UNL animal science students process meat for sale

Some students at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln really could have a problem with their dogs eating their homework.
From freshmen to seniors, students in UNL's animal science department can participate in preparing and processing meat to be sold at UNL's Meat Sales Store on 38th and Fair streets.
"We have the ability to go through the harvest of the animals, the killing (and) the cutting of the carcasses … that are frozen and packaged for sale," said Dennis Burson, an animal science professor at UNL. "Just about everything that happens in the meat laboratory we have student involvement with."
Burson estimated UNL has been selling meat since at least the 1950s. The current sales are out of Loeffel Meat Laboratory Monday through Friday afternoons, though construction on the animal science building is temporarily limiting the store from being fully functional.
The Meat Sales Store has beef, pork, lamb, some poultry, sausage, cured and smoked ham and bacon and fresh bulk eggs, nearly all of which come from livestock on UNL farms.
And everything on the counter was either used for teaching or research.
"The product that we sell is basically a byproduct of the activities we do here in the animal science department," Burson said. "We don't feel like we're in the business to try to produce a product and try to compete with people in outside stores."
The Meat Sales Store has only as much meat in stock as the assignments and research has required.
Animal science students learn about everything from how to make different cuts on a carcass – with the help of a 3D bovine anatomy video communication information technologist Vishal Singh and animal science professor Steve Jones created – to how to evaluate the meat.
"Mainly the students learn how to grade and learn about what makes one carcass better than the other," said Calvin Schrock, the meat lab manager.
Some of those criteria, Schrock said, include how much fat and muscle is in the meat.
In addition to the students who make the products, eight to 10 students work at the Meat Sales Store part-time. The store is open to UNL students and employees as well as the general public, though Schrock and Burson said most of the Meat Sales Store's customers are regulars, some of whom return because they say the dry-aged meat taste better than the vacuum bag-aged meat in chain stores.
"Customers have said they prefer our steaks because of that," Burson said.
andreavasquez@dailynebraskan.com