Creating Local to Local Culinary Business Opportunities: The Meat Industry + Chefs Collaboration = strengthening local food systems and economy

Posted on December 22, 2012 by mark

It is a sincere pleasure to see predictions come to pass. Back in 2007 just before the butchery trend-craze-fad hit I had myself already transcended this path. I predicted “a future trend that would have more chefs becoming familiar with and creating stronger relationships within the meat industry” in Meating Place News Magazine (2007). It happened! Now, a lost culinary practice has risen back to its rightful place and the results are here to stay! Chefs, cooks and enthusiasts alike are seeking to revive what was once everyday practice… people wanting to educate themselves about traditional food and food systems, more specifically butchery and meat-centric preparations.

Recently Denver’s own chef Justin Brunson (an Iowa transplant), owner of Masterpiece Deli and the (opening soon) Old Major project delved into their passion for pork feet first. Old Major will practice an extensive in-house meat program. Brunson armed himself with an SOP and HACCP plan that would rival most USDA inspected small plants practices including fresh meat, dry fermented sausage, not heat treated NRTE and a heat-treated not shelf stable program to allow him to safely and effectively craft meats in-house. Most health departments cringe at the mention of “house cured” “house made” salumi/charcuterie, or in-house meat programs. Brunson (Old Major) recognized this and respectfully wanted to do it right and proper as it relates to practice as well with the local health department officials.

The first final prototype making its introduction at the Denver Bacon & Beer Festival

Also recently, Brunson developed the Denver Bacon Company. Just as I did with Il Mondo Vecchio initially in 2006, Brunson started by outsourcing the services of a local USDA plant and familiarizing with production protocols. Small and medium sized plants can provide services such as private label contract business. We used to do similar contract business for the likes of Frasca, Canyon Ranch Spa Resorts, Vesta Dipping Grill, Cure Organic Farms, Oskar Blues and Black Belly Catering to name a few. Doing so allows Brunson to make his delicious artisan crafted Denver Bacon Company Bacon products under USDA inspection and bring it to market for wholesale, retail, food-service and grocers. For the small – medium plant it is an opportunity to generate more revenue streams and diversify their business model for profitability.

MEANS + IDEAS = STRONGER LOCAL FOOD SYSTEMS

From a purely economic standpoint this is truly a win-win situation for locally produced products, sustainable food systems and the possibility of becoming a local food staple supported by the general public:

For the USDA plant this allows opportunity to tap into revenue stream of simply manufacturing, packaging and possible storage and/or distribution or sales.
For the Chef, this allows the creative expertise of artisan-chef crafted products to go into commerce without the cost of starting up an entire USDA plant with employees and all the other costs associated with an entire plant.
For the Community, it provides opportunity for more local to local business interactions strengthening local commerce and local economy. Be it from farm to table, from field to fork or whatever other “buzzword” is appropriate. Outside the fancy talk, it is simply smart business all around.

This December, we were able to promote DBC at the Denver Bacon and Beer Festival sponsored by Forkly.com (Jenna’s favorite iphone food app), Eat Boston and Denver Off-the Wagon.

RECIPE:

Here is a recent recipe I created one evening at home utilizing Brunson’s DBC-Bacon. This dish also incorporates use of leftovers sitting in the fridge: roasted chicken thighs I’ll be candid… I love my refrigerator “Quick Fire Challenges” it’s like I am on a Bravo TV or Food Network show. So here is my Denver Bacon Company Quick Fire Home Refrigerator Challenge outcome:

Smoked Pimenton Broth Poached Vegetables with Chicharron of Chicken Thigh and DBC Bacon Lardons with manchego-truffled croutons.

THE BROTH & VEG

IMAG2843

Serves 2-4

1 TBS Olive Oil
2 Cloves Garlic Sliced
1 Small Yellow or Sweet Onion (diced ¼ inch)
3 Tablespoons Smoked Spanish Paprika (Pimenton)
¼ Cup Yukon or Red Potatoes (diced ¼ inch)
16 Ounces Poultry Stock
¼ Cup Orange Cauliflower Florets (sliced thin)
¼ Cup Baby Carrots (sliced 1/8^th inch thick)

Method:

In a small sauce or soup pan over med-high heat add olive oil. Add garlic and onions, cook until translucent. Add paprika and incorporate well. Add potatoes.

Add stock, bring to boil and reduce to simmer. Allow it to simmer until 25% of the liquid evaporates. Add the potatoes and simmer until cooked through: “al dente”. Turn off the heat and place in the remaining vegetables.

1 tsp Fresh Parsley Chopped for Garnish at time of service.

CHICHARRON:

IMAG2842

2 each Chicken Thighs, skin on, pre-cooked (roasted) a great way to use leftovers (shred off the bone into small pieces)
3 each slices Denver Bacon Company sliced into thin strips (julienne lardons)
2 TBS Olive Oil (not E.V.)

Over low heat in a heavy bottomed skillet place the chicken and bacon strips. Allow to fry slowly and cook crisp. Allow them to get golden brown and crispy. This may take up to 15 or 30 minutes…do not rush it, slowly crisp over low heat.

To serve, pull out of fat and place on dry paper towels to absorb excess oils. Keep warm and place over the broth and vegetables.

CROUTONS (these can be made in advance):

1 cup Bread preferably sour dough or rustic cibatta bread (diced ½ inch)
2 TBS Manchego Cheese (fine shred)
2 TBS Olive Oil
1 TBS White truffle essence olive oil

Toss all ingredients in a bowl to coat lightly. Adjust seasoning with hint of salt and fresh ground black pepper. Spread out the croutons on a sheet pan and toast in oven at 350* until light golden brown and crispy.

IMAG2850

Simplicity in execution and complex with tastes, textures, flavors and diverse cooking methods lend a velvety vegetable and broth with smoky notes of pimento, crisp fried bacon and chicken thigh meat/skin finalized with the classic flavor bombed crunch of a simple crouton.

Kudos to Chef Brunson, please join me in congratulating his current and future endeavors as well his respectable leap into the world of meat industry from production to plate and everything in between!

random delicious posts:

MEET THE MEAT GRADES: MAKING SENSE OF BEEF BASICS

ouef! here it is!!! eggs, chickens, and how to hard boil perfectly.

Culinary Tools: Selecting a Simple Set of Knives

Meaty Music: What's on my Android Music Playlist

beer can chicken???!!!???!!!

You say salami, they say salame and we say salumi! Which is what and what is which?!

Posted on March 27, 2012 by mark

As a chef, educator and a salumi maker, many people, especially those “not-in-the-know” ask me this question. I typically (tactfully) respond in my Massachusetts accent ~ butchering the pronunciations ~“It’s like that French chahhhcoooterreeeyyy stuff. Due to that Medici chick back in the day, and all the Italians basically teaching the French all they know about food, but somehow, the French get all the accolades and the popular meat term that eminates the salivating lips of foodies and chefs flexing their meaty muscles… Charcuterie!”

Salumi is to Italy what Charcuterie is to France. Both are considered to be forms of what the American public often calls “further processed meats”. For some, the term further processed meats itself brings visions of olive loaf, the multi-pack of meat from Oscar Meyer, and the fist pumping rants of Ann (renegade lunch lady) Cooper and PETA raging against the machine of the carniverous USDA.

Whatever your personal belief, further processed meats, salumi and charcuterie both are an all inclusive catchall terms referring to all meats; dry cured, smoked/cooked, fresh sausage and even pate, terrine and galantines. So sausage, bologna, pepperoni and proscuitto are all salumi. Furthermore, salumi/charcuterie can be considered anything other than roasts or steaks handled in such a fashion being transformed into a myriad of other well known processed meats.

Salumi- derived from the Latin term salsus (salty) or Italian sale (salt) simply a way of preservation. Originally salumi referred to meats that were dry cured such as salami, salame and prosciutto. Salumi came more from a means of necessity and utilization to sustain and have an abundance of food over long periods of time. Salumi, the real deal old world stuff made of nothing more than pure sea salt, meat and spices (no junk added, no nitrites, nitrates or fermentation cultures) was salted and dried to a point, now known in the new world, NOT to be a PHF (potentially hazardous food) due to its low moisture content. What that means is that salumi has enough salt and the lack of moisture which creates an environment that little nasty things like salmonella, listeria and botulism cannot survive.

These salumi items can be stored at room temperature without concern of spoilage which back in the day was a pretty good way to live.

Over the past decade salumi/charcuterie has been on the forefront of culinary trends in many forms from USDA small and large production to restaurant chefs and even home enthusiasts.

All Salumi is Salami but not all Salami is Salumi! Say that five times fast!!! Seriously though, here is the breakdown…..

Salami/Salame- Most well known term that American culture is most comfortable or familiar with when referring to dry sausage specifically. Salami/salame dry sausages are produced from big conglomerates down to today’s artisan producers. Coarse or finely ground meat (most often pork), at Il Mondo Vecchio we make a selection of seasonal SaLambi (salumi made from American Lamb).

Salumi- Originally an all encompassing term referring to preserved meats dry sausages and dry cured whole muscles such as coppa/capicola, prosciuttio, pancetta, lomo and guanciale just to name a few. Technically salumi now by definition in the new world also includes fresh sausages, smoked/cooked specialties such as mortadella and cotechino.

With expert execution and passion of salami, salame and salumi from my own Il Mondo Vecchio-Salumi (Denver), Erik Gutknecht Continental Sausage (Denver), Chef Cosentino’s Boccolone (San Fran), The Batali Family’s Salumi (Seattle) and Olympic Provisions (Portland) to larger companies such as Paul Bertolli’s Fra Mani (San Fran) and Salumeria Biliese (NYC/NJ) and the age old big dogs Volpi (St Louis, MO), Columbus (San Fran) to dare I even mention for fear of reprimand and ridicule from my salumi colleagues and brethren Hormel and Oscar Myer.

At the end of the day no matter how you slice it, from small to large, each fits the category of what salumi is in its purest form…which is nothing more than a fancy way of saying… “further processed meats”.

A great source reference and research on the great American Salumi movement by Kim Long (American Forecaster) and John Lehndorff (freelance writer Boulder Daily Camera, Aurora Sentinel) can be found @ www.AmericanSalumi.com

Other References, meat porn and friends:

random delicious posts:

MEET THE MEAT GRADES: MAKING SENSE OF BEEF BASICS

Culinary Tools: Selecting a Simple Set of Knives

Surprise rooster = Coq au vin blanc

beer can chicken???!!!???!!!

Creating Local to Local Culinary Business Opportunities: The Meat Industry + Chefs Collaboration = s...

MEAT: Federal Inspection & Grading Basics: Making sense of it all!

Posted on March 13, 2012 by mark

In this post, Mark gives you an idea of what goes down in his USDA plant where he makes his artisan salumi… and kicks off a quick lesson on some of what “happens” before your meat reaches the store. After this story, we will build on what this grading means for your pocketbook and taste-buds.

Inspection & grading are completely different programs that fall under the responsibility of the USDA.

USDA INSPECTION:

American consumers can be confident that the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS), the public health agency in the USDA, ensures that meat and poultry products are safe, wholesome, and correctly labeled and packaged. http://www.fsis.usda.gov/Factsheets/Inspection_&_Grading/index.asp

I process under federal inspection at Il Mondo Vecchio Salumi. A new inspector is rotated in every 6 months. Every day I am in production, a federal inspector (I.I.C./Inspector In Charge) stops by to check on things. Everything from our records to how we are handling product is under scrutiny. He checks and monitors cleanliness (so clean we sanitize the walls everyday) down to temperature and humidity and ensures that every hair is covered (I wear a hairnet on my beard!). It is a positive working relationship, and we both ensure that what we are doing is producing products in safe and sanitary manner providing wholesome products that will be eaten by the public.

USDA Federal Inspection is a mandatory inspection ensuring meat/poultry products are fit for human consumption.

All meat/poultry processed for commercial commerce (distributor/wholesale) is processed under Federal Inspection for wholesale/retail.

USDA Mark of Inspection Picture: http://www.extension.org/pages/27291/product-labeling

An easy way to explain this is that meats (fresh or further processed, like hot dogs) are safely prepared, in an approved USDA processing facility, by people that have handled the meat within the proper environment and in a timely fashion following HACCP guidelines. USDA regulations are consistent from border to border and sea to shining sea. From cutting to packaging to storing and shipping if all protocols have been properly followed the meat product is considered USDA Inspected & Passed. USDA processing facilities, both small and large, operate and have a federal inspector on site randomly throughout everyday of production Monday – Friday, 6am – 2:30pm. These hours are not negotiable, and certainly a far cry from my days as a restaurant chef where I would roll in at 2 am after a dinner shift.

Very few restaurants fall under the rigors of USDA Inspection. Restaurants and food-service establishments alike fall under the responsibility of the local county/state health department. A health inspector will stop by an establishment for an unannounced inspection every six months.

USDA GRADING:

A voluntary program that most often times refers to a standardized level of quality attributes of meat (poultry, lamb, beef, pork, veal); marbling, size, shape, carcass yield, color and musculature just to name a few.

Basic examples and explanations are…Beef: Prime (highest grade), Choice (mid-range), Select (lowest grade). There are lower grades, but these are not available for retail purchase… they go for items like dog food.

Lamb: Prime, Choice, Select. Very similar to beef grading relying heavily on marbling in the rib-eye area.
Veal: Choice or Higher Grades are associated with color more so than marbling. Veal is very lean meat often times with little to no marbling whatsoever. The lighter whitish/pinkish the color, the higher the quality. The darker or more reddish the color, the lower the quality.
Poultry: A, B, C
Pork: 1, 2, 3, 4. Not actual grades these more refer to what the carcass will yield of meat.

Grading can also refer to the manner in which the animal or meat was raised, fed, or how it lived, as well may refer to which manner it was slaughtered/processed (such as religious).

The following Grade Claims and terms fall under USDA Grading: