Butcher Shop

During the first years of my married life, I worked in a meat department at a grocery store in our small town. It certainly was not my dream job but it definitely taught me a lot about the world of butchery. As with most grocery store meat departments, we were not responsible for the front end process of dispatching animals. Our job was to break down and package the meat sent our way from other entities. The butcher I worked for was quite the character and he never failed to dredge up a story or two for anyone available to listen, which was most often me. I could hold my own in the story department so we were never void of conversation.

My primary job responsibilities were packaging and cleaning up. The butcher broke down quarters of beef or pork and I packaged, weighed, sealed and labeled everything for the meat case. Sometimes I helped grind beef for our hamburger packages. The grinder was enormous and a miserable beast to clean. I wrestled big clunky parts of that grinder in my stainless steel sink, often counting the minutes until the last part was finished. Another task I had was packaging on liver day. A cow's liver is rather massive and it has to be sliced into smaller portions. I used a large 2-pronged fork to spear the individual pieces and place them into smaller round containers. The containers were weighed and labeled for sale. I am not a huge fan of eating liver but I did take home a container on occasion and fry up a batch of liver and onions. The price was right and my generation was always reminded by our parents, "Eat your liver. It is good for you." 

I left that job when my daughter was born. The pay was not worth hiring a babysitter and I wanted to stay home with her as long as possible. I enjoyed my time in the meat department, but I knew it was not a career for me. Circumstances made it possible for me to eventually finish my teaching degree and finally begin many years in the classroom. A career I loved. 

Circumstances intervened again and my husband and I recently found ourselves working in a meat department of sorts. Due to the craziness of the wicked C-19, my sister and her husband faced a surplus of hogs with no place to sell them when the packing plants were shut down. In an attempt to save at least a few of them for a valuable cause, family members joined in the effort to butcher, package and label the pork for personal use. To be clear, my sister and her husband did the majority of the heavy lifting. The rest of us followed orders to the best of our abilities. 

Despite my time working in a meat department, I had no experience in the actual breaking down of the meat portions. My cooking experience gave me more direction because I know what cuts and sizes I can efficiently manage. I also know how to work with knives. That being said, I was the only one who cut myself during our first round. Pro tip: duct tape works better than bandaids for sealing off a wound.

Fortunately, the pork production crisis has eased in recent months. Even so, my sister and her husband found that they wanted to continue dabbling in the process. We were invited again last week to join in another round and we didn't hesitate to accept the offer. The thought of fresh pork chops on the grill was too tempting to pass up. 

Within 24 hours we were back on the road for our return trip home with all fingers intact and no need for  duct tape. And our coolers were full of porky possibilities. Mission accomplished.