First, it was the bacon, egg, and cheese. Now, the price of New York City’s beloved chopped cheese could be next to rise.
Average per pound ground beef prices across the United States rose to a record high of $6.12 as of June 2025, and steaks now cost $11.49 a pound, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Both are nearly a dollar more expensive than they were last June. Beef and veal prices jumped 10% year over year as of the same month.
Places like East Harlem’s Blue Sky Deli, better known to locals as Hajji’s, could feel the price pain especially hard. The corner store claims to have invented the chopped cheese, and workers behind the grill cook hundreds of the sandwiches daily.
“We’re making chopped cheese every day. We order 400 heroes a day,” said Frankie Frank Ramirez, who’s been working the bodega’s grill for 28 years.
Ramirez estimated employees use about 360 pounds of hamburger meat daily for the uptown staple. If the owners at Blue Sky Deli paid the average price of ground beef for their products, keeping chopped cheeses on the grill would cost $2,203.20 a day.
The price of beef is, in part, dictated by the cattle cycle, according to David Sumner, an agricultural economist at the University of California, Davis. The number of cows in the country fluctuates in cycles of eight or 12 years.
“ When we hit the bottom of the cattle cycle, when it comes to number of cattle, that also means the highest prices,” Sumner said.
While the number of cattle in the United States has been steadily decreasing for decades, agrarian experts in recent years have warned that the country’s cattle herd sits at an especially low point. Data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Cattle Inventory report in January showed that the cattle inventory is at its lowest point since 1951.
“A year ago, beef prices were very high, and I talked to people who said, ‘Well, they certainly can’t go any higher,’” Sumner said. “Well, they were wrong.”
Sumner said fluctuations in the cattle cycle aren’t the only factor that could push beef prices even higher.
The United States imports large quantities of cattle from Mexico, but the federal government this month banned imports from across the border in response to a flesh-eating insect affecting cows in Mexico and Central America.
President Donald Trump has also threatened high tariffs on New Zealand, a major U.S. trading partner for cattle. Beef manufacturers often mix imported and domestic beef for hamburger meat, which could further drive up costs for places like Blue Sky Deli, because of the shop’s reliance on hamburger meat for its sandwiches.
Despite the pressure inflicted by those factors, Sumner said there are early indications of hope. Fellow economists suggest that ranchers are beginning to build their herds. But the trajectory toward a large cattle inventory and lower prices is long.
“ That means four or five years from now, prices will be well down,” he said. “But what does it mean for the next few months? Nothing really.”
A chopped cheese on a hero at Blue Sky Deli currently costs $8.50, plus tax. As the slow climb of beef prices persists, the price of a beloved New York City cheap eat could balloon at any moment.
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