When old ways meat the new
WHEN she lived in Sydney, Emma Wills did her meat shopping at Feather and Bone, a shop that buys meat only from regenerative farms raising animals on pasture.
“I learned a lot from being a customer,” Emma said last week. “I became more interested in the ethics of meat productions and where my meat came from.”
When she and her husband Pete moved to Tasmania (a return home for Emma) she found it wasn’t as easy as she thought it would be to find the sort of meat she wanted. Small farms that sold meat from ethically raised animals mostly sold a whole or half carcass, and Emma did not have the freezer space to accommodate such a purchase.
And so Emma worked with friend Allison Horswill to cook up a boutique meat business with a feminine front. Allison had had the name Meat Mistress in mind for a while.
They got a big break when Dark Mofo Winter Feast curator Jo Cook teamed them with Josh Wheeler of Melbourne specialty butcher Meatsmith for a star turn in the Heavy Metal Kitchen, which also involved a little tour of some of our most innovative (or should that be oldfashioned) meat producers.
Although they had not intended to buy an existing butcher, when they heard Bayside Meats in Lower Sandy Bay was about to become available they investigated, and have been in business there since early August.
Feeling their way into the community and careful to accommodate existing customers they have not altered the signage, but the shop will probably be called Bayside Meats: Home of Meat Mistress.
Allison has kept her day job, but Emma works in the shop, with head butcher Andrew Newcombe, butcher Matthew Sproule and apprentice Elizabeth Clark.
Emma says she is “the most exhausted I have ever been”, including early weeks with “pretty easy baby” Evie, who is nearly three now. As a shopper, Emma was looking for a connection with producers and their farms, and that is what she practises now she is buying in bulk.
The first new line was free-range pastured duck from Strelleyfield Farm near Launceston, grown by Matthew Crane.
Pork comes from Daniel and Kim Croker’s Fork it Farm at Lebrina and from Guy Robertson’s Mount Gnomon near Penguin.
Lamb comes from George and Galina Shea’s Lyndall property near Hamilton and Lamb of Tasmania.
Beef still is bought in boxes and it’s not always easy to know where it was grown. “We are taking the transition quite slowly,” Emma said.
“We want to keep the old customers with us. We want to make sure everyone can get what they are after. You can pick up something on the way home after work, or you can get more information about where the meat comes from. It’s also about building up understanding about why you should pay a bit more.”
That part is simple to explain: It costs more to raise an animal with room to range, to leave it to grow older and in a way that does not damage the environment. And so meat from such animals costs more.
Supply might not be constant. Ducks are delivered once a fortnight and “when they’re gone they’re gone until next lot comes in”, Emma said.
Lamb raised whatever way is more expensive at the moment because of the mainland drought, because growers sell for the best price.
Her staff are keen for Emma to be more hands-on, and she has had a part in creating the recipe and making Peking duck sausages, with free-range duck, hoisin sauce, spring onion, coriander and a little chilli.
“We were very happy with them,” said Emma. “That was a great day in the butchery.”
They have also made beef and cauliflower cheese sausages and coming up are pork and fennel.
The vegetables in the products and for sale in the shop come from Backyard Bounty.
Not everything the Meat Mistress does is innovative. Just as her grandfather Charles Watson would have done at his butcher’s shop in St Georges Square in Launceston, Emma gives away a free cocktail saveloy to any child allowed to have one.