How long to age beef or lamb fat in fridge?

[Grey-Cup]

I noticed closing in on a week that the beef suet I have starts to have a pleasant cheesy aroma and taste improves. This is just a regular fridge at 4c, not a dry aging setup. How long could I "age" this for until it starts to go "bad"?

[van]

beef suet is different from beef fat,, as It's lower in water content and higher in saturated fat, thus less prone to oxidation or going rancid.  But your taste should guide you.  I personally don't enjoy eating suet, so I don't have any guidance to offer other than to take notice.  I'm a little fanatic with not eating rancid fats.  I will often trim off the exposed outside to get to fresher fat inside. 

[Grey-Cup]

Thanks Van! If a fat is rancid can it still smell cheesy or will it have a distinct bad odour and off taste?

[van]

I  don't know about the cheesy smell.       Hard to describe rancid fat.  Best to have what you know for sure is fresh, and then start comparing it.   For me, there is a definite energy loss when the fat is old.  My guess is that all animals killed in the wild, but other animals or humans,, the fat was eaten first.  This whole 'pemican' revelation to me is nothing but a way for people to survive in the winter months, and has little to do with optimum health,, as regards ingesting rancid fats.

[thehadezb]

As far as you like the taste. Cheesy smell comes from rancidity. Humans are appealed to cheese smell, so probably isn't something bad.
Humans digest fermented and aged meats better. That's something I've noticed from personal experience and testimonies here. Esmikos fed their dogs fermented fish because if they give them fresh they were with no energy and fish fat goes rancid very rapidly.

[van]

you're mixing or confusing fermented or aged meats and fish proteins with rancid fats.  Just because a sled dog may get better energy out of fermented fish proteins, doesn't mean it's going to pay the price in it's latter years for having ingested rancid fats. Same applies to humans.    Take a sip of rancid cod liver oil, and a sip of fresh, or for that matter any rancid oil or fat, and then tell me you prefer the rancid over the fresh.  What is happening is the fermented proteins are masking the rancid taste of the fat.

[thehadezb]

We don't know. Rancidity in the context of a rendered fat may be different from a raw fat. At the end, the fats are oxidized in our body, aren't they? I prefer to trust anthropology and animal behavior. If the fat doesn't taste good to me, I don't eat it.

[van]

and that's why I put the time in to suggest to others here to develop a fine taste for fat.  Way too easy to overlook, especially when some have a hard time finding good quality fresh fat, and tend to settle for what they have. 

[Grey-Cup]

Good conversation. I am enjoying the fat and meat with some age on them. Both are in a fridge at 3c, so neither are fermenting. But, some of the fat from certain sources tastes better fresh, others taste better with a week of age. I will continue to experiment. I do find the fat must be a large solid block with no aeration as a  mishmash of suet pieces fails as it dries out, where as a large block of fat is aging quite nicely.

[Canis]

I had fresh grass fed beef fat vacuum sealed in my fridge for 2 months, when I opened up it had a funky smell to it but it was not off putting.  I ate it with no problems.  I have never been a big fan of eating raw fat, but I feel good when I get done eating it so I guess that is all that matters.

[van]

must have been suet, as back fat would have turned green and not been good to eat