So many recipes seem to assume we have this friendly first-name relationship with our local butcher. Or that we have a local butcher at all! These recipes advise us to "ask your butcher for this..." or "have your butcher do that..." Well, what if we're not quite there yet?
Step one should properly be "find yourself a butcher." Small neighborhood butchers and meat markets are becoming much more common than they have been in the past several decades. Take a look at this list to see if there's one near you:
• Old-School Butchers in Your Neighborhood
Even if you don't have a butcher near you, keep your eye out at farmer's markets. Those vendors selling meat from coolers are often butchers, too! But even befriending the guy or gal who runs the meat counter at your local Whole Foods or chain grocery store is a great idea and will be a big help when it comes to making requests.
Once you've located your butcher-of-choice, the next step is making friends. Here's our advice on that:
1. Smile - You'd be surprised how far this gets you...and how often customers don't smile when making requests.
2. Make Eye Contact - Not only is making eye contact polite, but it will help fix your face in your butcher's mind (and vise versa!).
3. Go Regularly - Make it a point to buy meat from this butcher frequently enough that you start to establish a relationship. Also, vendors of every kind love repeat customers and will be more than happy to welcome you back.
4. Ask Questions - A good butcher knows much more than simply how to chop a steak. They can answer questions on recipes, advise on different cuts, and suggest cooking methods. Just being curious goes a long way toward establishing a friendship.
5. Give It Time - Don't be offended if your butcher doesn't recognize you on the second or even third visit. Just keep returning and keep smiling, and you'll gradually develop a relationship over time.
Why bother to befriend your butcher at all? Other than the fact that it's just a nice thing to do, having an established relationship with your butcher makes it much easier to make special requests when the time comes. More than likely, once your butcher becomes familiar with your cooking style and interests, they'll make suggestions or save special cuts that they think you'll like. It becomes a way for you to grow as a cook.
Do you have a friendly butcher that you go to? Any more tips on establishing a relationship with them?
Related: Smart Shopper: What to Look for When Buying Meat
(Image: Flickr member Northampton Museum licensed under Creative Commons)
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The biggest difficulty for me is timing - I tend to shop after work, and by that time the butcher (or the guy at the meat counter) is gone or is closing up and getting ready to leave. (There is a butcher shop in my area but it closes by 6 pm and is in "shut down" mode (sweeping the floors, clearing the cases) by 5:30 or earlier). My other option is shopping on Saturday, but that means struggling with crowded stores, long lines, and rushed service.
We have a great butcher, the local university agriculture program. They have an animal science program where students learn the entire process from raising animals to butchering. We have asked them for some unusual cuts for French and Asian recipes and they seem to enjoy the challenge. They're only open 6am to 3pm on weekdays and 30 miles away but I usually have meetings nearby a few times a year so I stop by before my meeting. I call or email my order a couple of weeks in advance and it's packed and frozen until I pick it up.
I'm lucky--my neighborhood (Astoria, Queens, NYC) is bursting with butchers. And the butchers tend to remember who I am because I'm not a crabby 70-year-old lady who's micromanaging them as they slice up the lamb chops.
The only time they've failed me was when I needed brisket. They had it, but had no idea how to cut it for corned beef--I wound up with this weird thick hunk. So play to your butcher's strengths (mine are all Greek and Italian), at least to start with.
Also, I've found that by expressing interest in humanely raised meat and the like, the butchers in my neighborhood are looking into that more.
I've finally mastered the art of befriending my butcher! I started shopping for meat during my lunch break because the store is less crowded then (and I'm lucky enough to have a refrigerator in my office).
I've found the best opener is to smile and say, "Hi! I'm thinking about cooking X and the recipe calls for Y. Is there a better/more cost effective/etc cut of meat?" Usually we get to talking about cooking and they'll throw in an extra pork chop or piece of fish. There are a few butchers in my local store who don't know or don't care about cooking so they're tougher nuts to crack, but I've learned the schedules of my favorite guys.
This also works really well at cheese counters. But don't do that because you'll end up with a lot of cheese. A LOT of cheese.
My problem is that we only have generic grocery stores and the butchers, if they're at the counter, are mostly antisocial teenage boys. Plus, I don't know a THING about cuts, etc. so I feel kinda stupid because I don't even know what I don't know, ya know?
i know this is a silly question, but even if i can find a local butcher in my area there is no guarantee that the meat is locally sourced and humanely raised/slaughtered right? guess i'd just need to ask eventhough my guess is that it wont be.
when i lived in argentina, i had a butcher that was had become a fanatic jew...he found out he had some jewish grandfather, so all of a suden he was learning hebrew and so on, when he found out i was jewish he started to give me any cut i wanted. but when he found out i was not religious, i had to work harder for my cuts. hahaha. i had to send my husbands cousin that spoke hebrew to practice with him at the shop to get what i wanted. those days are long gone, now that i am in spain, i still have not found my butcher. cross my fingers i find a good one soon. :)
The opening of your article is funny, I've always thought the same thing. I have the same peeve when I read fashion magazines that have suggestions for having my 'local tailor' do all these alterations to accommodate for a modern fit/style. I live in New York (not Manhattan) and I am yet to find a cutting edge personal tailor as they described. I get my pants hemmed at the dry cleaner.
Oh we have a lovely butcher on the next block. Its old-school, you can see whole sides of meat hung up, they'll cut things up on demand, have unusual cuts, and stock rare meats and delicacies. I always come up feeling happy about my high quality meat. Much better than buying meat in a polystyrene case from the supermarket.
Good tips, but probably for most people in the country you really won't have a butcher or be able to develop a relationship with one. Butchers are on the decline so they're not always close by, and around my neighborhood at least their stores are quite a bit more expensive than the grocery store. (Not that the extra cost isn't worthwhile to support a small, personal business, but it does put it out of reach for many people.) I wish so many recipes didn't tell you to "ask your butcher"! Just give us the facts about how we can do it ourselves or use a more commonly available product.