The Art of Manliness - #352： A Famous Butcher Dishes on All Things Meat

00:00:00.000 brett mckay here and welcome to another edition of the art of manliness podcast while meat makes

00:00:19.060 up a big portion of americans diet few people know very much about how meat is sourced and

00:00:23.460 butchered for consumption today on the show i talked to world-renowned third-generation butcher

00:00:27.020 pat lafreda about all things meat we began a conversation talking about his family business

00:00:30.980 in new york city and how he became one of the premier meat packers in america and then pat

00:00:34.800 walks us through how the steak you're grilling got there and all the factors determine the price

00:00:38.680 of meat so we get very macro with butchering we then shift from the macro to the micro of meat by

00:00:43.200 discussing the tools pat recommends every backyard chef should own how to tell if meat is bad and

00:00:48.320 what dry aging does to beef and whether you can do it on your own at your house he then shares what

00:00:53.060 his favorite cuts of beef lamb and pork are how to cook them and why he thinks you should be leery

00:00:57.260 when a restaurant boasts about their delicious sirloin steaks really fascinating show a lot

00:01:01.820 of interesting tidbits after the show's over check out the show notes at aom.is slash butcher

00:01:05.960 pat lafreda welcome to the show thank you for having me so you are a world famous butcher you just

00:01:14.620 came out with a new book called meat and i love it my kids love the books they love looking at the

00:01:20.020 cutouts of the different animals of the cow the cross section yeah you don't see that often you

00:01:25.540 really don't usually when you google a cut of meat you're usually directed to a photograph that looks

00:01:34.880 like a cartoon of an animal to a general area so i really thought it was important to segment each cut

00:01:43.940 exactly where it lies in the animal yeah my kids love it because now whenever we eat a hamburger or steak

00:01:49.320 they know what part of the cow it comes from it's great it's been fun well before we get to the book

00:01:54.540 and talking about meat in general let's talk about your history background because it's really

00:01:58.460 interesting you're the owner of a of a famous meat fulfillment company you're not a butcher for

00:02:03.800 like the average consumer you actually give meat you're providing meat for all the big restaurants

00:02:07.500 steakhouses in new york city how did that happen how did you get started with that well i'm i represent

00:02:12.020 the third generation i'm also pat lafreda the third so my dad took over from his father and

00:02:20.780 my dad didn't have a choice he was to be in the meat business and that's just the way that generation 1.00

00:02:27.980 was my grandfather's generation wanted their son to carry on their business my dad he wanted the

00:02:36.420 opposite he sent me to private school off to college and wanted me to go off and do something

00:02:42.080 bigger and better the problem was that in order to teach me work ethic he would take me to work since

00:02:49.760 i'm 10 years old and i loved the business i loved being the helper on the truck and getting to go down

00:02:58.460 and speak to the chefs and just knowing what happens in the kitchen it it's amazing if you can imagine

00:03:05.620 the perspective of of a child going into a kitchen and all the wild things that happen in a kitchen

00:03:12.220 for a kitchen to work when i graduated with a finance degree from college i got a job on wall

00:03:19.280 street almost immediately and i got my series 7 in 63 which made me a licensed broker and i could not

00:03:27.380 stand doing that for a living um i begged my dad to come into the family business he told me no

00:03:33.540 no reason for you to come here uh it's not why i sent you off to get educated uh it was a little

00:03:41.000 bit of a family bout my my aunt had come to my defense and she had run the business with my dad

00:03:47.620 and was retiring and she was a very tough lady that she rest in peace her name was lisa lafrida

00:03:55.940 and she convinced my dad to let me join the company and we were very small we only had two

00:04:04.020 vans that made deliveries my father essentially was the head butcher and had an assistant and they had

00:04:12.720 44 customers i would go to work at 3 a.m i would work with my dad cutting meat like i knew and was

00:04:23.900 trained to do and slowly grew the business by by running up to a shower changing into a suit after

00:04:34.280 the meat was cut and the driver left to make his deliveries and i would walk into restaurants and

00:04:41.000 actually get new accounts and skid and we grew the business really organically grassroots in that

00:04:50.140 regard yeah and what's crazy uh during the 80s and like early 90s this is when the meat packing

00:04:55.880 industry in new york city was you know saw a downturn what do you think helped the you know pat

00:05:02.780 lafrida meat purveyors thrive not only survive but thrive during that time to become this you know

00:05:08.480 big juggernaut that you are today well i'll tell you i joined my dad in 94 and when his dad passed

00:05:17.380 away in 89 i could see my dad did not have interest in growing the business anymore like

00:05:24.060 that was and i think that's part of the reason he didn't want me to join the business that was

00:05:30.720 for their generation and the generation before my dad's but if you had a meat company in the meat

00:05:38.540 packing district there are almost none of those companies that owned their own building so they were

00:05:46.720 all renting and some of these leases were 20 or 30 year leases but there came a time when the meat

00:05:54.860 market became a discovered secret treasure and the real estate values went so high that if you didn't

00:06:04.320 own your own building when your lease was up you were done because you couldn't go from 40 a square foot

00:06:11.040 to a thousand dollars a square foot you just could not there's not that kind of return and and net profit

00:06:18.280 in this industry so my dad always wanted to buy his own property and control his own destiny so the fact

00:06:28.760 of his genius of finding a location down in that area and purchasing it when those rents did

00:06:36.020 go up very quickly to unaffordable numbers here i wasn't in a company protected by the ownership of the

00:06:47.160 building so that was a massive massive key component to us surviving that period art galleries

00:06:59.280 and restaurants where meat where raw meat used to be hanging is something that no one envisioned

00:07:06.400 that was in our industry uh but my dad did yeah wow so you mentioned earlier you know your day when you

00:07:13.520 were you know working with your dad would start at like three o'clock in the morning how late were you

00:07:18.320 would you sometimes work to oh we would we would often be done around 5 p.m wow and i mean i

00:07:25.280 imagine that the work is pretty physical very physical and you have to be able to work in a

00:07:31.420 refrigerator so for anyone that's never felt that before you know 35 degrees 36 degrees you know for

00:07:41.520 the entire your entire work day it it does take something like experience to get acclimated to

00:07:50.020 i find the largest turnover rate with new employees is within the first two days if they can

00:07:58.220 last the first two days they understand that okay once i get moving and working i'm gonna warm up

00:08:06.400 before you know it you're gonna strip a layer or two off before the end of the day but that fear

00:08:12.640 that and it's not talked about very often but there is a fear in someone that gets put into a work

00:08:19.720 environment that's refrigerated and you have to get over to that fear and realize okay this is this

00:08:24.900 is normal this is okay so how does butchering work obviously meat comes from cows let's talk about

00:08:29.660 cows in a good example like do they let's talk about steer steer yeah steer well let's talk about the

00:08:35.000 difference that because this is the biggest i think misconception that the general public has is

00:08:44.480 everyone thinks that beef is cow where where cow is is a a female milking cow is in the dairy industry so 1.00

00:08:54.780 cow meat does exist but we we have opted out of that with usda so our company doesn't handle any cow meat

00:09:04.860 and the the difference is in the age so anything that's over 30 months of age we don't touch

00:09:12.340 and there's a reason for that the 30 months of age or more can potentially have bsc which is mad cow

00:09:21.020 disease it's never been detected in anything less than 30 months of age and that's where we get steer

00:09:27.420 so the steer that we use are on average 22 to 24 months of age so that's that's the difference when a cow

00:09:37.560 is in its eighth year of giving milk that's usually about about when they'll send it to

00:09:45.740 be harvested because that meat has a place in the marketplace as well it's just going to be the lowest

00:09:53.880 form of meat because it's older it's tougher it doesn't taste as good as steer do at 24 months of age

00:10:03.440 so we're talking about steer how does the steer come to you and like what do you do with it after

00:10:07.940 that point when when i first started we were still using hanging meat on rails and kind of like the

00:10:15.220 movie rocky where rocky was punching the meat and it was hanging from a hook that has changed in my

00:10:21.760 generation so that is a good change because meat that can fall and hurt someone just to take that

00:10:30.940 danger out of out of the scenario and it was a great thing but the beef industry has changed in

00:10:38.480 such a way where it actually follows the the most capitalist example possible and in a good way

00:10:47.300 and what i mean by that is in my dad's generation if he wanted to sell two whole strip loins

00:10:54.120 that would yield about let's say 24 steaks he would also have to sell the rest of the animal and

00:11:03.380 where where do you sell the whole inside round bottom round beef eye round the chuck the neck like

00:11:12.400 you have to sell all of those parts and have no waste because it'd be a sin to have waste to begin

00:11:18.880 with but you wouldn't you wouldn't be profitable at all farmers actually have to even take into

00:11:24.880 consideration what the hide would be worth and what is worth in the leather industry at that time

00:11:31.220 so how it's changed is that meat at the processing facilities in the country is broken down into the

00:11:40.720 different cuts and equations get formed so if there's a huge demand for ribeye a price will be set for it

00:11:51.600 at a high price and that would lower the price of everything every other cut in the animal and it would go by

00:11:59.000 demand each week it changes obviously but that's the way pricing structure works so i only need to bring

00:12:08.180 in the cuts of meat that i need and that's vastly different from a generation before me where my

00:12:14.880 dad would never be able to grow the business in fine dining like we have he would have to we would

00:12:22.620 have had to get rid of the rest of the animal so for example inside rounds make great roast beefs

00:12:30.400 it's the muscle that we are all sitting on right now so roasting that that should really go to

00:12:40.360 someone who's processing roast beefs whereas i need more of the middle meats the strip loins the the

00:12:47.800 ribeyes where we get cowboy steaks and tomahawks i need more of that meat and the only reason i'm able

00:12:56.440 to get it is because the person who wants the inside rounds is able to get it get that delivered

00:13:01.980 to them only and they would have no use for the steaks that i would have use for so it's become a very

00:13:08.140 sustainable and and more importantly more efficient system than my dad's generation and does this

00:13:15.140 same apply to pork or lamb the same sort of thing where they you only get the cuts you you just need

00:13:20.240 yes it does apply to to lamb pork veal just like it does in beef but you'll find that most people

00:13:29.420 eat beef or poultry and then less lamb pork and so on so you'll get more efficiency in the beef

00:13:41.200 industry than you would the pork industry when it comes to being able to buy individual cuts how is what

00:13:48.220 you do different from say you know what the neighborhood the corner butcher does right um you

00:13:53.880 guys don't serve like specific individual consumers you're guys more focused on restaurants well yeah

00:13:59.520 our our entire history was based on selling restaurants now an amazing supermarket chain shop right

00:14:09.380 did approach us last year and and they were big fans of our product in restaurants and wanted to see

00:14:17.400 how it would work on their retail shelf because what a retailer would normally carry is different

00:14:24.060 from what we do so dry aged prime steaks is not something you'd normally find and they were shocked

00:14:32.500 they actually were had three times the demand for our product than what their most optimistic

00:14:40.480 forecaster saw in in in what our success would be in in the general public so specializing in the top 10

00:14:50.700 percent of what's produced in our country has really given us an edge in that so having beef procurement

00:14:59.320 people on the ground speaking to the growers who are the farmers about exactly how we want and what we want

00:15:08.860 our beef to be as far as raising protocols and finishing protocols that's taking it almost to the point of being vertical

00:15:17.560 we wouldn't want to be vertical in our situation because if there's bad weather in one part of the country

00:15:25.120 and very little beef came from that part we would be out of business so having the ability to spread

00:15:32.920 across the corn belt and to work with different farmers in multiple states really and and then

00:15:41.620 be getting the top 10 percent of product that comes from those growers is really the key to our success

00:15:48.580 and you know that did not take overnight to happen it took many years of what's very important

00:15:56.100 and i think it's probably true in any industry is uh we made sure we paid our bills before we ate

00:16:03.760 so my father could not sleep if he thought he owed someone money and if you're willing to pay someone

00:16:13.100 and that's a huge problem in our industry i'm i have an entire floor

00:16:18.620 of personnel and all they do is try to keep our restaurant customers current and it's not easy for the restaurants to do so

00:16:29.360 but we work with them a lot but we're as a restaurant may get 30 days of credit from me

00:16:36.640 i have to pay the growers within seven days

00:16:40.180 and that's seven days from when once it leaves the facility in which it was harvested

00:16:47.400 i don't get it for about four days after that it's on the road in a refrigerated truck

00:16:53.960 so three days after i get the product the product's paid for

00:16:58.580 and i still have to sell it and then collect the money for it

00:17:04.580 and regardless if i've collected or not i have to pay my taxes as if i did collect the money

00:17:11.820 which is very very difficult and we've had our times when you know we have to

00:17:19.600 you know go back and use our own personal money it's been quite some time since that's happened but

00:17:26.520 if if you're not careful

00:17:29.100 you have to pay your taxes it's something that we also take very seriously so

00:17:35.960 if two if your restaurants get too far out on you and and there's too much in receivables

00:17:42.240 then you won't be able to pay your your meat bill in seven days

00:17:46.880 then the farmer doesn't want to hear from you that's it if you get blacklisted in that industry

00:17:53.680 you're done and it's something that we worked very hard and

00:17:58.600 always thought about is that we need to make sure we pay for our product and make sure our farmers get

00:18:07.140 paid before we eat it's very simply said in my family yeah well imagine it's a tough business too

00:18:15.020 because weather can affect price i remember a few years ago when there was some drought in texas

00:18:21.120 in oklahoma the price for leather and for beef went up dramatically because all the cows were dying

00:18:27.100 yes and they were like i mean i mean steers i said cows again in those years there was an amazing

00:18:34.940 amount of corn production so that's what's kept beef affordable is that finishing them off on corn

00:18:44.920 that's inexpensive even in even through those droughts corn production was great i think you

00:18:51.540 could see it more in poultry poultry right now cost a little bit less than when i started with my dad in

00:18:57.700 1994 full-time which i think is remarkable and i think it's what's kept food pricing and the inflation of

00:19:05.740 food pricing where it is we all see the difference in what our grocery bill is right i think the one thing

00:19:13.140 that has that has kept it even affordable is the availability of corn in our country plays a huge

00:19:20.660 role in in the industry and in pricing so let's talk a bit about your book and some of the tips you

00:19:26.760 providing so i love about it you you look at each type of meat you've got beef pork lamb you have veal

00:19:33.320 and not only do you talk about the different cuts which i find extremely useful but you also provide some

00:19:38.700 recipes let's sort of talk big picture here i know a lot of guys listen to the podcast they like

00:19:43.980 to cook outdoors grill and particularly they're probably grilling meat of some sort what tools do

00:19:50.900 you recommend that people have on hand for all their meat preparation and meat cooking needs i would say

00:19:57.560 as a butcher the biggest people love to show me their knife set it's it's kind of comical as a guest

00:20:07.980 over anyone's house like hey pat look at these knives i bought from this maker and i'm as i look

00:20:14.420 through them none of them are are meat knives so i to have a knife which we call a boning knife

00:20:22.660 that debones let's say a leg of lamb or a rib of beef to a longer scimitar knife to cut slices off of a

00:20:33.100 whole strip uh or to cut some beef into maybe stew it's important it's they're very different from

00:20:41.540 a chef's knife uh or a paring knife or something that's made for produce so that's that's the first

00:20:49.220 key tool you need the biggest issue i see in in in grilling is when you have a grill that is not

00:21:00.460 able to get to the temperature in which you want and that's a big debate what's better natural gas

00:21:08.020 or charcoal of course charcoal tastes better but if you have the hours that i do which translates into

00:21:17.260 very little amount of time that you have to barbecue i need gas i gotta cook with gas i gotta get that

00:21:24.960 that grill up as as high as i can as fast as i can i don't have time to play with charcoal you know

00:21:33.220 every time i grill if i did i wouldn't be able to grill anywhere near as much as i do so i think having

00:21:39.120 a grill that's able to reach the temperature that you want in a time frame that you that you want

00:21:44.840 recently i found the grill i i almost didn't even look at it it's the size of a toaster and kind of

00:21:52.560 looks like a toaster without the door it's made in germany it's uh made by otto wild and it's

00:22:01.040 restaurants would call it a salamander or a um a cheese melter where the heat's only coming from

00:22:08.100 above and it has this great tray underneath that you put a little water in first so that you never

00:22:15.760 get a flare up there's no fire ever so if you are cooking a great quality cut of meat it mostly has

00:22:25.100 a lot of intramuscular fat so that's the marbling you see it's going to lose some of that fat in the

00:22:31.600 cooking process and leave behind a great tasting steak but to be able to do it in a manner where you

00:22:38.200 don't have you know this huge flaring up when you're trying to get a sear on on on meat is very

00:22:46.500 important otherwise what you get is the steam effect you get that gray steak that's gray throughout

00:22:54.400 because you you tried to get some color on it but by the time that happened the heat was able to

00:23:00.560 transfer through the steak all the way through and and to cook it all the way through the you know the

00:23:08.740 least desirable for a butcher to eat a cut of meat like that gotcha so good knives some meat knives 0.99

00:23:14.640 and then a grill that can get you the the right heat right are the two the big essential things

00:23:20.680 all right let's talk about some of the the things you hear about meat you talk about this why should

00:23:25.200 people avoid frozen meat like what happens to meat whenever you freeze it and then thaw it and

00:23:30.460 then cook it well if you know where the source of meat is there's nothing wrong with freezing meat

00:23:37.200 i don't like frozen meat because traceability it it it all depends if you're to buy frozen meat

00:23:47.020 why would anyone want to buy frozen meat when meat is readily available in america seven days a week

00:23:53.980 and the reason that i don't like frozen meat in that regard is because when you freeze meat and then

00:24:01.980 defrost it you'll notice so much more purge so much more of the natural juices are escaping and they're in

00:24:08.800 that package when you defrost it so frozen meat it's very questionable as to traceability as to where it's from

00:24:16.320 and then it does lose some quality if if it didn't my life would be a lot easier because everything we

00:24:24.140 make we would make it ahead of time and freeze it and ship it but it's just not the way it is the

00:24:30.740 fresher the meat is cut to include dry aged meat so now we're talking about aged meat that's been aging

00:24:37.060 for 45 days if that's portioned and then eaten within a few days that's the best steak you're

00:24:46.760 ever going to eat if you were to take that meat and freeze it and defrost it and then cook it you

00:24:52.480 you lose a lot of the good great qualities of of what was preserved that's just natural in the

00:25:00.000 freezing process let's talk about aged meat like what what are you doing there like what does aging

00:25:05.700 beef do and why does it taste so much better than just cooking it you know when it's fresh it's

00:25:13.000 dry aging beef is really controlled decomposition of the meat we are making sure the meat does not

00:25:21.180 get rotten as it would normally in 60 days or 120 days is the max that we go by making sure the

00:25:29.440 variables in the room are correct that's wind circulation that's temperature and that is the

00:25:36.520 humidity keeping the humidity down in the room what we're doing is letting the collagen that holds the

00:25:44.000 muscle fiber together really break down and what it's leaving behind is something that's got a lot

00:25:51.140 more flavor than as it than when it was fresh it's kind of like uh trying to pick up a water balloon

00:25:59.080 with with two fingers you can do it with a dry aged steak a fresh steak would be more like the water

00:26:06.800 balloon where it's it's drooping down so very much like uh you would broccoli rob is a good example in

00:26:14.600 produce where we're trying to get the moisture out so we kind of put it in a saute pan with some olive oil

00:26:22.860 and cook it for a while what we're doing in the dry aging process is is making a lot of that water

00:26:30.300 come out of the muscle group and there's plenty that we have to shave off when we're ready to portion

00:26:39.560 that product so anything on the exterior is removed but what's left behind is an enhanced

00:26:47.940 bee flavor that is so much tender so much more tender i should say and so much more flavorful than

00:26:54.680 when it was fresh gotcha and is this something that people could do at home or does it require a lot of

00:26:59.520 fine tuning and using you know special equipment to get the right right conditions to it ages properly

00:27:06.000 yeah that's a great question it's it's almost impossible to do at home unless you had a

00:27:12.140 refrigerator that was dedicated to that and one in which you could read the internal temperature of the

00:27:20.620 refrigerator and the humidity the humidity has got to be controlled and we have several systems that

00:27:29.680 take the moisture out of the air so it's very difficult to do at home it's

00:27:34.580 nearly nearly impossible to get it right unless you have a very small amount in a refrigerator

00:27:42.620 and you were able to read those those um the environment and i'll i'll tell you the the what

00:27:50.600 you would normally get if you tried to do it at home in a refrigerator because a refrigerator is a

00:27:55.920 natural dehumidifier any refrigerator has water that it expels and that water it's expelling is from

00:28:03.680 inside the moisture that's inside the air that gets on the coils and gets drained out or in some

00:28:12.340 refrigerators it is evaporated off the top it's still not enough to keep up with the amount of

00:28:19.640 water that's in the muscle of of a whole loin let's say so it's it's not worth your time you can make

00:28:28.580 prosciutto is at home the that that's something that's controllable but dry aged meat more times

00:28:34.860 than not it would rot on on anyone trying to do it and speaking of rot like how do you know when

00:28:40.180 meat is bad because there's been instances where i have meat it's been in my fridge for a few days and

00:28:44.720 like it's kind of turning gray and i'm like is this still edible and i throw it out then sometimes

00:28:49.420 i think well maybe i shouldn't have thrown that out it was actually good so is there any telltale

00:28:53.700 signs that you've got some rotten meat and you shouldn't consume it oh yeah i i laugh i i laughed

00:28:58.980 at what you were describing i know exactly what you mean so the best way to see if meat is still good

00:29:05.480 because the the turning gray is not a problem that's oxidation it's going to happen oxidate if

00:29:13.460 you were to make fresh ground beef right now and form it into a patty and put it in your fridge

00:29:18.580 the next day if you were to break it open in the in the middle it would be turning a darker brown

00:29:24.640 and you would wonder wait is this still good and it would eventually turn to a grayish color

00:29:29.340 all of that is fine that that has to do with with the oxygen and oxidation the best way to tell if

00:29:37.500 meat is good or not is by it not being a brightish green color which is obvious right but

00:29:46.600 but but beyond that smelling the meat if the meat smells good most likely it is good

00:29:55.640 so i myself as a butcher have taken steaks home and put them in in the fridge then you're like oh

00:30:02.560 i forgot i had those steaks in the fridge five days later well all you have to do is open the package

00:30:08.780 and smell the meat if the meat still smells good it's good and um no one really explains it

00:30:16.540 like that but that is the best way to tell so as a butcher you're professional here what do you

00:30:21.940 think is the most underrated cut of beef the most underrated probably flat irons especially for the

00:30:29.040 price so flat irons are from the front shoulder um they're from the clod and more specifically from

00:30:38.240 the top blade steak is is exactly where it is and it blindfolded it tastes the same as a new york strip

00:30:47.480 steak it's about 25 of the cost of a new york strip but you wouldn't be able to tell the difference

00:30:55.020 between the two the striation and the muscle is is the same the marbleization is the same and the flavor

00:31:01.420 is the same and when you find things you know cuts of meat like that that you know to have a new york

00:31:08.560 strip steak experience at 25 the cost it's a great economy cut well what's crazy about these economy

00:31:15.640 cuts though sometimes they get really popular and then like they're more expensive so that happened

00:31:20.520 with flank steak i feel like a few years ago for a little while it happened with hanger steak and then

00:31:25.320 hanger steak came back so hanger steak is the butcher steak because it's the only muscle in

00:31:31.280 the entire animal that you need to remove before you split the animal so on the assembly line

00:31:38.220 as the animal is eviscerated and the hide is removed it's then split you have to pump the brakes for a

00:31:48.120 second and remove by opening up the actual cavity it could because the hanger steak is on the inside 0.70

00:31:56.060 and it hangs from where the kidneys are so you need to remove it first before you split the animal or

00:32:03.460 you'll damage it and it's not symmetrical like every other muscle in the animal or in any mammal the

00:32:10.620 hanger steak is about two-thirds as big on one side and the other third on the opposite side that

00:32:18.640 was a steak that was not be not easily marketable by a butcher like because they never thought of taking

00:32:27.980 that taking it out first so when you got it it was after the animal was split and it didn't really look

00:32:34.260 much you couldn't make many portions enough to sell to one restaurant to put on a menu

00:32:39.500 but it had a lot of flavor and butchers would then take it home or throw it into the ground beef mix

00:32:47.600 one or the other but when it was discovered how much flavor it had and the breakers would start to

00:32:56.740 remove it before and they were able to get enough of them to sell to someone like myself who could then

00:33:03.900 portion them into usable steaks they became very popular and doubled in price for a while

00:33:12.880 they've since come down a little bit but that's an example of an economy cut that got more expensive

00:33:19.040 than than than uh i would say something comparable to it right so a flat iron steak most underrated

00:33:26.300 what do you think is the most overrated cut of beef the most overrated cut i guess i think

00:33:32.160 is anything that that's referred to as sirloin nobody knows what the heck sir sirloin is but

00:33:41.340 you know you'll put a tv on and there's that commercial for surf and turf and it's some sort of seafood

00:33:49.760 and a sirloin steak oh boy oh boy but no one knows what the heck sirloin is a sirloin steak does not

00:33:57.820 have much flavor at all it it's it's part of the love handle of of of a steer it comes from the top

00:34:06.780 butt the peeled knuckle or the flap meat one of those three muscle groups anything cut out of one

00:34:14.520 of those three muscle groups is considered sirloin but retail butchers seem to throw that word around

00:34:20.660 a lot and that's why i think it's the most overrated because real sirloin steak is not much of a steak

00:34:27.320 at all gotcha okay i'll remember that next time i go out to eat don't confuse that with strip loin

00:34:32.560 okay so strip loin steak very different from sirloin steak strip loin is a new york strip from the back

00:34:40.240 what is sort of the characteristics of a new york strip that's the classic steak that that that's the

00:34:46.740 l part of the t-bone you know that's the steak on that side so that's from the back there's a

00:34:52.580 finite amount of them per animal and that's where i said earlier about 24 steaks for those two strip

00:35:02.080 loin pieces it's one of the more expensive cuts and it's gotten center cut strip loin has no they call

00:35:13.880 them vein steaks but it's really a nerve that runs through got no sinew or nerve that runs through

00:35:20.240 any part of the steak so that you you have this great steak experience so when you eat the best steak

00:35:26.780 of your life it'll most likely be a ribeye or a strip loin that's been aged and is prime and domestic

00:35:34.060 so maybe you can answer this question um my friend has asked me about this i have no clue about it

00:35:39.000 either you are a purveyor of meats to new york city steakhouses what's with new york city steakhouses

00:35:45.860 serving big thick strips of bacon with steak i don't really see it anywhere else i only it's only

00:35:52.920 in new york city what do you know what's going on there i you know some say it's it's the classic

00:35:58.100 cut i think i'm along the lines i'm on your side on that one i'm not really sure why that is i've

00:36:04.900 asked my elders about that very question and they said well why would i want to eat the bacon

00:36:11.900 before i eat my steak i'm not sure so i think you have some traditional new york city steakhouses that

00:36:20.300 have been doing that forever and a lot of clientele have gotten accustomed to that so it has become a

00:36:28.920 tradition and i've been to many steakhouses in which get my guests have ordered bacon to come

00:36:37.680 out before the steak as an appetizer and i i really i'm i'm it does to me it doesn't seem to fit

00:36:46.280 but it's not for me to decide it's just for me to provide so okay that's weird okay well it's unsolved

00:36:54.980 let's get that guy from unsolved mysteries on it if he's still alive so let's shift gears to pork

00:36:59.580 and we'll um in there what do you think what do you think is the most overlooked or cut of pork

00:37:04.740 from folks that you think it man if people really embraced it they would get a lot of enjoyment from

00:37:09.700 it i i think the pork butt so the pork butt is the pork shoulder in beef it would be the chuck

00:37:17.620 why it's called butt is because they used to be stored in big containers called butts and shipped

00:37:26.700 up to boston so the pork butt or shoulder is very tender so with a pork butt it's very inexpensive

00:37:36.220 so to slice one inch steaks from a pork butt is really just as good and tender as the center cut

00:37:46.580 pork loin or pork chops so i mean it's such a versatile cut where if you wanted to make pork stew

00:37:54.040 all the way to a pork steak i'd make it from the pork butt you'll have a number of muscle groups that

00:38:00.520 you're cutting through but they're all tender and i think that's the big takeaway from pork butt i like

00:38:06.020 that well hey pat where can people go to learn more about the new book well the book is on amazon

00:38:12.500 and if you wanted anyone wanted to know more about the book you go on to our website lafrida.com

00:38:20.300 and there's there's more information there about the book the book is really was really crafted and made

00:38:26.480 with a lot of careful time to to really show where each steak or each cut comes from

00:38:34.960 and it's different characteristics so in that regard some companies have bought it for their

00:38:41.060 entire staff that are in the meat business just to use as a guide and i find myself using it as a guide

00:38:47.960 when i'm trying to explain to a chef what where certain cuts come from and what's good about them

00:38:55.380 and not it's a great guide but again it's available on amazon and to learn more about it my website's a

00:39:02.800 great place to go and that's well pat lafrida thank you so much for your time it's been a pleasure

00:39:06.080 thank you my friend thank you for having me on my guest today was pat lafrida he's the owner of

00:39:09.860 pat lafrida meat purveyors he's also the author of the new book meat everything you need to know

00:39:14.760 it's available on amazon.com and bookstores everywhere you can also find out more efficient

00:39:18.040 about his work at lafrida.com also check out our show notes at aom.is butcher where you can find

00:39:24.240 links to resources where you delve deeper into this topic

00:39:26.400 well that wraps up another edition of the art of manliness podcast for more manly tips and advice

00:39:42.320 make sure to check out the art of manliness website at artofmanliness.com if you enjoy the

00:39:45.580 show you've got something out of it i'd appreciate if you take one minute to give us your view on itunes

00:39:48.940 or stitcher and if you've done that already i'd really appreciate if you'd recommend this to a

00:39:52.300 few friends that's how most people find out about the podcast as always i appreciate your

00:39:56.000 community support until next time this is brett mckay telling you to stay manly

The Art of Manliness - October 31, 2017

#352： A Famous Butcher Dishes on All Things Meat

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