Openings

Butchers Gone Wild: Rabbit Puppets, Date Butchering, and Good Ol’ Pat LaFrieda

Photo: AHNY

Tom Mylan, who opened the Meat Hook today, tells Fork in the Road about the concept of “date butchering”: “Well it’s Saturday night, you can have couple drinks— we always have some beer around— hang out, watch some butchering, and go out to eat afterwards.” Sounds great! Actually, the students don’t get to butcher, but some “meat-curious New Yorkers” got a taste of rabbit killing over at another Williamsburg spot, Roberta’s, where urban farmer Novella Carpenter gave a class on raising and killing rabbits yesterday. “Although Ms. Carpenter burned sage and spoke of dispatching an animal as a solemn task,” writes Diner’s Journal, “others named their rabbit carcasses and made hand puppets out of their hides.” You gotta wonder what an old-school butcher like Pat LaFrieda would think of these shenanigans. Actually, judging by the sign that appears in AlwaysHungry’s enjoyable tour of the LaFrieda plant (“Pat LaFrieda Says ‘Eat My Meat’”), maybe Pat Jr. wouldn’t mind.

Small-Scale Butchers [Diner’s Journal/NYT]
Chatting with Tom Mylan: Date-Night Butchery, The Word ‘Hipster,’ and Why Butchering Is Not As Cool As You Think It Is [Fork in the Road]
A Look Inside LaFrieda Meats: Pat LaFrieda [AHNY]

Butchers Gone Wild: Rabbit Puppets, Date Butchering, and Good Ol’ Pat