I really appreciated this story: “Looking Your Bacon in the Eye: Notes on a Slaughtering Class,” by Jack Lahne on Ethicurian.com.
Some choice words:
“It is easier to disavow knowledge of what goes into slaughter, imagining the process as a black box which mysteriously transforms living animals into consumables. The meat industry caters to this kind of thinking. But by preempting this opportunity to understand and empathize with our food animals we are, I believe, lessening ourselves. As humans we have the ability to empathize with other living beings — it’s what makes slaughter so unpleasant for us — and knowing exactly what an animal goes through, both on the farm and in the slaughterhouse, seems an important factor in the decision to eat meat.”
and
“With a public unwilling to acknowledge the living nature of their food source, the meat industry has been free to institute practices that no compassionate person can countenance.”
Worth the read.
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I’m very pleased to announce this really exciting literary butchery event, which I’ll be co-producing alongside Watershed Communications in Portland, Oregon this November:
NEWS RELEASE
Media Contacts:
Watershed Communications
Jackie Zeider / Jackie@watershedcom.com / 503.827.6564
Michael Phillips / Michael@watershedcom.com /503.827.6564
First Ever Livestock To Piggyback On Wordstock
Two New Culinary Events To Spur Sustainable Farm-To-Fork Conversation Through Literary Arts And Live Butchery Demonstrations
Portland, OR (September 23, 2009) – Watershed Culinary Productions, in collaboration with Camas Davis, food writer and founder of the soon-to-be-launched Portland Meat Collective, is pleased to present the first ever Livestock, an urban conversation designed to explore the literary and literal aspects of killing our dinner. Livestock will be held on two consecutive Wednesdays, November 4th and 11th, from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. at the International Culinary School at the Art Institute of Portland. Tickets are $25 each with $10 from every ticket sold going to Friends of Family Farmers, an organization working to promote and protect socially responsible agriculture in Oregon.
“I wanted to produce an educational experience that brought the discussions happening around food safety and animal welfare to life in a thoughtful, and poetic way,” says Lisa Donoughe, executive producer of Watershed Culinary Productions.
At Livestock Cathy Whims of Nostrana and Adam Sappington of Country Cat Dinnerhouse & Bar will respectfully display their butchery craft as ranchers share their bond to the land, and writers present short stories exploring the food politics and emotions embedded in eating meat. Both evenings of Livestock will include a question and answer session where guests are encouraged to actively participate in the greater debate surrounding our food and where it comes from. The evenings will wrap up with a terroir tasting of a flight of beef or pig from three local farms cooked by the evening’s featured chef, with the purpose of showcasing place and encouraging conversation.
Livestock will emulate Wordstock, an annual festival of books, writers, and storytelling in Portland, Oregon. To date Wordstock has hosted over 550 writers, who have read and performed for nearly 55,000 people at past festivals. “One of the literary developments that excites us most is the growing crossover between the experience of food and the experience of writing,” says Greg Netzer, executive director of Wordstock. “We’re thrilled to partner with Livestock to showcase more of this work in Portland, which is lucky enough to enjoy a very rich culture in both.”
CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS: Local writers, chefs, and other artists are encouraged to submit personal essays of no more than 1200 words for consideration as part of the Livestock. Essays can explore anything from the politics of eating (or not eating) meat to the emotional (or unemotional) context of killing (or not killing) your dinner. Submissions might only explore the chop or the rib, or they might go as deep as the tail or the trotter, but metaphor and style will be prized above technicalities and generalities of any sort. Six finalists will be chosen to read their essays at the event. An honorarium will be offered to each author, along with all the charcuterie they can consume in one evening. To submit please contact Camas Davis by October 12th at: camas.davis@gmail.com
Space is limited so please call (503) 827-6564 between 9:00 a.m. and 5:30 p.m. to reserve your place. Pay by Visa, MasterCard, American Express or cash. Sorry no checks.
Livestock 1: The Butchery of a Cow
What: Country Cat Chef Adam Sappington and Sweet Briar Farms, with readings & butchery demonstration. Chef Sappington will prepare three cuts from three different farms, and guests will be invited to compare and contrast flavors.
When: November 4, 2009 from 6:00 p.m. – 8:00 p.m.
Where: The International Culinary School at the Art Institute of Portland
34 NW 8th Ave
Portland OR 97209
(503) 228-6528
Cost: Tickets are $25 each. Please call (503) 827-6564 to reserve your seat.
Livestock 2: The Butchery of a Pig
What: Nostrana Chef Cathy Whims and Laughing Stock Farm, with readings & butchery demonstration. Chef Whims will prepare a flight of meat and invite guests to compare and contrast flavors.
When: November 11, 2009 from 6:00 p.m. – 8:00 p.m.
Where: The International Culinary School at the Art Institute of Portland
34 NW 8th Ave
Portland OR 97209
(503) 228-6528
Cost: Tickets are $25 each. Please call (503) 827-6564 to reserve your seat.
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ABOUT LIVESTOCK
Livestock was developed by Watershed Culinary Productions as a collaboration with Camas Davis of the Portland Meat Collective (PMC). Sponsors of Livestock 2009 include The Art Institute of Portland, The Country Cat, Nostrana, Laughing Stock Farm, Sweet Briar Farms. Wine will be donated by local wineries.
ABOUT PORTLAND MEAT COLLECTIVE
The Portland Meat Collective brings local meat to local people. It’s a network of Portland citizens who want a cost-effective way to buy meat directly from Oregon’s small ranchers. While PMC is modeled after traditional meat CSAs that are popping up around the country, it is also an up-close-and-personal traveling butchery school. Once PMC procures that whole cow, pig, or lamb, members can take part in master butchery and charcuterie classes with Portland meat masters. They’ll get to decide how they want their animal carved up. They’ll wield knives and bags of curing salts. And they’ll learn what to do with all those specialty cuts once they’re at home in the kitchen. PMC brings a dynamic, local, sustainable approach to buying and eating meat straight to the people.
ABOUT WATERSHED (Formerly LAD communications)
Watershed is a strategic editorial services company specializing in the restaurant, beverage, and hospitality industries. With deep expertise in natural foods, beverages and products, Watershed promotes national brands as well as regional companies with a strong appetite for growth. Watershed’s special expertise is in helping place-based brands (such as farms, ranchers and wineries) take that big leap up to the national scene. Livestock is the autumn event for Watershed Culinary Productions, producers of the Indie Wine Festival.
A package arrived in the mail today. I had sent it to myself from France and it was full of cans of foie gras, and duck pâté, prune liqueur, and rillettes. But during the two weeks I waited for the box to arrive, I most anticipated finally being able to open up the jars of pork pâté that I had made during my last week in France.
Photo by Eugenie Frerichs
As a kind of final test, Kate, Jonathan and I acquired a half pig from the Chapolards for our final days in Gascony. The Chapolards cut it into thirds for us, we loaded the pieces into plastic bags, then into the back of our tiny white car, and headed home. It was cooler that day than it had been for a week or two, but we were still going to be butchering in less-than-ideal conditions (i.e. without temperature regulation) in Kate’s kitchen, so we were all operating under a certain sense of urgency.
While Jonathan worked on the jambon, I set about cutting up the middle third. Without guidance and under pressure to get everything cut up so none of it went bad, I was a little nervous, and while I removed the ribs and the spine without too much trouble, I also shaved a bit too much off of the main roast. I managed to get the little tenderloins out of the carcass still intact and we cooked them up for lunch, placing them between slices of French bread smothered with hot sauce. But since I didn’t have a skin-removing machine, I probably took too much fat off the belly trying to get the skin off with my knife. Actually, I think all the pieces I cut up had a few extra grams of meat from the other parts located next to them: My ribs were all rib and a little coppa. My coppa was missing part of its side. My belly missed its good friend, pig fat.
When it’s said that someone has “butchered” something other than an animal, when the verb is used in figurative terms, it often implies someone has botched something. In the dictionary it means :
1a: a person who slaughters animals or dresses their flesh b : a dealer in meat
2 : one that kills ruthlessly or brutally
3 : one that bungles or botches
None of these definitions sums up the process of butchery. In fact, butchery is an art. Or at least it should be, though watching supermarket meat counter employees use an electric saw to cut your porkchops hardly counts as art. During my last butchery test in France, I was undoubtedly butchering a pig in the roughest sense of the word, but it was the art of butchery that I held as my standard even if it’s going to take me a little more practice to actually master it. My butchery mentors touched knife to flesh with grace and finesse and speed. It was a choreographed, subtle dance between pig and human. Watching a skilled butcher approach a half pig has given me chills and even once brought me to tears (though I don’t think my butchery mentors saw them). I hope such a sight still will as I try to find my way in the butchery world of Portland, Oregon.
After moving our way through the thirds, it was time to start preserving. I cooked up some North Carolina pulled pork so that Kate would have enough jars to provide her with a taste of summer through the winter months. Kate prepared a deliciously sweet and nutty estouffade–a kind of herbaceous French version of American pulled pork–with herbs from her garden. We also slow-cooked several batches of Jambon de Tonneins, hunks of ham that are cooked in an autoclave with vegetables, spices, wine, and black pepper, and then usually sold geléed in glass jars. We salted the belly and let it cure in the fridge and rolled up the skin to be used for stews and roasts later in the year. And we used any scraps of meat I found to make a lot of pâté spiked with leeks, pepper, salt, and a little red wine.
When the jars of pâté finally arrived in the mail, I opened one to share with Chris, who helped make my trip to France possible in so many ways. I took another to Levi Cole’s house, who, along with Robert Reynolds, originally inspired me–whether they know it or not–to learn how to butcher pigs in France. Watching Robert and Levi spread the rough pâté onto crunchy slices of bread brought me great pleasure. It was the perfect way to thank them. And tonight, I will share the last of the pâté with old friends who have been good to me over the years. We might open a jar of foie gras too, and then grill chorizo that I made on Monday with the help of a new mentor and friend–Mary Gehring. For dessert tonight, we’ll raise glasses of sweet and bracing prune liqueur from Gascony, and toast whatever lies next.
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Check out this website: http://goingwholehog.blogspot.com/. It was put together a few years ago, but revived by my lovely friend Kate Hill’s (a la France) and her culinary partner in crime, Judy Witts Francini (a la Italy). They’re putting together a series of classes and events all about the pig both here in the States and in their respective countries. All worth signing up for.
Also, Kate Hill, who made my pig butchery fantasy become reality in France, is in the process of launching her new website and programs (complete with a charcuterie focused apprenticeship program). It’s still under construction, but worth following: www.kitchen-at-camont.com
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I just returned home a few days ago, and have had a rough re-entry to say the least, so I am behind on posts. I continue, however, to be amazed at the extent of America’s new butchery obsession. My friend Kate Hill just sent me a link to this: Jcrew’s new boucherie boxers.
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<— INSERT CLEAVER HERE.
As many of you reading this probably already know, the New York Times came out with an article a few weeks ago proclaiming that butchers are the new rock stars in America–nay, the new “Indie rock stars.”
I’m as guilty as the rest of the people quoted in the article when it comes to fetishizing butchery. I’ll admit that wielding a cleaver gives me a certain sense of uniqueness, pride and showmanship, maybe even one-up-manship, that I sometimes relish in. And I think certain food-obsessed members of my generation feel similarly. Part of this, I believe, comes out of a growing desire to have more control over the food we eat, as well as a desire to know more about what we are eating. This fascination with butchery also stems from a kind of culinary and cultural nostalgia that has swept much of the nation, mixed with my generation’s growing fascination with living on the so-called fringe, or off the grid, a lifestyle, like indie rock, that’s become mainstream remarkably fast, given our culture’s propensity for consumption of anything and everything still considered new under the sun–a hard commodity to come by these days, hence our reinvention of the old.
But the article also captured a somewhat disturbing aspect of my generation’s relationship to food. There’s something a little sarcastic, a little showy, a little too faux “punk rock” about it–thanks partly to the Food Network. Why can’t we just learn to butcher animals because it’s necessary and we want to do it right? Why do young butchers now show up in bars and dissect a pig in front of customers who paid $100 to sip cocktails and watch said butchery performance so that they supposedly feel closer to the process? Is this really about educating the consumer and making them feel closer to the process? Or is it about further removing us from the process of butchery? Is it about setting up butchery as spectacle? And what will the ultimate result of such spectacle be? I’m all for the butcher becoming an important part of our society again, and if it takes articles like the one in the NYT, so be it. But I think it’s important for those of us wishing to study butchery to question our own motives. The article certainly forced me to question mine.
When I told my butchery mentors in France about the spectacle of butchery in the United States, they had trouble wrapping their heads around this. For them, butchery is butchery. It’s something that needs to be done, and needs to be done well. There is no pomp and circumstance surrounding it, unless you count Dominique wearing a beret at the market to appear more French to potential customers. Besides, the Chapolards keep reminding me that my French counterparts, their children, have very little interest in carrying on the art of butchery, farming, and the like. There is no rock star status in butchery in France. You work hard, you produce good product (or not), and then you retire, hopefully, though if your children or someone else from the younger generation doesn’t take over your operation, you will work with tractor and knife until you die.
The Chapolard’s inability to understand the current phenomenon in the United States is precisely the reason I decided to start learning butchery in France, versus the United States: to escape the sentiments of nostalgia and kitsch, ego, even sarcasm, which, in the end, only serve to remove us from the topic at hand, the food at hand, the knife in hand. I’m not typically a serious person, nor a righteous one, but I want to be a serious student of butchery, rather than pretend I am a serious student of butchery when I am in fact not.
A few weeks ago, I met a woman, Marie-Helene, (pictured left) who raises her own pigs, makes her own charcuterie, and sells it at two local markets all by herself. When she explained to us how much work it was, she did not do so to gain sympathy, nor to gain respect, nor to sell us on her own rock star status. This was what she had chosen to do. She was the daughter of pig farmers. It was important work, and she did it with integrity, every day. And through that, she commanded respect from all of her customers.
I’m sure there are plenty of young butchers in the United States who also feel the same way, though articles like the one in the New York Times force me to wonder how many young butchers there are who don’t. I can see some magazine, in the next year coming out with a cover package titled “10 Sexiest Butchers in America.” Oh wait, I should be pitching that story, as a writer. Except as a budding butcher, I really won’t.
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I’m working on more posts complete with beautiful photos from my lovely and talented photographer friend Eugenie Frerichs who has joined me for the last leg of my trip. But, for now, a little something to get us all through to the next post: one of the most beautiful butcheries I have visited in Southwest France.
This was in the center of Moissac, a lovely little village. When we entered, the owner, whose father had run the shop for many decades before he passed away, made sure to tell us that it wasn’t normally this empty, but we’d walked in during a busy day. In addition to the shiny black and white tile, and meticulously organized charcuterie display–classic French butchery decor–the butchers themselves took just as much care with their own look. Each wore the one-strapped apron that is so common here. While working, they tuck one corner of their apron up into the waistband so that when they walk in front of the counter they can take it down and show the clean side to the customers. The man below, who had worked there for seven years, especially impressed me. We arrived just around lunch time, and when he left to go eat, he emerged from the back, having taken off his blue shirt, which covered a crisp white shirt. Over that he wore a nice black suit jacket, and under his arm her carried a baguette as he strode out of the shop, said his au revoir, and left. I mention this because his decorum and pride surrounding his work made quite an impression on me. He wasn’t just in the business of slinging meat around. He was mastering an art.
The owner has made a name for himself selling individual servings of beef tartare with a side dressing. While he makes fresh sausages, he told us that he preferred to get all of his charcuterie from the Basque country, down in the French Pyrenees, because he thinks it’s generally made better there.
Below are more photos of his shop, which I can only hope I will be able to emulate some day.
I fell in love with the wooden cutting counter (above), which I’m sure is totally against health code in the States, maybe even in France, unfortunately.
The red, black, and white tile is classic French butcher shop design.
I’d like to find the person who scribed this board and have them do the same for mine, someday.
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For July 4th, we decided to roast a suckling pig, whip up some pimiento cheese, Boston baked beans, and shortcake, and invite about 20 people to bring other side dishes. We bought our suckling pig from the Chapolards, my butchery mentors in Southwest France, but neglected to specify what, in our minds, a suckling pig weighed. The pig we ended up with was only 2 months old and, quite a bit younger than we had assumed it would be. (In photo: yes, that’s me in a hairnet.)
We rubbed its insides with salt and pepper, stuffed it with rosemary and fennel, and then inserted a half baguette inside its cavity to help it keep its shape. 
For roasting it, we borrowed a makeshift (but genius) electric spit from our neighbors (I’m hoping my tinkering dad will reproduce it back in the states) made out of a bicycle wheel and a motor.
Having at least enough foresight to realize this pig would not feed 20 people, we bought a huge Boston butt to roast alongside it, for pulled pork that we slathered with tangy North Carolina barbecue sauce as well as Kate’s homemade fig barbecue sauce.
Our friends arrived–American and British expats, Spanish and French folk, and a few dogs, including a Boston terrier named Boscoe (lots of Boston going on here). We drank champagne and played boules. We snacked on cornnuts made in Morocco, anchovy stuffed olives from Spain, and pork hot dogs from France. The French were especially impressed with my pimiento cheese.
And finally, after about 5 hours, the pig was ready. Most of the French people who attended the party had already mentioned to me at some point in the evening that they didn’t even like suckling pig, because it had no flavor–”Crazy Americans,” I’m sure they were thinking. They were right of course. It had very little fat on it, and so the skin didn’t crackle and crisp up like we wanted it to. And, after tasting those little baby ribs next to my pulled pork, taken from a pig that was a year old, I have decided that aside from being tender, baby pig isn’t anywhere near as good as a full-grown one. Perhaps it would have been better had we brined it, but it would still be missing that quintessential pork flavor. 
Nonetheless, alongside my mother’s baked beans (which the French were also fascinated by, save for the fact that there was ketchup in it, which they did not approve of), the suckling pork was still more than satisfying. As seems to be the French way, the first to arrive were the last to leave, a good sign indeed. Happy Fourth of July!
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For a region and a country that loves their pig, I’ve been pleasantly surprised by how little pig (re:meat) people eat here, and by just how many vegetable dishes they consume. It may sound funny coming from someone studying butchery, but this is all as it should be in my opinion. Here, pig (or whatever other meat or fowl one prefers) may appear in one dish during a meal, but it’s accompanied by two, four, six, sometimes eight simple side dishes that feature the produce that grows so well here in Gascony.
Crop fields don’t just dot the landscape in Gascony. They are the landscape. Where there’s not a house, there’s a field of wheat or corn or tomatoes or melons or sunflowers (for oil). And while many of these crops are actually sold to large agricultural cooperatives and then turned over to supermarkets in the north, or transformed into oil or flour or grain, there’s plenty of bright red tomatoes, sweet corn, fat asparagus, leeks, onions, garlic, potatoes, the sweetest melons I’ve ever tasted, to be found at the indoor and outdoor markets. (Here in France, these markets aren’t called “farmers markets” like they are in the states, partially because produce wholesalers are allowed to sell at them, but partially because the phrase “farmers markets” seem redundant to the French–of course they are farmers markets, they’ll say, who else would be growing this stuff?)
Because the produce here in Gascony is so easy to grow, and because it tastes so good, people generally don’t do
much with it before bringing it to the table. Tomatoes are sprinkled with minced shallots, salt, and a lot of black pepper, maybe drizzled with olive oil and vinegar. Melon is sliced and sprinkled with pepper, or sometimes served with a little cured jambon. Eggplant is roasted and turned into a kind of “caviar” to be spread on bread. Cucumber is shredded and mixed with yogurt for dipping. Squash might be cored and stuffed with breadcrumbs and herbs, and a little ground pork, but just enough to flavor it, not so much that the meat overpowers the vegetable. Curiously, all the corn grown here is turn into oil, or it’s sold in cans, and the French don’t really seem to eat fresh corn on the cob.
These dishes all sound very simple and obvious, and each time I’ve eaten them I’ve kicked myself for forgetting to make them at home. But after a while I realized there is a reason I don’t make them as much at home: often the produce just isn’t quite as good as it is here. When you buy a melon at the market here, the seller asks whether you plan to eat it today or tomorrow. If it’s for today he’ll give you a ripe one whose perfume you already smelled from several hundred feet away. If it’s for tomorrow, he’ll feel his melons for ripeness, sniff them, and decide on one that he knows will be perfect by the time you cut into it. He might even ask you if you plan on eating it for lunch or for dinner in order to determine which one he’ll give you. The consumer should NEVER touch a sellers fruits. It is up to the seller to find the one that is right for you, and you are supposed to trust him. Why wouldn’t you?
In the states, since most farmers markets are closed half the year in Portland, I’m often left to shop at supermarkets–even good ones like New Seasons–but I’m disappointed by bitter, watery onions, pale tomatoes, and shined and buffed apples. There is no one to ask me when I plan to eat these fale reproductions of the real thing. And I rarely trust those laying out the fruit displays each day to know what they are talking about. And so I don’t buy them. Consequently, half the year I don’t eat a whole lot of vegetables and fruit. Here the markets are open year-round, and while the produce changes with the seasons, you can always count on fresh, flavorful, well-cared for produce that requires little in the way of seasoning in order to taste good on the table.
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After a morning of work with the Chapolards, Christiane took me back to her house for lunch. While she cooked, I drew a picture of the pig and attempted to remember everything I’d learned. As we tucked into our meal of green peppers, tomatoes, and potatoes stuffed with seasoned ground pork, Christiane told me to write down everything she was about to say. She told me I needed to make a list of things to do when I get back to Portland, and that these were the things that should be on my list:
1) Find a French friend in Portland who will speak French with me.
2) Create a “dossier” or plan for my butcher shop.
3) Find a farm or butcher who will take me in as an apprentice.
4) Find a rich person to be my investor so I can open a butcher shop.
I suggested that I swap #4 with #1 in terms of importance. The family agreed.
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