Austin Texas Butcher

Frenched Rack of Lamb. The Breakdown.

2014-11-22T15:55:00.001-06:00

In response to the holidays, I've decided to do a post on Frenching a Rack of Lamb - Here in Austin, Rack of Lamb is hugely popular, for Thanksgiving, and Christmas. I'll admit, I don't care much for Lamb, but I really enjoy how tedious it is to process. I hope you enjoy this as much as I have!

This is a whole, uncut Lamb Rack - and this is the Loin-end.

This is the Rib-end, also known as the Large-end.

This first step here is removing the Thoracic Vertebrae. You could certainly cook this piece whole, just like this, but it'd be hard to carve and for most people the eye-appeal just isn't there. So, as a merchandising fiend, I'm going to take this to the next level.

You could remove all these with one swipe if you wanted to, but I enjoy taking my time with it - especially since I'm doing this at home.

Almost done. Also, cutting away the vertebrae one at a time increases your yield.

View from the Large-end.

This yellow, rubbery tissue is inedible and needs to be removed, no matter what animal we're talking about. The only purpose this guy serves is holding the animal's head up - since we've already cut that off, it's useless to us.

That's more like it!

The bit of cartilage that we're going to remove now is the remainder of the sheep's shoulder blade.

On an animal this size, you could essentially just pull it out with your fingers, but you run the risk of tearing the meat, also damaging some of the meat you want to leave on the rack. Use the tip of your boning knife to outline the cartilage and then pull it out.

Nice and clean!

Now to remove the cap.

This is a piece that pulls away fairly easily, on Lamb, I doubt you'd need a knife until the very end, but each animal is different.

Cut away with you knife and safe the Cap / Lifter for later.

Score the top of the rib from eye to eye, all the way down to the bone.

Cut the meat from the rib off.

I've changed my methods quite a bit since these pictures were taken, but this way works just fine! Score the length of the bone with your knife to split the tissue that surrounds the rib.

Start pressing the tissue away from the bone with the tip of your knife.

Once you've got each bone facing relatively clean, you should be able to pull the meat away pretty easily!

Pull / push / karate chop the meat all the way down until you've reached the line you originally drew from eye to eye, then cut the meat away in a perpendicular fashion.

Until your rack looks like this!

That's it for this post. Next up will be a Breakdown of a Dry Aged Shortloin into Bone-in Tenderloin steaks. I've posted that before but with some crappy Instagram photos that I was never happy with - I just relocated the original pictures, so once I've made the new post, I'll delete the old one. The post following the Bone-in Tenderloins will be a massive (probably two-part) post on the Best Butcher Contest I was involved with last year - there are hundreds of photos to go through, which is a fairly slow process. Thanks again!

Reece.

Veal Loin and Rib. The Breakdowns.

2014-11-19T15:39:00.000-06:00

Let me start by apologizing for not keeping this blog going over the last year and a half. I've been very busy, and less than inspired. Since my last post, I competed in Whole Foods Market's Best Butcher Competition, where I placed second, nationally. The experience was amazing, and the outcome was quite humbling. I've refocused on the finer details and have continued to hone my skills. The next time they have a competition, I definitely plan on entering.. this time, I'll be completely ready.

Aside from Whole Foods, earlier this year I had the opportunity to work at Salt and Time Butchershop and Salumeria here in Austin. There are some amazing things happening at that shop on a daily basis, beginning with the overall quality of the meat they're bringing in. All the butchering is done while the sides and quarters are still hanging on the rail, and learning that aspect of the trade blew my mind. Easy, yet difficult.

I have plenty of pictures from these experiences and hopefully I'll have the gumption to post something more meaningful about them. Until then.. here we go with the Veal:

Frontal view of a Split Veal Loin. On the left is the Tenderloin, on the right is the Striploin. Both would yield fantastic cuts by themselves, but with veal, it's best to keep them together.

Another view of the Loin.

First off, start peeling the fascia away from the Loin Tail / Flap.

This isn't very difficult, but if you're having a hard time grasping the fascia, use a towel for extra grip.

Now that the Sirloin Flap is exposed, start clumping the Suet together for separation.

To remove the suet, pull away from the ribs, towards the porterhouse-end - this should be pretty easy. If you need to snip some of the tissue to ease the motion, use the tip of a boning knife.

Veal Sirloin Flap.

Now for the T-bone Chops. Feel around for the empty space between the vertebrae, they will be equally spaced out.

I'll usually feel out the first two to give myself an idea of the space between them, then I'll cut through the meat, all the way down on both sides.

The reason I knife between the bones instead of taking the whole piece to the saw is simple: It takes more skill and the meat doesn't get town up on the saw. Also, this will inevitably extend the shelf-life.

After you've made your cuts, take the primal to the saw and split between each chop.

To help with presentation, I like to lay a sprig of Rosemary on the silverside of each chop, then tie.
Easy enough. Now for the Rib!

This is what's referred to as a Hotel Rack. There are 6 ribs for a rack of Veal. Each animal is treated a little different: For a rack of Lamb, there will be 8 ribs, For beef - 7, Pork - 13. These are the Center Cuts of each respective Loins.

To start the Frenching (which the French call American-style), score the meat from eye-to-eye, all the way down to the bone.

Score the inside as well.

Next, score down the length of each bone. The goal here is to cleanly remove all the tissue on the bone, leaving it as clean as possible.

Once you've scored each bone, start pushing the tissue away from the bone, beginning from the loin, down the bone.

After you've done this for each bone, put down your knife and press the meat off the bone with your fingers. I like to get the first inch or so of each bone bare, then start working the entire piece.

If you've done the first few steps well, the rest should be pretty easy.

Clean as a whistle. Try to make your cuts between the ribs as square as possible. There's a million and one tricks for accomplishing this, learning them requires practice. Note the Veal McRib to the left :)

Now to tie the ribs.

Work your twine under the roast, aligned with the bone. Keep the 'free' end in your right hand, and the end of the twine still attached to the roll in your left.

Bare with me here, for this is not an easy task to explain.. Each rib has a 'J' shape to it. Most butchers I've worked with will have two knots per bone to keep the meet from flopping over or working it's way out of the knot. You've tied a successful chop if, when you pick it up by the rib, horizontally, the meat does not sag. The know I'm about to try to explain is singular, but works from both sides of the bone. It's beautiful, and functional. Time saving, and simplistic.

Starting from the hook side of the bone, work the string around the rib until on the way back, the twine crosses the 'J'.

Now for the hard-to-explain part. keeping the free end of the twine on top, clamp the two ends together and move the free end underneath and around the anchored end. Release the knot, and...

Repeat the process again, but don't let the two knots get too tight, otherwise it won't slide.

Next, slide the knot firmly into the meat, but not tight enough to cut into the meat.

Close off the knot and snip the ends. Repeat.

Repeat this process for each rib.. Marvel at its beauty!

Cut each chop between the ribs to yield six Veal Chops, ready for market.

I'll have to get a video put together for how to tie, because I doubt any beginner will be able to learn from the description I just put together. Sorry!

Dry Aged Beef Hindquarter. The Breakdown.

2013-04-11T13:32:00.001-05:00

So this is a big one...

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I have been helping to teach a bunch of students at Texas State University in San Marcos how to break down whole Lamb/Sheep, Hogs and finally - Beef. So far, the experience has been great - I have a newfound (maybe rediscovered) love for teaching, especially my craft. As a friend of mine, Bryan Butler of Salt and Time, once said, "True Masters Teach." Well - I really took that to heart and I can't believe the opportunity to teach at a university fell in my lap the way it did. Some of the motions/seams/angles are hard to make out through these photos, but I'm going to assume that if you have the chance to break down a hindquarter, you already have a pretty good idea of what's going on!

This is what we're going to be working with - beef hindquarter off a high-choice steer. We've had it aging since March 15th, so just over 30 days.

As heavy as these guys are, they're not too hard to get off the hook and onto your table. Essentially, I just bear hug it from behind, center the weight of it between my feet and lift up - you'er mostly hugging around the Flank and Short loin, so the way it settles into your arms prevents it from slipping out, that is if you can get your arms all the way around it.

First off, we'll remove the Flank Steak. I like to start by removing the whole belly from the leg, just follow the seams and don't cut into anything that's red.

While you're removing the Flank and all of the fatty tissue around it, you're also outlining the Round and exposing the Sirloin Tri-Tip.

Once you start reaching the end of the seams, you can focus your attention back on the Flank - this step is very easy and bears little explanation.

I like to trim the meat as it's still on the quarter - saving steps/time leaves more time for the other things.

Now that the Flank is out of the way - fix your attention on the Sirloin Flap. This is easily one of my favorite cuts, for any purpose. Make pre-cuts along the bottom of the Flap until you start getting into the Loin Tails (red meat, thin but lean.)

After you get the bottom of the Flap started, go back to the top of the Shortloin where the Suet begins. Suet is a very large hunk of fat that comes from the interior of the animal - if you're lucky you'll find a kidney hiding in there, otherwise suet is great for rendering into Tallow.

Keep working the suet by pulling with your [left] hand and cutting with your [right] hand. The two should be working together, minimizing the effort needed to accomplish these tasks - make no joke about it, this is hard work.

Once you've got the Flap/Suet section removed, set the fat aside, trim down the flap, and get back to the rest of the quarter.

Here's what mine looked like after removing the Flank, Flap, and Suet. I'll be the first to admit that if you look closely, I nicked the Tenderloin, which is a big no-no. Don't do that.

Start clearing out the belly of any lean meat. We're going to get this out of our way to make room for the next few steps. As I'm working on this, I'll begin to outline the Tri-Tip, while clearing the layers of fat that hide the Sirloin Tip / Knuckle so when I'm ready to break them out, I can already see the curvature of the muscle. I told my students that as you're doing these kind of things, in a way you're giving yourself lines for which to color inside.

Saw through the 13th rib about two inches from the bottom of the NY Strip. The bone is maybe one inch in diameter, so it doesn't take much - this step is all about ease of operation...

After the rib is sawed through, cut it out leaving the boneless belly. Clear away the belly with your knife to give yourself clear line of sight to the where the Hip / Aitch Bone curves down, separating the Sirloin from the Shortloin.

Draw a line vertically from the end of the Aitch bone to the Spine. Ideally, the only bone you'll have to saw through is the vertebrae right before the spine curves down into the tail.

Saw through until you either hear the bone snap, or until you can feel soft meat. Do not cut through the rest of this with a saw, you'd be doing the meat a disservice - the saw would obliterate the Tenderloin and NY Strip. Do no do this.

Damn near perfect. My angle could have been adjusted slightly, but I am very happy with this break.

Now for the Trip Tip. The seam for this is nearly impossible to see on the Top Sirloin side, use your experience and just go for it - if you make a mistake, at least it won't be the most costly one you could make.

Trim it down and set aside. As you can see, it looks like I'm explaining this to the Photographer - I like to talk during the process, helps keeps my excitement in check while working out the steps.

Now for the Butt Tender. You're just going to be following bone here. Err on the side of bone, for the Tenderloin is not only the most expensive cut, but it's also easy to ruin. Keep the side of your knife firmly against the bone and take shallow but deliberate swipes while pulling the Tenderloin away with your left hand.

Getting warmer...

Though it's hard to see, where the Tenderloin ends is right between the beginning of the Top Round and Sirloin Tip.

Just about done.

Once you've removed the Butt Tender, trim it, set it aside.. take a breath and get back to it!

Now for the Knuckle, a.k.a. Sirloin Tip. This is sort of difficult to see at first, what I like to do is start at the Top Round and work your way down until you hit the femur, at that point, follow the bone from top to bottom. It helps if you know what the grain of this side of the knuckle looks like, if not, you'd be working blind.

Follow the seams, young padawan.

Now for the Top Sirloin. The way I'm going to do this is not the way I learned, nor is it the American way. I approach this exactly like I would a whole leg of lamb because, really, the only difference is size. Start by outlining the part of the hip bone where the animal is split in half, from the bottom of the anus to the curved side of the hip that marked where we removed the Shortloin.

This, to me, is the most difficult step in breaking down a hindquarter. The hip curves about 45 degrees and if you deviate from the curvature of the bone, you will seriously gash the Top Sirloin.

Keep drawing your lines until you break the connection between the Femur and the Hip. You may hear a variety of different sounds, you may see fluid pour out - you may not, either way - once you've exposed this connection and broken through it, you can change your angle and start using the weight of the Sirloin to ease the amount of work your knife has to do.

Cut all around the Hip-side of the joint.

Start working the curves on either side of the joint.

...Now we're dancing! Now that our lines are drawn and the shape of the sirloin is evident, start cutting the rest of the bone away - there are a few pre-cuts to this process that we didn't get good pictures of, but again - if you've made it this far, I bet you have a pretty good idea of how to finish this step.

Home free.

Here's where we deviate from the 'normal' way of approaching this - if your trained eye can see, I left the Culotte attached to the Rump and taken the Sirloin off as a lean whole. In my opinion, the rump is highly under utilized and if cut and trimmed correctly can be a very enjoyable cut of meat.

The rest of this breakdown is just following seams. I go into detail about this process in my post about breaking down the Steamship Round.

On the far left we have a nearly identical Hind Quarter, Butt Tender, Flank, Flap, Tri Tip, Sirloin Tip, Top Sirloin, Eye of Round, Top Round, and Full Rump. The last bit I'm working on is the Hindshank.

That's it! Time for a break.

Again, "True Masters Teach." Dylan's turn.

The look on his face is my new reason for doing this. The joy, pride and excitement that people exhibit when doing something like this, especially someone that's pretty well versed in meat cutting getting to see the puzzle as a whole is very special to me. Teaching has really started calling my name and I'm going to be working on how to figure out how to do it for a living.

Now for a sneak peak at Fore Quarter breakdown. These guys are significantly heavier than the hinds, still possible to lift, but this one proved to be a bit too heavy for my frame - luckily I was able to enlist the help of my long time friend.

Since these have aged for so long, the exterior has turned a bit and though pre-trimming is usually a no-no, I think it's called for here. Best to remove it now and prevent any bad tissue from getting into the grind.

Beautiful.

Whole Mutton. The Breakdown.

2013-04-02T21:12:00.000-05:00

This last week, before class, I was able to get a couple mutton broken down and figured I'd take some pictures - I'm going to do the same next week for Beef, which I'm very excited about!

These guys weigh in right around 100 lbs, they've been aged about two weeks so all the fat has become very dense and the animal has become very easy to work with.

The animal is a bit too big to split whole on the size of saw the school has, so I decided to split the animal in half another way - between the 12th and 13th rib on both sides - going between the ribs ensures you wont run into any bone until the spine. Pro-tip - use a knife that gives you a bit of leverage - either a 10 inch or a 12 inch breaker would be perfect.

After the meat is cut away, take a hand saw and cut through what little bone is solid.

A look inside the Rib and Shoulder section.

To split the Mutton, line up the spine, backside-down, with the saw blade aiming at nothing but bone, your margin of error on this step is VERY slight.

The next step is cutting off the Naval, Brisket and Foreshank - Draw a line from the top of the Brisket to the bottom of the Loin-side of the ribs.

Cut straight through - the Shank will barely be hanging on and the Riblets can be split further or sold whole.

Now for the Shoulder - You can usually get two Arm Chops (1" thick) by cutting perpendicular to the ribs. Then turn it around and cut with the rib until the muscle groupings begin to taper off - usually four chops will come out nicely, bringing the total to 6.

You can identify the Arm Chops in the top left by the round bone surrounded by lean meat - The Shoulder Chops will resemble the 7 Bone Chuck Roasts your grandma used to cook for you.

The rib section is really quite simple - that is if you're not going to french them, which we'll cover another time. Take off the chine bone far enough to be able to cut though the ribs with a knife...

You'll usually find these sold as two-rib chops.

Now for the back half. Pull the Flanks out of the way and cut through as much of the Top Rounds as you can until you hit the center of the hip bone (aitch). Again, you're trying to cut this thing exactly in half - make sure you can see what you're working with!

As you can see, I cut into the meat-side of the loin on the quarter to the left, not a huge deal but not perfect.

At the end of the aitch bone, cut through the loin, all through the meat and through the flank, separating the Loin from the Sirloin

If you've seen a Leg of Lamb sold as "semi-boneless' but still has bone (femur, shank) in it and wondered why, here it is - The aitch bone is a very oddly shape and makes carving this side of the leg would be very hard to carve - though the femur and the shank are easy to carve around.

The Sirloin is the section to the bottom-left of the femur bone - this is the area of the leg where the femur connects with the pelvis.

Now for the loin - clear away the flank and square up your primal - cut at each vertebrae through as much of the meat as you can until only bone remains.

And buzz through the bone on the band saw. The reason I do it this way is because the meat itself is very tender and the saw will only chew it up - attention to detail, I guess.

Stay tuned - should have a beef post around this time next week.

Carcass Breakdown at Texas State University. Week One.

2013-03-27T19:33:00.000-05:00

Now that it's been about a year since my last post, I've decided that now's a pretty good time to get this thing back up. In the time since my last post I've left the Lamar store to open the Arbor Trails store. It's been awesome seeing the systems that I helped design at work in the beginnings of a new store.

Aside from opening the store, I've also just started working for Texas State University to help teach the students about carcass fabrication - from beginning to end! I just wrapped up my first of eight weeks and I couldn't be more excited!

The man in front of the camera is Dr. Reed Richardson, this is his second year instructing this particular class, though it's been going on for a long time. By the way, I had no idea classes like this even existed!

Myself and the students are going to be breaking down all the meat from quarters and sides into primals, on down the line to cutting the meat for sale. We've got six sides of beef...

Four sides of Pork, plus some extra hams and loins...

And four whole lambs.

Tune in next week for more!

Top Sirloin. The Breakdown.

2012-05-29T16:21:00.000-05:00

In celebration of Memorial Day, and my income tax return, I thought it'd be great to document the breakdown of a Top Butt. This was by far the hardest cut of meat for me to master and I've done the cutting tests / yield-to-margin tests to prove that done correctly, this is the most profitable (and enjoyable - to me) way of breaking this primal down. A great deal of variety can be found in this primal, and it literally took me years to decipher the intricacies.

The Top Sirloin is a primal that comes from the top of the steer's butt, which is why you'll also see this referred to as the 'Top Butt'. Very Scientific. Anyhow - This primal houses a few secrets including the Brazilian cut, the Picana, (Culotte, Rump Cap, many names), Top Sirloin Steaks and a nice Chateaubriand - type roast that makes excellent portion-sized steaks.

Starting with the bottom-left of the primal, where the muscle has been cut with the grain, is the beginning of the Culotte. This muscle extends from the Bottom Round, wrapping its way down and around the femur but is most tender towards top butt. In the center of the primal you can see the beginning of the Petite Sirloin Roast, and hidden behind a veil of heavy tissue and silver - Literally where the steer's leg meets the hip - lays the Top Sirloin.

The first step of trimming down the Top Butt is getting rid of the heavy bone tissue - don't add this to your trimmings, discard this stuff.

Removing the 'hard break' is just like removing silver skin, though it's much more dense, the principal the same.

Work the tip of your knife under the tissue and push forward at a slight angle. Finish the stroke by flipping the knife towards you, pulling the tissue taught and cutting it away.

This is nice, tender meat - when you're trimming the roast down, try not to gouge the meat. Remove only the inedible tissues.

This triangular muscle grouping on top of the roast isn't terrible, but it makes better trimmings than steak... remove as much of this as you'd like.

For the untrained eye, this picture makes it difficult to see, but there's a band of 'bubble gum that form in the Thoracic Vertebrae (At the neck and Chuck), runs through the Rib Primal, Shortloin and ends in the Top Butt. This little bit is the last of it, so I usually trim enough meat from the top of it to open a space for my knife to get underneath it to clear it away.

Expose the meat, but again - do not gouge.

You can follow the fat down and around the Sirloin until you reach the Culotte, at which point just clear the fat away from the top.

Now to separate the Picana from the heart of the Sirloin. Once the fat is cleared away, the seam is very easy to find and separating these two muscle is a fairly effortless task. However, it's also very easy to go too far and remove more fat than you need to from the Top Sirloin. When you're pealing the Sirloin away, locate the outline of the Culotte and cut it away as soon as it ends, leaving the fat on to rest of the Sirloin.

Because of this cut's triangular shape, it's mistakenly referred to as the Tri-Tip, however, that is all together different than the Culotte.

To clean the Picana / Culotte, begin by removing the silver skin.

After removing the silver skin, clear away any undesired fat and shape the muscle up but cleaning the edges.

Once cleaned, you can do whatever you want - roast the muscle whole, cut for kabobs, or cut steaks. Whatever you choose to do, the cooking method will be the same - Hot and fast.

The line on the right side of the muscle that runs parallel to your current line of sight outlines the Petite Sirloin. You can either seam this muscle out, or cut straight down - either way, this line is your marker.

This time, I cut straight down to separate the muscle in two.

Trim away and silver and clean the muscle to your preference.

Tie the roast for steaks...

... and cut your steaks - this roast yielded 6 evenly sized steaks.

For the Top Sirloin, clear away any gristle and silver.

Once you've trimmed away the gristle, make your face cut about two inches from the hip-end of the Sirloin.

The picture is a little rough, but this gives you and idea of what it should look like.

After facing, cut your Top Sirloin Steaks. This roast yielded 5 Top Sirloins. Nice!

And there you have it. The whole Top Butt cost me about $75 - untrimmed it weighed around 9.25#, and here's the bounty. There's about 1.5# worth of Culotte / Picana , 2.25# worth of Petite Sirloin steaks and 4.25# worth of Top Sirloin.
Invest in some some heavy duty butcher paper and this will last 6 months or more in the freezer. If I bought all of this at retail, the price would have been significantly more, plus processing meat is incredibly fun for me, especially at home.

Thanks for sticking around through my dormancy - next post will likely be a tutorial for bringing old knives back from the dead, reconditioning them and a quick lesson on knife sharpening.

Reece.

Berkshire Hog. Breakdown for Dry Curing.

2012-04-17T22:18:00.000-05:00

Location: Niederwald, Texas - Salt and Time HQ

I've had the pleasure of meeting, and working with, Ben and Bryan from Salt and Time for a few months now, and the day this breakdown happened has been the highlight.. Let me take a moment to say that Ben Runkle and Bryan Butler are true artisans. They've got a good thing going and in time, will have a REALLY good thing going, but I'll let them spill those beans...

The hog that's being broken down in this photo-set is one of superior quality to anything I've ever worked with - The first time I've even touched a heritage-breed hog: Berkshire.

The process of removing the Tenderloin is fairly simple; remove the outer layer of fat, start at the butt of the Tenderloin - located at the beginning of the Aitch bone. Once the connection to the Aitch bone is severed, simply grip the butt and pull the tenderloin away.

To Remove separate the Hind-Quarter from the rest of the hog, cut through the meat underneath the second-to-last vertebrae from the curve marked by the tail. Once the meat is cut...

Before you remove the Ham, seam-out the Flank. Identifying the muscle groupings is hard for beginners, but once your eyes have been trained, this is simple to do.

You can see the Ham really taking shape!

Flip the primal 180 degrees to sever the vertebrae. This takes some strength to lift the hindquarter, but the motion is relatively effortless.

Clean the Ham up and store in the cooler for further processing. Remember - temperature is key!

On the bottom right, you can see the beginnings of the Loin and Belly - hanging off to the bottom left, you can see the Flank (major muscle in the diaphragm).

Beautiful meat.

At the bottom of the Spare Ribs, the breast is connected by cartilage that's easy to cut with a knife. No saw just yet...

Now to remove the Coppa and Palleta - In the same fashion as the Ham, count the ribs and mark your place.

Cut through the 'boneless' portion of the meat until you reach the bone...

You'll be working in multiple angles, but the actual cut should stay constant - you want to avoid fraying the meat as much as possible.

Once you reach the bone...

Continue between the ribs until all of the meat has been cut through.

Then flip it over. Again... Absolutely beautiful.

Now's time to work through the rest of the cartilage along the bottom of the ribs.

Once the cartilage is severed, work the piece away from the Belly, this is a quick, but precise motion - the less cells you expose, the better for dry-curing.

This piece, once removed, can be further processed - set it back in the cooler until you decide what you want to do with it.

To begin the process of removing the Belly, mark a line on either side of the Loin just past the kernals of each side.

The line you just marked is meant to guide your saw, so that you don't.... mess up.

Saw through the bone... not the meat - Saws tear meat to shreds, they are to be used only when necessary.

Any task your knife is capable of performing, use it.

Bone in Loin; Bone in Bellt. The ribs on the left are the Baby Back Ribs, to the right are the Spare Ribs.

To remove the membrane that rests between the Hog's Offal and the actual ribs/rib-meat, guide your steel between the vein on the fore-side of the rib and the membrane itself. From bottom to top, sever the connection.

Once severed, grasp the membrane with one hand and firmly guide your finger through the rest of it. Again - Relatively effortless.

Removing the Spare Ribs is pretty simple - let the pictures be your guide.

Before the Belly is done - there's a layer of fat that lays between the muscle grouping and the animal's nipples. Cut this away - notice the angle of the knife as it compares with the Belly.

The hint of blood is quite faint in the picture, but to expand on the process of removing the membrane from the ribs; starting at the spine-side of the rib, press down and force what blood remains in the vein and follow the rib all the way down. This motion will force out any remaining blood and at the same time, re-opens the vein - this is where you guide your steel into to free the membrane.

Now to bone-out the Loin. I've covered this in previous posts, so the details here will suffer a bit, but I'm assuming that if you're breaking down a whole hog, you certainly know how to bone-out a loin.

The key difference in boning these guys out in a retail environment compared to the Norcino-style is that in retail, a lot of money is in the Baby Back ribs - it's a good thing to leave a bunch of meat on the bone.. for purposes regarding Salumi and Charcuterie, the muscle itself needs to be as intact as possible. The more exposed cells on the muscle, the more of an area harmful bacteria has to operate.

Add caption

Saw the spine off of the ribs to make Baby Back ribs that anyone can easily cut through to enjoy - put these guys in the cooler and keep with the breakdown.

Very gently remove the 'tail' of the loin, leaving the clear membrane intact.

That's pretty much it, for now - Further processing will come later - Plenty of secrets to share.

Thanks as always for visiting, there's more to come on the art of Norcino-style butchery.

Reece.

Dry Aged Flat Iron. The Breakdown.

2012-02-22T18:06:00.000-06:00

I'd like to start by expressing my gratitude for all of the folks that visit my blog, especially those that have become denizens. I'm so proud of what the blog has become and I'm thrilled that there is such an interest in what I've been doing. I spread this message around earlier on Facebook and Twitter, but I'll repeat it here:

"One year. 50 posts. 100,000 page views... I wouldn't do it without you."

I truly mean that. For this site to have struck such a chord really humbles me. If no one cared, I'd be doing all this in the privacy of my own home. Instead, I've tried to invite you in and teach what I know in the formats available to me.

So without any further ado, here we go!

What you'll need: One whole, untrimmed Top-Blade Roast (Flat Iron). Cheesecloth. 1 S-hook. Twine.

This membrane runs throughout the entire muscle, tapering off at the end. Pierce the thickest part of this with a meat hook and thread some twine through it. Tie twine into a knot. This is where we'll be hanging the Flat Iron from.

Using enough cheesecloth to completely cover the roast, wrap the meat like you would a sandwich.

Make sure to keep the hook on the outside of the cloth.

Once wrapped, loosely bind the roast with twine.

Hang the roast from the top rack in your refrigerator.. The reason we're hanging this vertically is to make sure the entire roast is able to breathe. Also, make sure your fridge is nice and clean!

I let the roast hang for 10 days. You can tell when a piece is done when the meat has become noticeably more dense and the outside develops a hard crust.

Notice the deep, dark red color of the meat and the flaky brown-cream fat. The fat will feel slightly greasy; a feeling that I've come to really love!

As you would treat any hard-tissue (where muscle meats bone) and silverskin, start cleaning off the bone-side of the roast. The goal here is to expose the Flat Iron muscle as a whole and keep it intact.

For those that aren't familiar, there are two strokes in trimming silver, the forward stroke and the backward stroke. When you're going forward, your knife will be angled slightly upwards to literally scrape the meat off the silver and you back stroke is your finishing stroke - same concept, opposite angle.

Once cleaned, start peeling the Flat Iron away from the fat cap.

Peel with your free hand while severing any connective tissue with the tip of your knife. This motion should be rather fluid, in that both hands are working together.

Making progress...

I wouldn't recommend using the exposed fat for anything other than raccoon food, but I've been crazy enough to mix it with lean beef and make hamburgers - which were pretty outstanding!

Scrape off any bits of fat remaining on the layer of silverskin that met with the fat cap.

Again, trimming silver skin 101. Forwards.

Backwards.

Repeat until the muscle is smooth and clean.

Now... I vowed to keep this secret to myself, but seeing as though it's this blogs 1-year anniversary, I'm going to share with you something that me and one other person do. The other cutter that does this is my friend Sebastian, who I've had the pleasure of training for the last year or so.

Using a meat hook...

Hook the hole where the twine was to help you get a a grip that won't falter.

At this point, you'll be able to hold the roast in a solid position while you guide your knife along the top of the heavy silver. This motion is just like cleaning a fish!

After every inch or so, check your progress.

Not the cleanest I've ever done, but the method is relatively effortless compared to the way I was taught.

Trim away any remaining silver bits that may remain....

And Voila! Four servings of Dry Aged Flat Iron.

As an added bonus, I made a real-ish time video of this process - except that I forgot to turn the microphone on, so it's set to a Woody Guthrie tune and story. Enjoy!

Thanks again,

Reece.

Pork Shoulder. The Breakdown.

2012-02-21T18:15:00.000-06:00

This is home butchering in one of its most basic forms: Pork Shoulder. Not only is Pork Shoulder readily available almost anywhere, it's moderately priced and extremely versatile. I can't think of a cut of Pork more useful and versatile than the Shoulder. It's composed of multiple muscle groupings, so it offers a great introductory-level lesson in Seam Butchery. This is a video taken while my friend, Beau and I were preparing to make multiple batches of sausage with some Venison and Wild Boar that Beau bagged this season. Adding Pork to Venison and Wild Boar sausage recipes is essential on account of the wild animals being so lean!

I hope you enjoyed it, I think it's funny you can hear my daughter's movie playing in the background... Home Butchery at its finest!

An Introduction to French Sausage Making.

2012-01-19T18:09:00.000-06:00

I've collected and researched a lot of different recipes over the last few years, but none of them have fascinated me more than recipes coming from France. There are a few different types of sausages that come from there and they all have their own methods of cooking.

First off, all of the recipes that I'm going to share with you are going to call for 'Quatre-Epices.' Everyone has their own recipe for this blend of spices and all vary quite a bit, but each recipe calls for these ingredients: White Pepper with Nutmeg, Cloves, Cinnamon, and Ginger.

The first recipe I have for you is a fairly basic sausage.. These ingredients are simple, but the end result is truly delicious: 2# Pork, 2# Chicken, 1# Veal. Sticking with Ruhlman's suggestion, I always start with 1 1/2 ounces Kosher salt for each 5# sausage, but amounts will vary with every batch. 2 Tsp Quatre-Epices. 1 cup Parsley, 1 cup White Wine, 1 Tsp Black Pepper.

In a bowl large enough to comfortably mix everything, combine ingredients.

Mix well until you've reached the primary bind. Do you see how the meat is bound together in a single mass? This is what you're going after. You want all of the ingredients to be evenly mixed and dispersed so that each bite is the same as the last.

Before you use the casings, make sure they've soaked for at least an hour. Replace the water multiple times and run clean, cool water through the casings at least once. Casings are packed in salt and I would hate if my recipe was botched by carelessness.

By coiling the sausage as it comes out of the stuffer, you're able to contain your mess and the aesthetic is greatly enhanced. To me, this is another added bonus of crafting my own sausages; the experience is awesome!

Look at that. Seriously. Really look at it.

The links should be around 6" long and as taught as the casing allows.

Allow the links to settle, cut and refrigerate. To cook these, fry them in rendered Duck Fat or butter or both!

Now for the Boudin Blanc.

Here, as with the Saucisse, We're going to use a mixture of Pork, Veal and Chicken - totaling 5#.
1 1/2 ounces Kosher salt, 2 Tsp Quatre-Epices, 2 Tbs Parsley, 2 cups minced onions, a dozen eggs and a pint of Heavy Cream.

Grind meat's one time and put them in the freezer, once they're nearly frozen grind them again.

Once you've ground your meats, roughly mix them with the parsley, dry spices and onions.

In a few small batches, add the egg and cream mixture. I used a potato masher to mix the eggs/cream in with the meat.

After the eggs and cream are mixed in with the meats, start whipping them together. START SLOWLY.

After a couple minutes of mixing, place the bowl back into the freezer, repeat this process until the mixture becomes homogeneous, the color should be constant and the mixture will be quite viscous.

I would absolutely suggest wearing latex gloves while handling this mixture.

Loosely stuff the sausage into the casings. If you link the sausages to tight, they will burst while cooking. I was shooting for 8" links for these.

To cook Boudin Blanc, bring 1 part Milk to 2 parts water to a boil. Gently lower a few links at a time into the liquid and simmer for ~30 minutes. This would be a great time to take a break and drink some wine.

Once the sausages are done, fry them in butter, duck fat or a mixture of both. Enjoy!

There's a real nice lineup of posts waiting for you all, so stay tuned!

-Reece

How-to: Salsiccias - A Cured, Spreadable Sausage.

2012-01-11T22:19:00.000-06:00

Before I talk about what the heck this sausage is all about, I need to start with the first step of the process: Certified Pork. Certified Pork has many names and what it means is basically, through freezing, all possible Trichinae larvae that MAY be present have been killed by a thorough process. The Federal regulations on this process are pretty tedious and detailed but any and all sources will agree on a few of the principals:

Freeze Pork in blocks that measure no thicker than 6" in any direction and freeze for:

20-30 days at 5F

10-20 days and -10F

6-12 days at -20F.

I used the freezer at work which maintains a pretty constant -10 degrees and kept the meat frozen for 21 days, just to be sure. At this point the Pork could be eaten raw with little or no worry!

Now, for a word on the recipe. A gentlemen I worked with in Milwaukee scribbled this recipe down for me after he brought in some of the sausage for the guys at the shop to try. This was actually the first cured meat I had ever eaten, other than bacon, and I was astounded at the dark, piquant flavor.

Basically... the way he wrote it down was pretty spotty, so after a few different tries I feel like I've nailed down the ingredients to fit my palate. Here we go!

5# Pork
1.5 ounces Kosher Salt
1 1/2 TBS Sugar
1 TSP Insta-Cure #2
2 TSP Black peppercorns, toasted and ground
1/2 TSP Coriander seeds, toasted and ground
1 TSP Garlic powder
1 TSP Mace, ground
1/2 TSP Cayenne.

The cayenne plays an important role aside from adding flavor, the capsaicin helps to cure the meat as well as adding to the piquant-flavor of the cure.

Thoroughly mix all of the seasonings, making sure there are no clumps - Mace tends to clump. For those of you that are interested in this sort of thing, the seasonings have a combined weight of ~2 1/8 ounces.

Pour about half the seasonings onto the meat, mix a little and pour the rest on.

Reach the primary bind! In most of the recipes that I have shared with you all, temperature plays a vital role in sausage making - however, in this recipe, temperature isn't the most important factor. After tying off the links, this sausage will be hung at 60F -or less- for 48 hours to dry and cure.

What I absolutely loved about this recipe is how fast the salt and sodium nitrate started working! Almost instantly the color of the meat started to change!

This hank (one casing) was exceptionally healthy and was able to fit all 5# with ease - I was able to finish a different batch of sausage and still had some leftover casing.

Another aspect of this sausage that distinguishes itself from others that I have made is that the links should be tied with string at 3" intervals instead of being twisted. Notice how the color has completely changed - from the time I seasoned the meat to the time it took to link and tie was maybe 15 minutes, and the overall color and composition has entirely change.

I hung these next to a pair of windows in my kitchen that has allowed for the temperature to stay below 60 over the course of drying these. Luckily for me, Texas has really mild winters! During the day today, the temperature started to rise a bit so I put the links in the fridge for the 'hot' part of the day.

This was taken right around the 32 hour mark - as you can see the sausages are dry and a reddish hue is beginning to develop. This red hue is what you're going for.

Right at 48 hours after being hung, you can see the links have taken on a reddish-hue.

And believe it or not, these are meant to be eaten as-is. They're not raw, they're not cooked. It's a curing process that takes 48 hours. This recipe ONLY works with CERTIFIED PORK, so if you're interested... plan ahead. I'd recommend only to enjoy these as-is for two, maybe three days, otherwise you can cook them like any other sausage. If not...

Bake them gently. These cooked at 225F for a little over an hour before I pulled them out. I temp'd them at 139, turned off the oven and let it cool. I'll wrap what I'll eat this week and freeze the rest.

I hope you've enjoyed this installment, it sure was fun making this for you (and me).

Next up will be an introduction to French Sausage Making - Boudins Blanc and Saucisses.

- Reece

How-to: Maintain Wooden Cutting Boards and Wood-handled Knives

2012-01-11T18:43:00.000-06:00

One of the topics I haven't touched on much is that of maintenance and because I want this blog to be an all-encompassing 'How-to' on being a Home Butcher, I'd like to start with the essentials - The cutting board and the knife.

It's hard to beat the beauty of a wooden cutting board but many of the ingredients you're likely to use are rather harsh on them; onions especially. A good friend of mine has a saying that really affected me the first time I heard it - "Regular maintenance is mankind's only defense against entropy." This... mentality... has made an impact on a lot of what I do, and I'm rarely bored because of it.

The most readily available product to help preserve your cutting boards is Food Grade Mineral Oil. It's relatively inexpensive and can be found at any restaurant supply companies, and certainly online. If I recall correctly, this container was $7.99. Grab a clean kitchen towel and a clean tupperware and soak with the oil.

I keep the towel saturated with some excess oil in the bottom of the container.

To put it quite simply, all you're going to be doing is wringing out the towel like you would any other and wiping down the surface. Wipe down all the sides and let the oil soak in for ~10 minutes. Once the oil soaks into the board, apply another coat.

While marveling at the sheen of your (easily maintained) cutting board, take out your wooden handles cutlery and treat the handles in the same fashion as the cutting board.

The two knives on the left are both Forschner chef knives that I found for $1.99 a piece at a thrift store today (Jan. 11). I know. I couldn't believe it either. The edges were in decent shape and I could tell they had never been sharpened which told me two things two things; These knives are fairly old because they still have the "Forschner: stamp on the blade, instead of today's "Victorinox" and that these knives were pretty gently used. Needless to say, but I'll say it anyway - I was stoked to find these.

It took less than 15 minutes to oil the cutting boards and these handles. Resetting the bevels and sharpening my new knives took much longer, but I couldn't be more excited to have them.

The next few weeks should see multiple new posts. Most excitingly will be an introduction to French Sausage Making. Also, in the next few days I will have some mighty-exciting news for you all, so STAY TUNED!

Reece

How-to: Beef Prime Rib.

2011-12-26T17:28:00.000-06:00

First off, you'll need a Prime Rib. This is a Boneless Dry Aged (57 days) Rib Roast. Total weight was ~9.5#.

To season the roast, I mixed Plenty of Kosher salt with some dried thyme, white pepper, toasted black peppercorns and a small amount of dried sage. I combined these ingredients in my coffee grinder and ground them for a few seconds to blend all the flavors together. I let the roast sit out on my cutting board for the better part of an hour so that'd it'd come to room temperature and develop a pellicle for the seasoning to stick to.

Due to lack of available supplies, I had to improvise with the 'Oven-Searing Stage'. I didn't have a spare rack to rest the roast on and I didn't want to bother with flipping that large of a roast next to a 500F oven. I suspended the roast over the pan using twine. I put the roast in the oven and let it sear for ~20 minutes at 500F.

Once it reach a really nice golden color, I snipped the twine and backed the oven down to 325.

The roast took around 3 hours pot-searing. We let it rest while loosely covered with foil for ~20 minutes while we prepared the Yorkshire Puddings.

This roast yielded 12 thick steaks that were easily the best I had ever had. If you've never tried to cook Prime Rib before, do yourself a favor and give it a shot - it's surprisingly easy and the end result is truly delicious.

How-to: Home Made Boudin.

2011-12-13T19:22:00.000-06:00

Alright, Guys... Here we go! Boudin is absolutely one of my favorite sausages, so in order to make a batch, I've been researching tons of recipes to get an idea of what makes the Boudin true. I didn't want to throw together some rice and pork and make it spicy.. I wanted to make a delicious, authentic batch that will blow my Cajun buddies away - We'll soon find out what they think!

Before I go any further, here's the recipe I decided on:
3# Pork Shoulder - my favorite section can be referred to as the Collar, and is the same cut used in the production of Coppa.
~2# Pork liver - I bought a little over 2# but after cleaning it, was more like 1.8#
3 stalks Celery, roughly chopped
1 small onion, roughly chopped
2 Tbls black peppercorns, toasted
2 ounces Kosher salt
3 tsp dried thyme
2 tsp cayenne
3 green onions, diced
2 cups rice.

Pork collar and Pork liver. Best friends.

Add the Collar, Liver, onions, celery and peppercorns into 2 quarts water. I sneaked some of my chicken stock in there, too... Bring water to a soft boil and let the pot braise.

After the meats braised for a few hours, pull them out. Discard the celery, onions and peppercorns but save the stock - Use the stock to cook the rice and also to add to the mixture to assist in forming the primary bind..

Before you use the stock, make sure to strain it first.

Most of the recipes I looked through called for the meat to be ground.. I don't have a grinder at home (yet) but I figured if the meat was cooked properly, I could chop it by hand. I will say the the liver turned out fairly tough, so I made sure to pulverize it very well before adding it to the meat.

I nearly dropped the rice on account of being so excited about this step...

Mix together the dry seasonings as well as the green onions, pour into the meat.

I decided I wanted to cold-smoke the Boudin, I thought it wise to add some Cure #1 at the rate of 1/2 tsp per 2.5#, Since the mixture of meat weighed ~5#, I used a full tsp.

Time to mix! This is one of the most important steps in sausage making. If a sausage is not mixed well, it will not be as good as it could have been. Take the time needed to reach the primary bind!
Also, take this opportunity to try the mixture.. this is the last chance you have to tinker with your recipe. If it needs salt, now's the time.

Poppa bear, Momma bear, Baby bear.

Link the sausages, making sure they are as uniform and as taught as the casing allows.

Hang to dry as you prepare the smoker. this step allows the seasonings to continue to dissolve and the Sodium Nitrite will start doing it's thing.

Once dried, (2 hours for these), take them out to the smoker... By now you'll be so hungry you can hardly stand it.

And there we have it, friends - Home made Pork Boudin. I hope you've enjoyed this as much as I have.. It's been swell and all but it's time for me to EAT! As always, thank you. -Reece

Whole Chicken. The Breakdown.

2011-11-15T18:13:00.000-06:00

Alright.. I feel like it's been a long time coming for a how-to on whole chickens, so here we go!

The first step is cutting off the wings. This hen is currently 'under arrest' so release the wings and begin by moving the joint around to get an idea of where the wing is attached to the rest of the bird.

Once you found the joint, cut down into it to expose the connection.

Using the tip of your knife, work your way around the drum of the wing while pulling the wing away from the bird.

Hanging on by a thread.

Repeat this process for the second wing.

After the wings are taken care of, direct your attention to the legs. The first step in removing legs is simple. Make an incision into the loose skin between the leg and breast.

Tear the skin to free the Leg from the rest of the bird.

Grab the leg by the thigh and force the thigh-bone out of the joint. You'll hear a 'pop'.

Pressing your knife against the carcass, work your way through the meat - obviously leaving as little as possible on the back - until you reach, and break, the cartilage that connects the thigh to the back.

Once that cartilage is broken, you can pull the rest of the leg off.. If you do this correctly, the oyster from the thigh that rests on the back will remain on the thigh.

Cut the skin to finish out this step.

Repeat this process for the other leg.

A perspective of the back, legs and wings removed.

A perspective of the breast, wings and legs removed.

To separate the thigh and drumstick, manipulate them until you have a bearing on where the joint is and cut through. Your knife should glide through this meat effortlessly. Ideally you will be cutting through meat and cartilage, if you run into bone, just force your knife and repair it later.

Take your knife and cut the flaps of tissue that connect the breasts from the bottom of the back.

Place the chicken neck-side-down. This step is unbelievably simple once you've figured it out however, until you do you will make it harder than hell. Place your knife on the outer side of where the oysters were, dig in a little bit until you get to the ribs and force your knife down through them until you reach your block.

Repeat this process on the other side of the back. This is what your two primals should look like.

To remove the keel bone, make a shallow incision through the cartilage at the top (neck/head-side) and continuing down the length of bone. This is the first step of separating the two breasts.

I use my thumb to split the keel bone from either side of the breasts.

A bare keel bone.

Once the keel bone is removed, cut through the wishbone and separate the two breasts.

That small red dot in the middle of the meat is part of the wishbone.

slide your knife under the wishbone to clear it out of the way.

Using the tip of your knife, cut the ribs away from the breast.

Now we're going to make some boneless skinless thighs.

Cut the meat away from both side of the thigh bone, once you can get your knife around the drums...

... bend the meat backwards to force the bone outwards. Slide your knife down the length of the bone until you reach the block. Remove the skin and you're done!

As an added bonus, I'm going to quickly show you how to make Airline Chicken Breasts.

Halve the chicken, separating the white meat from the dark meat.

You'll cut away the skin and tissue connecting the two halves and break the back at the beginning of the ribs.

Starting at the upper back, near the wings, start scraping away the scapula until the 'shoulder blades' and wing joints are exposed.

Once the wings are removed from the carcass, start pulling away the carcass while knifing any tissue that connects the meat to the bone. Working your way around the wishbone is probably the hardest aspect of doing this.

Once the ribs are cut away and all that's left connecting the carcass and the meat is the keel bone, peel the carcass back to expose the boneless breast.

And there you have it, a forgotten cut from a time when airlines still served proper food. Airline Chicken Breasts.

How-to: Canadian Bacon.

2011-11-15T12:50:00.000-06:00

In this recipe, lean is king. Canadian Bacon recipes call for all fat and sinew to be removed, so when shopping for the Pork Loin, I looked for the one with the most fine-grain marbling I could find. This view highlights the end of the Rib-eye section of the loin and the beginning of the Center-cut section. At the top right of the muscle, you can see the end of the Rib-eye's cap-muscle.

This view shows the center of the loin, the cap off fat on top is beginning to dissipate, as well as the kernel.

For the first step, turn the loin over with the Rib-eye section facing you. You can simply peel the cap and kernel away from the loin with your fingers.

Any connective tissue is easily broken.

Once you've peeled the majority of the cap off, you can roll the loin away from the cap.

Once you've removed the cap, save it for later - You can make Salt Pork, or save for making Sausage.

The second layer of tissue to be removed is almost as simple, but may require a knife. This kind of trimming utilizes a sort of pushing motion, you don't want to cut into the meat, but you're trying to take off the fat and silver skin in one piece.

Now that the Loin is left fairly bare, the next step is going to be removing the heavy silver skin from the top of the Loin.

In portions of an inch or so wide at a time, slip your knife in and push forward while tilting your knife slightly upwards. The idea here is to get all the silver off without cutting into the meat.

Long knife strokes aren't the easiest but are absolutely worth practicing.

Now we have an entirely lean Pork Loin.

Now it's time to make the brine. Warm a gallon of water on the stove. While your water is warming, weigh out a cup and a half of Kosher salt, 1 cup sugar and 1 ounce Cure #1 (Sodium Nitrite). Tie together a bunch of Thyme and a bunch of Sage and smash a handful of Garlic Cloves. Add these ingredients to the warmed water and stir until Salts and Sugar are dissolved and the mixture becomes aromatic. Remove from heat and let to come to room temperature and then chill in the refrigerator. DO NOT put the Loin in until the brine's temperature is below 40F. You do not want the brine to cook the meat!

Submerge the loin completely, weigh down with a plate and refrigerate. I allowed the Loin to brine for a little less than 3 full days.

Remove the loin from the brine and rinse off thoroughly and discard the brine.

Once you've rinsed the Loin off, pat dry with paper towels and refrigerate uncovered for a day (or two).

I didn't want the Loin to be overly smoky, so I only smoked it for an hour and a half, then finished it in a 225F oven. Once the meat reached 150F I pulled it out, cut some up for my friends and refrigerated the rest. I feel the need to say that this was one of the best tasting and most enjoyable recipes I've recreated and I would definitely recommend you try this at home!

How-to: Home Made Bratwurst.

2011-11-01T19:08:00.000-05:00

First off, you'll need some sort of sausage press. I use an LEM 5-Pound Capacity press. I've adapted all of my favorite recipes into 2.2-2.5# batches, so this press is ideal for me.

Whenever you buy Casings from your butcher, they'll usually sell you Hanks (a whole casing) that are packed in salt. If this is the case, make sure you let the hank soak in running water for 20-30 minutes. I make sure to rinse these very well, I'd hate to make a nice batch of sausage and have residual salt messing up my recipe!

List of ingredients: 1.6# Ground Pork, .6# Ground Veal, 1Tbs Kosher Salt, 2 Tbs Chives, 1 1/2 Tsp White Pepper, 1 Tsp Caraway, 1 Tsp Marjoram, 1/2 Tsp Nutmeg and 1/3-1/2 Tsp Ground Ginger. To help with the mixing and binding of ingredients, you can add about 1/2 cup cold water as well as a couple egg whites.

Keeping your sausage mixture cold is very important in sausage making, if it get's too warm the finished product will be affected. From Charcuterie, (Ruhlman, Polcyn) "Sausage that gets too warm can 'break,' meaning the fat and the protein will separate from each other when cooked. You can't always see this happen when you're making the sausage, but it results in a dry, crumbly texture, rather than a smooth, firm, juicy bite"

While you're readying your dry ingredients, lightly mix the Pork and Veal in a bowl and put it in the Freezer. Once your spices are ready, pour them on top and mix thoroughly.

A thorough mix is as important as keeping the temperature as low as possible. Thorough mixing of ingredients results in the Primary Bind - a solid, evenly mixed, sticky mass. Once you've reached the primary bind, stick the mixture back in the freezer for another 20-30 minutes.

While your sausage is cooling, ready your casings / press. Roughly 18" of casing will hold about a pound of sausage.. Remembering that our mixture is ~2.5#, measure out about 5' of casing and slide it onto the nozzle.

Stuff the mixture into the container and press down to remove any air pockets.

Crank the press down until the meat is at the edge of the nozzle.

Once the meat has reached the end of the nozzle, start feeding the casing until there is a couple inches of excess at the end of the nozzle.

Start cranking! One of my favorite aspects of hand-crank stuffers is the amount of control the user has over the speed of the process. It is both aesthetically pleasing to coil the sausage as it comes out of the nozzle and useful in containing the surface area of the mess you'll end up making.

Once the sausage in the stuffer runs out, remove the rest of the casing from the nozzle, if there's a lot left and you plan on making another batch, simply cut the casing an inch or so past the end of the first batch.

To link sausage, measure out your link and pinch if off at the end. To twist the sausage, pinch both ends and swing it end over end a few times, until the link is firm. If any air pockets occur, you can pop them with a toothpick, knife-tip.

Once you've linked the first sausage, continue on through the rest of the batch. Either change the direction you twist each link or 'skip' links. Measure out 6", twist, measure out another 6" but skip this link, move on to the next link and twist the same direction as the first. This will effectively the time of the process in half.

To cook Bratwurst, toast some Caraway seeds in the bottom of a pot. Once the seeds are toasted, pour in a few beers and a little water, a bay leaf and lightly simmer until fully cooked. As an added bonus, you can add sliced onions and peppers to this mixture to serve alongside the sausages.

These look done enough, and besides.. I'm starving at this point.

Home Made Bratwurst, German Potato salad made from scratch, Sauerkraut and a hoagie to soak of the juices and my inner German in satisfied (I'm not at all German, just like the food.)

Home Dry Aging. Short Ribs.

2011-10-17T22:35:00.000-05:00

This is my first attempt at dry aging meat at home. I know the ins and outs of how the process works on large primals, but I have never thought about dry aging smaller cuts in my refrigerator. While my buddy Dylan and I were bagging the chicken stock I made, I was telling him about some Short Ribs I bought at work. He noticed that I had some spare cheesecloth and essentially said, "Why not?"

... and so it was!

These Short Ribs came from a Grass-Fed steer, who are not known for being very marbled, but are some of the finest Ribs I've ever seen. These pictures don't do the Ribs any justice, though... It's sad that my camera couldn't capture to superior fine-grain marbling. My boss was cutting them for the case and commented on them, I looked over, snatched them off the block and wrapped them up on the spot, he didn't even have time to separate them!

Loosely wrap the Ribs in cheesecloth and tie a knot to fasten.

Fold the excess cheesecloth at the top of the wrap and tie a tight knot, leaving a short length of string. I tied the excess string to an S-Hook to hang it from the beams in the fridge.

I tried to make sure the Short Ribs would have plenty of room to breathe and I placed a towel above the Ribs so that nothing would fall onto them.

So my best guess for how long these hung for is 9 days (birthday week, lost track of time). As you can see, the outside of the ribs has developed a nice crust. The ribs lost about an ounce and a half of moisture, leaving the meat very dense.

Trim off the outer layer of meat. You'll notice the overall texture of the meat has changed entirely. It's no longer soft and loose, rather it's sort of stiff and solid.

Cut between the ribs and ENJOY!

How-to: Chicken Stock, of the Hearty Variety.

2011-10-12T23:36:00.000-05:00

Now that the weather is turning.. I'm guessing your house's odor could use a freshening-up. Why not make some Chick Stock? The process is fairly simple, but probably best reserved for your day off. Here's what I did:

This is roughly-10# of chicken carcasses. These came from Vital Farms. I started this process after I got off work and worked into the night a bit before making dinner and going to sleep.

This here is the fixins of a Mirepoix. Mirepoix is like the Holy Trinity of Cajun/Creole cooking: 1 part carrots, 1 part onions, one part celery. For the amount of stock I'm making, some would argue that this amount of mirepoix is extraordinary, but I wanted to make a stock of the heartiest variety.. No skimping on account of the food eaten in my house!

While you're chopping up your mirepoix, start warming a pot of water and add a bouquet of fresh bay leaves. Break each leaf a bit to help release the flavor.

This is about 6# of roughly chopped mirepoix. Reserve this while you brown your chicken carcasses.

I forgot to take a picture of what they looked like after browning in the oven... BUT!! After browning, nestle the mirepoix on top of, and between, the carcasses and replace the pan in the oven to brown.

Once browned, add carcasses to warmed, seasoned water. After a few hours, add the mirepoix. Adding the mirepoix later in the process ensures that freshness of flavor inherent in the vegetables, on top of the flavor of the gelatin from the carcasses, stays constant.

Though it's already hard to resist stirring the mixture to see your work, it's still important to do so! After a few good stirs, put the lids on the pot and let the mixture simmer until the carcasses fall apart.

The process of cooking down the carcasses took roughly eight hours. I checked and stirred the mixture frequently, though I never skimmed any of the fat. A lot of how-to's and classically trained professionals will say, "skim, skim, skim..." But I don't feel the need to do so, rather... I had a better idea that will come up later..

Once the carcasses are broken down, fish the solid masses out of the pot.

Once I had all the carcasses fished out of both pots, I transferred all the liquid to my smaller pot and washed the big one (10 Qt.). Line the pot with cheesecloth. This step will strain out any small, crunchy (bones) debris.

Once all the liquid is poured, remove cheesecloth and discard. Leave the pot to cool to room temperature. You can quicken this process by transferring the liquid to an already-cool container, but since I wasn't strapped for time, I let it be.

Once the mixture is at room temperature, refrigerate until the fat gathers at the top of the pot. Once the fat is 'solidified' (lack of a better word), remove with a spoon and save for later. Chicken fat isn't the best grease to use in the world, but it's still useful.

Proper stock is supposed to be fairly translucent... Mine is barely translucent. I set out to make the heartiest stock I could to get me trough the winter (beef stock is coming soon...).

All in all, 16 qt's worth of pot-space, ~10# chicken carcasses, and ~6# Mirepoix left me with 6-2 Quart baggies of strong, hearty stock.. And enough reserves to snack on!

Freeze and stay well-fed.

-Reece

How-to: Beef Jerky at Home.

2011-08-23T18:01:00.000-05:00

There are a few different cuts of meat you can use for Jerky but I use Eye of Round. It is one of the leanest muscles
on the steer and has a nice shape when cut. You want to use the learner cuts of beef because any fat will go
rancid sooner than the meat will and the name of the game with jerky is shelf-life. If done properly, beef jerky can be stored for months in a simple plastic bag.

You'll also need Kosher salt, Chipotle chilis packed in Adobo, Garlic Powder and Onion Powder (I did all this prep-work early in the morning, so I needed some coffee, too).

Use about a half a can of the chipotles, chopped fine. Mix in ~TBLS of Garlic Powder, ~TBLS Onion Powder and
~2 ounces Salt. Mix the ingredients in a bowl and set aside.

This guy weighs about two and a half pounds. To make cutting uniform
medallions, freeze the meat for an hour or so.

Trim away all excess fat.

Cut the roast into medallions about 1/8-1/4" thick, try to be as
uniform as possible.

Mise en Place.

Transfer meat and chipotle paste in a large enough bag to hold comfortably. Manipulate
the bag until the meat is coated evenly.

Here's the fun part... It's August in Texas. It's hot. Hot enough during the day to make a proper batch
of beef jerky without any other heat source (I noticed one day that my grill was hovering around 150F during the day).
In the off-set smoke box on my grill I had a small bed of coals going for the first few hours - just enough to make wood chips smoke. This picture was taken around 7:30PM.

This is what the jerky looked like at 7;30AM the following morning. I had been tending the coal/smoke situation for most of the evening and into the night. I flipped the meat a couple of times when the temperature was high.

Here's the bagged-up Jerky after I took it off the grill at around 8:00PM.

All in all, this process took 2 days. Each of the steps are incredibly simple and the result is fantastic! Never again will I buy store-bought Jerky.

Brief Interviews with a Meat Cutter.

2011-08-22T23:21:00.000-05:00

So this is a pair of practice interviews recorded during a media training class. These are not professional interviews, intended to learn from. The class was a great experience and I was thrilled that they sent me the tapes! These are unedited videos and I certainly make some mistakes and say "umm" a lot, but I though I'd share anyway - I was able to talk about things I'm passionate about and it's great that I get to share.. Enjoy!

Dry Aged Bone In Tenderloin.

2011-08-16T12:52:00.000-05:00

I have to say, Bone In Tenderloins are one of my favorite steaks to cut-especially Dry Aged. Dry Aged meat is special and the practice is old school. Before refrigeration, steers were usually slaughtered in the fall and the untrimmed sides were hung in caves or cellars; slightly humid with lower ambient temperatures. In the right environment, moisture evaporates from the beef leaving a more enhanced and distinct beef flavor. Aside from the the difference in flavor, the connective tissues in the meat begin to break down leaving a more tender cut.

Now that we are fortunate enough to have coolers and humidity systems to dial in the right environment, we can choose the exact cuts/primals we want to age. At the shop I work at, we age three different primals on a semi-regular basis: 107's / 3x3's, Shortloin's, and Top Butts.

107 and 3x3 are different ways you can order the rib primal. Each are cut to a different specifications at the slaughterhouse, but both result in Rib-eye roasts. This primal section starts at the Chuck and ends at the Shortloin.

The Shortloin is home to two major muscles and the makings of a third. The Striploin is a boneless NY Strip roast, whole and untrimmed. The Tenderloin is the most tender muscle on the steer, both raw and cooked. The third muscle on this primal starts out as a small oval on a Porterhouse-side NY Strip and actually turns into the Top Butt / Top Sirloin.

Lastly, the Top Butt. Once cut, these are called Top Sirloins - the last of the luxury cuts. I consider a Top Sirloin to be the workingman's steak. A nice-sized Top Sirloin will easily be two pounds, able to feed 3-4 people.

This is a Shortloin. This one had been aged for 14 days.

Any time I'm going to cut into an aged primal, I trim away some of the bulk fat to clean the piece up.

This is the top side of the piece, NY on top, Tenderloin on bottom. There are a few ways to do this
step, but in essence, the goal is to make a clean cut against the bone to begin to free the Striploin from the Bone In Tenderloin.

It is a priority to get as close to the bone as possible, leaving all the meat intact, but boning out beef is notoriously hard
on an knife's edge so I wont use my sharpest knife for a few of these steps.

Usually while cutting one of these, I'll stand the primal up vertically and cut down into the spine using the tip of my knife as a fulcrum. In a few revolutions, this step will be complete with less effort and stress on your hands.

Once you've made it all the way across the spine, you'll start working in and around the plate-bones and 'buttons'.
I'm going to go ahead and promise that if you ever cut one of these, your hands will hurt afterwards. You'll be doing a huge amount of pulling as well as fine, sturdy manipulation with your knife.

Looks like I'm about two vertebrates in, at this point I am still using a 6" knife. Take baby steps with the bone structure closest to the spine, here is where you'll find the highest concentration of bone. The plates separating the Striploin and Tenderloin are fairly flat and require less knife-work.

Once I have most of the spine-work down, I'll use my 8" Breaking knife to take deeper cuts to free the meat from the plates.

Though you can't see it clearly in this picture, most of the meat can now be considered boneless. Approximately 3/4 the the Striploin has been freed.

Flip the primal over to remove the Tenderloin. While peeling the roast back, use the tip of your knife to separate the two roasts.

On the left is an unfinished masterpiece, on the right is a Boneless Striploin. Once cut and trimmed, you should be able to get 12 decent NY Strips.

Cadillac on the left, Limousine on the right.

Chine the Tenderloin Roast as you would anything else. These steaks will be single-vertebrate steaks, after you chine these the steaks are cut by hand. There's no reason to take a Tenderloin and cut it with a saw unless you're cutting T-bones.

Firm-up the Tenderloin and clear a path on the plates so that you can buzz them off without hitting any meat.

Cut between the vertebrates to get 3 Large steaks and one fair-sized steak. In my opinion, this is the hardest cut to master and one of the more dangerous. Wear a cut-resistant glove and have fun!

Boneless Beef Tenderloin. The Video Breakdown.

2011-08-11T20:30:00.000-05:00

So this will kind of highlight meat cutting in real time. I'm cutting a beef tenderloin purveyed by Premium Natural Beef , who have just become the newest addition to the Whole Foods Market family. The beef they've been sending us is of superior quality; the marbeling is excellent and the sizing of the muscles is near perfect.

Hope you enjoy the video and as always, thank you for visiting my blog!

Reece

Export Rib 3x3. The Breakdown.

2011-07-28T18:29:00.000-05:00

Chuck-End portion of a 3x3. A 3x3 is a Bone-in Rib Roast that still has the Chine bone.
As you can see, there's a hefty amount of fat covering this Primal.

Loin-End portion. The Fat covering this primal will protect it during the aging process.
At Whole Foods Market, we age meats for no less that 14 days.

This particular piece isn't going into the Dry Age Cooler, rather, I needed
some Boneless Ribeyes in my case. The first step for breaking this guy down is cleaning
it up a bit. Clear away bulk fat to give yourself a better understanding of where the
bones are.

The first incision is right along the animal's spine. You'll
need to flex your blade into these bones a bit to keep the muscle
intact.

As you can see, we're making some progress now.

I've always called this bit of tendon 'bubblegum'. You can peel it off with your
fingers

Now that the first side of the 3x3 is cleaned up, turn the 3x3 over and
focus your attention on the ribs. Starting at the 12th rib, ease your knife down into
the meat, working around the bones, across the roast. This may take three or four revolutions
to finish, so take your time!

Looking down into the meat.

Now that the ribs are removed, it's time to clean around the vertebrates.

From one side of the rib to the other, guide your knife around any bones still
holding onto the meat.

Fully removed.

Cross section of the Rib

Case Ready Ribeyes.

Steamship Round. The Breakdown.

2011-07-19T16:36:00.000-05:00

This is a Steamship Round. The Round is the hind leg of the steer. From this primal comes the
Top Round (London Broil), Eye of Round and Bottom Round Rump. The primal usually weighs around 60#.

This bone is the animals femur, making the the steer's thigh.

To remove the femur, start by making an incision along the outline of the first side of the bone with the first inch or so of your blade.

Once the first side of the bone is released, you'll be able to manipulate the position of it to allow
your knife to reach underneath the bone.

Once you have a good start on the first side, switch over to the opposite side and begin repeating the process.

To get in and around the high-side of the femur, start at the base and free the bulk of it.

Once you've gone around the top of the bone, you will be able to free a larger portion, allowing you to increase the
angle of the femur further and further.

As you work down towards the shank, keep lifting the femur upwards as this motion should be relatively fluid.

Almost done!

Just a little bit more!

Finished! Remove any meat that might remain on the femur for trimmings.

The next step is removing the Top Round. As this is butchering, the goal is to avoid cutting into any muscles, instead you will be separating them into their respective sub primals.

As you continue working this seam, the weight of the Top Round will work to your benefit and acts as if it wants
to be free from the remaning Gooseneck (Subprimal including the Eye, Rump and Pike's Peak). Also in this style of butchering you will be using your cutting hand just as much as your other hand; Pulling and knifing at the same time.

As you work your way down you can see how the muscle previously fit together, as well as being able to see where you
need to go next.

After a certain point, the Eye of Round becomes visible and the Top Round is almost completely removed.

Done! Set your Top Round aside and make room for the process of removing the Eye of Round.

Another perspective of the Femur, Gooseneck and Top Round.

To locate the seam connecting the Eye to the Rump, glide your knife along the top of the Eye. This will expose the Eye
as its' own muscle and provide you with the proper path of removing it.

Again, as you continue to make progress you can see clearly the muscles' shape and size easily.

Can you see the Eye of Round? Look closely, it's the long narrow muscle in the center of the picture.

A continued perspective on how the muscle fit together.

The next muscle grouping to me removed has many names and uses. Some folks call it Boneless Shank; The Rat; Lean Trim. Far fewer folks turn this into a Pike's Peak roast, which we'll see soon.

Starting from the top of the Rump, this grouping begins as a large, inedible tendon.

In the same fashion as removing the Femur, start at one end and work your way down using both hands effectively to make this process fluid.

Almost there!

Finished! You now have four out of the five muscles that make up the Round (missing is the Knuckle, or Sirloin Tip - removed at slaughter for packaging reasons).

Now to tackle the Top Round.

I start by clearing away some of the bulk fat to help visualize the shape and outline of the meat.

Up until now, the only knife I've been using has been a flexible six-inch boning knife. For use in trimming larger primals
such as this one, an eight-inch breaking knife will be much more efficient and comfortable.

Excess fat removed, it's now time to break down the meat.

Remove the grey-ish section of meat first, this is caused when the Primal was vacuum-sealed; discard this section.

There is a Cap on the Top Round that is easily located, remove this.

As you're peeling the cap back, continue assisting the process with your knife - As with removing the Femur, you'll only be using the tip of your blade.

This cap incases the Top Round from the top, all the way around to the side.

Working your way down, now.

Follow the seam until the cap is removed.

Face your roast perpendicular to the grain.

There is a vein and some Silver Skin that should be removed from the bottom of the roast, once completed the Primal is finished. Now you can cut steaks, roasts, lean stew, etc.

Now for the Rump (Bottom Round).

There is a large tendon on the Silver-Skin-side of the roast, remove and discard.

Remove the heavy Silver Skin, there will be some meat remaining on it that you'll need to clean off but the time it takes to cleanly remove the s-s is greater than the time it takes to clean it.

The Eye of Round doesn't require much explaining, just removed the fat it's incased in, leaving you with and extremely lean roast that's perfect for making lunch meat and beef jerky.

Opposite side.

Now for the Pike's Peak roast. As you can see, this primal is ugly and if you intend to retail it as a roast it requires a lot of work. Some folks don't retail this cut as it is great to use in the grinds but I'd rather retail every muscle possible!

Remove all outer fat and silver skin.

Once the top of your roast is clean, flip it over and focus on the bottom.

Do you see the high concentration of Silver running through the middle? That's what referred to as the rat, remove this.

In a 'rolling' motion, peel the rat out with your left hand, using your knife to separate.

Almost done!

Once removed you can return your focus in the Pike's Peak. Remove the heavy silver skin and roll the roast once you've completed cleaning it. At this point you can tie and retail your roast.

Cleaned and rolled.

And you're finished! All in all, this took me roughly 30 minutes, cleaning up my mess probably took longer than creating it!

As always, THANK YOU for your sustained interest in butchery and the work I'm doing with this blog. I hope you've enjoyed!

-Reece