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Made a meatloaf last night with lean hamburger. No other fat added drained off so much fat after cooking the loaf.  
I thought lean shouldn't have that much fat. Drained off 3/4 of a soup can full.

I poured an amazing amount of fat off my meatloaf last night. I get enough off the extra lean hamburger but this lean meat was unreal

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are we allowed to mention what store it was from? I bought lean hamburger from sobeys and it had a lot of fat drain off.

I can't send you a message? Don't know if I am doing something wrong

If you are buying lean,or extra lean, and are having to drain fat off of it, you would be saving money by buying regular grind and treat it accordinly. I don''t think something would tick me off more than paying a high price for something like lean hamburger then having to drain a whole bunch of fat off it. There are limits to the amount of fat that is allowed in the different grinds, but don''t know if anyone enforces those levels.  
 
Edited by don brown, 2017-06-26 20:48:03

Call or text me I have hamburger for sale.

They also add water when making hamburger so when cooking the water mixes with the fat it looks like a lot of fat

I know a few things about meat depts.... lean isn't always lean..... to make sure they "stretch out" the lean ground beef they do have.... they will add regular ground beef to lean..... on like a 3/1 ratio...... 3 tubes lean to 1 tube regular.... so technically Aren't getting "lean" ground beef but more of a "medium" but still paying the lean price.... and it doesn't just happen when it's on sale...... same thing goes for extra lean.... just add lean to extra lean to stretch it out

I am always looking for hamburger, steak, and ribs if anyone is selling beef. Store beef always seems so expensive and not always as good as it looks in the package.

Their lean ground beef is excellent. Worth the short drive and priced reasonably.

Well, extra lean can have up to 10% fat by raw weight, and lean can have up to 17%. That's almost 1/5 of the meat in lean is actually fat. So depending on the size of your meatloaf, say you used 2 lbs of meat (or about 900 g) it's not unrealistic to pour off 1/2 to 3/4 of a cup of fat as it should have roughly 150 g of fat in the raw product that you could render out.  
 
Also, it probably wasn't 100% fat. There is almost always water mixed in that's released as it's cooked, the sooner your pour it off (i.e. before allowing sufficient resting time), the more water it will be.  
 
Regular beef, by contrast, has up to 30% fat by weight. A meatloaf made with 900g of regular beef will render out roughly 270g of fat, or roughly 1 1/3 cups of fat.  
 
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/health-and-fitness/health/does-cooking-ground-beef-reduce-its-fat-content/article29941268/

Shyguy81 said "I know a few things about meat depts.... lean isn't always lean..... to make sure they "stretch out" the lean ground beef they do have.... they will add regular ground beef to lean..... on like a 3/1 ratio...... 3 tubes lean to 1 tube regular.... so technically Aren't getting "lean" ground beef but more of a "medium" but still paying the lean price.... and it doesn't just happen when it's on sale...... same thing goes for extra lean.... just add lean to extra lean to stretch it out "

They are allowed to sell the product "up to" a certain percentage as long as they don't surpass it. So their lean beef could often be in the 12-15 % range, but they are allowed to go up to 17%. If they surpass 17% on lean, for example, they are breaking the rules set out by the federal government and could be fined. The meat industry is highly regulated and I somehow have some doubts that they would intentionally break the rules.  
 
The categories are actually a range - lean is over 10%, but no more than 17%. That's a huge margin. But anything within that range is fair game!

Not naming stores..... but they break rules......

AnnaBanana said "Their lean ground beef is excellent. Worth the short drive and priced reasonably. "

Lean ground meat from Henry's meat is excellent, "no fat to drain off at all"