Welsh Country - Issue93 - Mar-Apr 20

welsh food & drink
Will Lloyd, Machynlleth
I’ve been asked about meat production in Wales. The last
40 years has been a real rollercoaster with EEC Regulations,
foot and mouth disease, BSE, more veterinary controls, and
generally more costs to run a small abattoir / cutting plant
and retail meat business. But if you stay in something long
enough ‘the wheel goes round’ meaning in the ‘80s they
wanted to close all small abattoirs and the way The Ministry
Of Agriculture tried to do this was to put massive costs on
these old buildings, making sure that the spending of those
hundreds of thousands would not be justified with the small
throughput the abattoirs had.
I was 19 and dangerous, meaning that I was not going to
see a long established, well-run family business closed by
people with clipboards.
After spending over £280K to be compliant I am proud of
my facilities and was glad that my late father ‘Billo’ saw and
appreciated the effort both mentally and financially. He was
proud of me and what we had achieved.
My dad used to sell what he wanted, I sell what the
customer wants, which is a big difference.
Our shop in Machynlleth caters for traditional comfort
foodies with lambs liver, neck of lamb cawl, roasted crackled
belly pork squares to the ‘new’ younger housewives who
want ‘more ready meats’ such as lamb steaks in garlic and
rosemary, minted lamb racks, pork in sweet chilli or lime
and chilli and a host of sausage from Welsh dragon, pork
and leek, lamb and mint, beef and horseradish.
Cater for ‘traditional and new’ but be different from the
enemy!
All of a sudden. it’s ‘OK ya’ to have a small abattoir in
your town as people boast the “leg of mountain lamb that
we are having for Sunday lunch comes from Huw Thomas,
Nant Y Gaseg Farm”, likewise the “slow cooked shoulder of
Salt Marsh lamb comes from Rees Brothers, Penmaenbach
Pennal”. Both these farms are about 5 - 6 miles from our
abattoir.
Traceable, local, low carbon footprint product and
completely sustainable, we are doing it and have been for
40 years or Tesco and Co would have swallowed us up and
do you know, by doing it our way we are helping to save
the planet - as an aside. Is this ok? Please do use your local
butcher or risk losing them.
Tom Samways, Cardigan
I first started butchery 22 years ago at the age of 14.
There have been many changes over the years which have
seen butchers shops evolve from simply selling just your
standard pork chops and mince to now the convenient oven
ready range. We first started doing fresh oven ready foods
about 6 years ago and since then have seen a really a massive
increase from customers who want good quality, freshly
made and easy to cook meals. Gone are the days when ‘the
wife’ will spend all day at home looking after the children.
Most households these days have 2 full time workers so we
look to offer good quality, convenient food that doesn’t cost
the earth. I genuinely think that if we hadn’t gone down this
route then the shop in Cardigan wouldn’t be here today.
The advantage of taking this route is that people who
come into the shop for our oven ready foods will also buy
all the usual cuts. They also buy steaks, sausages and bacon
- all their meat for the week because they put their trust
our products. We’ve seen a massive increase in trade in the
amount of steaks we sell and that’s because we’ve installed a
Dry Ager. Initially our customers weren’t sure what to make
of it as no-one else in the area had one. But our customers
trusted us and once they had tasted the finished steaks they
were amazed with the flavour.
Our business is built on our personal service, sourcing the
product locally and giving our customers a reason to trust
us. One of the biggest changes I’ve witnessed in butchery
which I never thought I’d see is how butchers are now
working with each other. Gone are the days where your
biggest competitor is the butcher down the road. Our biggest
competition is the supermarkets who drive down the price
for the farmer to offer cheap meat. Four times a year myself
and many butchers from around the country get together
for a premier Welsh butchers’ meeting where we swap ideas,
recipes and have chats about what’s selling, what’s new and
where the trade is going. The club itself is expanding with
every meeting and it’s great to see that butchers are thriving
across the UK. I’ve worked in the same shop for the last 20
years and took that shop over just 2 years ago. I think with
the help of other butchers and a passion for the job there’s
no reason why we can’t do another 20 years.
Mar - Apr 2020 31