easy to forget about them with so many more accessible grocery spots around but when I do go, I usually leave thinking I should go there more often so I’ll say they’re A-​ok by me.

Perfect place to find any meat you are looking for! They even had a hard to find Italian pancetta I needed for a holiday dish.
Their selection, prices and quality are all top notch.
As a butcher they are exactly what I was looking for. My mom now does all of our meat shopping at the meating place.
As a grocery store… It is small, not much selection, and the produce isn’t always as fresh as one might hope.
I’d recommend guercios for produce and the meating place for meat/​cheese.
Even when they are busy the service is quick and efficient.

For a long time, I was the kind of tender-​hearted vegetarian who’d squint her eyes closed when she passed the meat section. After spending a year among the unsentimental carnivores of Asia, I’ve unlearned my herbivorous ways, and am now, belatedly, re-​learning my way around the world of meat.
The Meating Place is to a meat newcomer like me what the Museum of Natural History might be to a budding biologist.
Though it’s jumbled and messy around the edges, with shelves piled high with other grocery items like gallon-​size salad dressings and 2−4−1 cakes, the meat counter here has everything beautifully laid out and labeled. And we’re not just talking steaks and pork chops here: there’s goat meat cut to Thai food specifications, tripe, tongues. There’s also an array of international accoutrements you might not find at your typical suburban grocery, like queso blanco in the cheese case and tamarind in the fridge.
As Guercio’s, with its gorgeous produce, is just down the street, I’d recommend buying my fruits and veggies there before venturing over to the Meating Place, located on the other side of Westside Stories. It’s much better. And if you’re looking for sustainably-​raised, grass-​fed whatever, I’d feel much safer buying from the farmer’s market in summer, the Lexington Co-​op or Five Points Bakery (which also sells organ meats and other unusual stuff, from local farmers). But if you’re recreating an authentic Jamaican recipe from scratch, looking to stock up on half-​price steaks for a BBQ, or just learning your way around a real meat counter for the first time, the Meating Place is a great starting point.

OK! I admit that I’ve been putting off writing about The Meating Place because I wanted to keep the place a secret. But my conscious got to me after talking to Marco. You’re probably wondering «Who the hell is Marco?» He’s my Jack Russell and foodie wannabe; he not only likes the cheap marrow bones ($ 1.69 lb and cut to order to accommodate his small jaws) at Meating Place but all the decadent dessert goods there too. The cuts of meat here are delish and more competitively priced than Wegmans. The butchers here are friendly and there is a tight community vibe here that’s easily recognizable when you observe the butchers interact with their regulars.
You want to make Korean Kalbie BBQ at home? Ask the butcher to cut the short ribs «hotel style» here and you will easily save yourself over $ 40 with DIY Korean BBQ.
But honestly I go here for the desserts most of the time. Yes… even Vegans and people not looking for meat can find some good deals here.
The shop seems to be an outlet for overstocked Rich’s dessert goods because there is a rotating stock of cheesecakes, muffins, cakes, cookie dough, ice cream cakes etc. My favorite score has been organic, vegan, gluten– free chocolate cupcakes from a small bakery that works through Rich’s regional distributors (4 for a $ 1). Yes you read that right… $ 1! Needless to say it was a very affordable item to bring to a potluck. There are often two for one specials on desserts and meats too. Even without the two for one deals, you can score a Jon Donaire caramel turtle cheesecake for $ 2.99. Or Rich’s frozen pies for $ 3.99 before the 2 for 1 deal. Last week I got Mrs. Fields chocolate chip cookie dough desserts for $ 1. Looking for gourmet sandwich wraps? They sell massive sized spinach and sundried tomato tortillas for $ 3.99. Wraps half the size sell for the same price at Wegmans. The closeout sales they score vary and offered sporadically; I once got a ton of Muir Glen Organic canned soups for 50 cents each. It’s kind of like Marshalls… if you see something you like grab a few because it may not be there during your next few visits.
But please… don’t share this gem of a place with blabbermouths since it can get crowded here during the afternoon. Time your visit though since they close at 5 pm.

BTW for those lacking planning skills, you can run all of your food errands at once while on this 2 block stretch of Grant: grab a beverage at Sweetness 7 and then get your grocery shopping done at the Meating Place and Guercio and Sons.

Not for everyone, but awesome to me. Lots of 2 for 1 on frozen stuff, good prices, and meat done right. Why not for everybody? It’s just got a lot of personality. You can’t make it your one stop shop if you need some particular things, but you will find something that you didn’t know you wanted every time, too. They also sell video games, for some reason.

My absolute favorite market. The meat, which can be cut to order, is by far the best in Buffalo. I’ve never had a tough or bad piece of meat from The Meating Place in the 10 years that I have shopped there. The owners and staff are fantastic. After a few visits, they know you by name and never fail to say hello. The prices are unbelievable. The deli counter is filled with delicious and low cost lunch meats of every type. When was the last time you bought a lunch meat for $ 1.00 per pound? And, it’s sliced fresh when you order it! Many, many buy 1 get one free deals including frozen steaks. The rib eyes are to die for. Spices, produce, ethnic foods, desserts and so much more. The store is small and it can get crowded so, go early in the morning and you’ll definitely NOT be disappointed.

My butcher. The Meating place is an actual, honest to goodness butcher shop. Want a steak cut to order? No problem. Want your chicken quartered for no cost? Sure. Want them to cut up some beef bones to distract your dog next time you have a party? They’ll fire up the saw. Ask for a chuck roast & they’ll ask if you’re making a pot roast and let you know their favorite recipe. They’ll do it all with a smile and they’ll be genuinely happy to see you the next time you walk in.
They do have a lot of non-​fresh-​meat stuff but I tend to ignore it. But if you’re looking for frozen pies or something you can get them here too.
But meat! Lets talk about meat! Beef and pork and chicken and goat! Good prices, good quality meat (sadly you aren’t going to find organic/​sustainably raised here, but I find it to be much tastier than whats offered at Wegmans or Tops). They seem to be making an effort to draw in the area’s migrant/​refugee community, offering goat & other meats that I wouldn’t have expected to see hear just a few years ago.
The bad: lines. The place gets crowded — I’m fine with that — its a fun atmosphere. But the lines sometimes drive me nuts. They’ve got one register & it doesn’t always move quickly. Try to avoid weekends & it shouldn’t be too bad.