James Werrell: Where can we get Trump steaks?

Your boss has just given you that big raise you’ve been hoping for. Time to celebrate!

What better way to mark the happy occasion than to indulge in a thick, juicy Trump steak! One just like those on display near the podium where Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump was holding forth about his victories in the Michigan and Mississippi primaries Tuesday.

There, on a table next to bottles of Trump water and Trump wine and copies of Trump magazine, were the gorgeous steaks, glistening pink with lovely veins of marbled fat. Tell us please, where can we get Trump steaks?

Well, unfortunately you can’t. At least not unless you want one that has been in the freezer since around 2007.

Bloomberg News did a little investigating and found that sales of Trump steaks were discontinued years ago. Sharper Image had marketed the steaks.

Its Classic Collection – two filet mignons, two bone-in rib-eyes and 12 burgers – went for $199.

But sales reportedly were not huge. In fact, they were miserable, so Sharper Image quit offering them in its catalog.

What, then, were those beautiful hunks of meat Trump gestured to at Tuesday’s victory party? According to Bloomberg, they were stand-ins provided by Bush Brothers Provision Co., a fifth-generation family meat purveyor in West Palm Beach, Fla.

A close-up picture of the steaks featured online shows some of the steaks still partially wrapped in cellophane bearing the Bush Brothers label.

The fact that real Trump steaks no longer are available might be disappointing if one is inclined to spend $200 on four steaks and 12 hamburgers in the first place. And that is before factoring in shipping costs.

I have a millennial friend who labels mail-order meat – such as the selections sold by that company in a state that also produces a lot of corn – as “meat for old people.” I’m not sure exactly certain how he concluded that the target customers for mail-order meat are the elderly. The only thing I can think of is that maybe the claims the company makes about the tenderness of the meat suggest you could eat it even if your teeth are soaking in a glass.

The fact is, though, good steaks can be found at the grocery store. And instead of letting someone in a distant Midwestern state pick out your rib-eyes for you, you can choose them from the bin yourself.

Furthermore, the biggest difference between a good steak and a bad steak is how it is seasoned and cooked. An overcooked filet mignon is no better than liver, even if it cost $30.

Nonetheless, there is a certain mystique about dry-aged, ultra-expensive beef steaks. Perhaps that is what Trump hoped to tap into as he swept his arm toward that mouth-watering pile of grade-A prime Tuesday.

But what was the point? Why would he blather on about the success of his steak business when the venture went toes up nearly a decade ago? Why would he go to the trouble of displaying steaks from another company?

It’s not just mystifying. It’s weird.

Unfortunately, these swaggering displays aren’t even medium-rare.

This story was originally published March 11, 2016 at 7:37 AM with the headline "James Werrell: Where can we get Trump steaks?."