How Much Is a Half Cow? A Straight Answer From an Iowa Farm
If you have searched "how much is a half cow" and found vague ranges instead of a real number, here it is: a half cow from Mundorf Heritage Beef is $2,350 for about 200 pounds of custom-cut, dry-aged beef, which works out to roughly $11.75 a pound. I am Jeff Mundorf, and my family has raised cattle on this Iowa ground near Red Oak since 1873. Here is the honest breakdown I walk every family through.
What a half cow costs, and what you actually get
A half beef share is $2,350 total, reserved with an $800 deposit that applies to the price. For that you get approximately 200 pounds of finished, take-home beef: steaks, roasts, brisket, stew meat, and more than 100 pounds of ground beef, all custom cut to your kitchen. Every pound is pasture raised, grass fed and grain finished Angus, dry-aged up to 21 days for flavor and tenderness.
The number that matters is the blended price per pound. At about $11.75 a pound, a dry-aged ribeye costs you the same per pound as the ground beef. A share puts premium steaks in your freezer at closer to ground-beef math.
Why the per-pound price beats the grocery store
You are not comparing the same product. Grocery beef is rarely dry-aged, and you cannot see how it was raised. Ours is dry-aged up to 21 days, raised without growth hormones or feed additives, and finished the old way on our own Iowa ground. You are paying a fair price for a genuinely different beef, and locking that price in while the national cattle herd sits near its smallest in decades and grocery prices keep climbing.
How you get it: pickup near Red Oak or shipped frozen
You can pick your half up locally near Red Oak, Iowa, or we ship it frozen, packed to stay cold, to the continental United States. Either way it arrives ready to stock your freezer, and we deliver to the Omaha and Council Bluffs area. A half cow needs roughly 6 cubic feet of freezer space, about a dedicated chest or upright freezer.
How it works, start to finish
Reserve your half with the deposit, and we build your cut sheet together in plain language, so you get every cut you want and none you do not. Your beef is then dry-aged and cut to your specifications, and we let you know when it is ready. If you are weighing sizes, see our guides on how much a quarter cow costs and how much a whole cow costs.
Frequently asked questions
How much does a half cow cost?
A half cow is $2,350 for about 200 pounds of custom-cut, dry-aged beef, roughly $11.75 a pound, reserved with an $800 deposit that applies to the total.
How much meat is in a half cow?
About 200 pounds of finished, take-home beef: steaks, roasts, brisket, stew meat, and over 100 pounds of ground beef. Exact weight varies by animal and your cut choices.
How much freezer space do I need for a half cow?
Roughly 6 cubic feet, about a dedicated chest or upright freezer.
Is the beef grass fed?
Our Angus is pasture raised and grass fed, then grain finished for marbling and flavor, and dry-aged up to 21 days. It is real Iowa beef from our family farm.
Can I pick my own cuts?
Yes. Every share is custom cut. We build the cut sheet with you so you get every cut you want and none you do not.
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About the author. Jeff Mundorf is the fifth generation raising cattle on his family's seventh-generation Iowa farm near Red Oak, founded in 1873. He studied Meat Science and Animal Science at Colorado State University.