NYC bars, delis dealing with sky-high corned beef prices ahead of St. Patrick’s Day

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Erin go broke! 

This year’s inflated price of the beloved St. Patrick’s Day staple corned beef is making New Yorkers’ wallets bleed green — and is so expensive one supplier named after the product is no longer selling it.

“These guys couldn’t hack it because of the pricing,” Joe DiGangi, owner of Queens’ Mario’s Meats and Deli, said of his former vendor Mosey’s Corned Beef. “Not everyone does it anymore because of the pricing.”

The bloated brisket price has risen 8.7% in the past year. The cost is so high that the Middle Village deli’s single-serving platter of corned beef and cabbage has surged from $9.99 to $16 in five years, said DiGangi — who found a new vendor in the nick of time this year.

“The price of everything has risen slowly after COVID – it went up, and it didn’t go back down,” he lamented. “Every year it keeps going up. It wasn’t drastic this year, but some companies went out of business.”

Staffers at Mulligan’s Irish Pub in Murray Hill told The Post the watering hole also increased its prices in January on various meat dishes — from chicken to steak to fish — to reflect inflation.

Similarly, Midtown’s Connolly’s Pub raised its menu prices about 5% across the board at the beginning of the year, including the corned beef.

“The cost of everything’s gone up, it’s not just beef,” Connolly’s Pub general manager Ardell Reilly said. “Beef is on par with everything else, there’s been significant increases in the cost of all produce over the past year — from chicken to beef to fish to vegetables.”

“Egg prices and chicken wing [prices] went up, but I think it’s got something to do with the bird flu,” added Long Acre Tavern manager Aaron Mackin.

Uncooked beef roasts, including corned beef, are at an all-time high this year ahead of St. Patrick’s Day, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics – with the average pound costing customers about $7.99 as of last month.

That’s compared to $7.35 per pound the same time last year and $5.53 per pound in 2020 – a whopping 8.7% and 44% increase, respectively.

By comparison, the price of chicken breast and potatoes per pound has gone down by about .6% and 1.4% over the last year, according to federal data, while the price of eggs has risen by 96.8%.

High grain prices, droughts and a dwindling domestic cattle inventory have all contributed to record-high beef prices, according to a NerdWallet report – which projects even higher prices amid tighter supplies and high demand — and some restauranteurs told The Post that Manhattan congestion pricing has only added insult to injury. 

“Since congestion pricing went in, it’s affecting delivery trucks, so I’m sure after the first quarter there will be another cost increase,” Reilly said. “I’m sure we’ll see prices go up again in April or May.”

Depending on the time of year, restaurant food distributor Baldor Specialty Foods expects to pay anywhere from $500 to $1,000 a day in tolls, Seth Gottlieb, senior vice president of logistics for Baldor previously told The Post.

The cost of meat has soared so much that the owner of Avenue A Deli, who declined to provide his name to The Post, said his own customers are buying less.

 “We’re getting fewer customers, and the ones that come buy less. Everything is going out of their reach,” he said. “Everything has gone up. Cookies, candy, beer. Beer has gone up three percent.” 

In response to declining sales, “we buy less meat.” 

But in the world’s borough, DiGangi reported an uptick in orders – about 200 this year – of his signature corned beef and cabbage platter.

The owner speculated that more customers are willing to pay a premium for convenience given  mass return-to-office mandates and a decline in the work-from-home workforce.

“It just makes people’s lives easy, now that husbands and wives both work … it helps keep the traditions going,” he said – adding that another tradition could be at stake if soaring food prices don’t come down in time.

“We make Italian meat pies, we get Italian sweets … anything with eggs is through the roof right now,” he said.

“If these egg prices don’t go down by Easter, it’s going to be rough.”