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Ethical Butcher

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A Christmas gift idea with a difference

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Butchery Courses at Garlic Wood

Since running our first butchery course in 2013 these regular sessions have become increasingly popular – so much so that with a few exceptions we now run courses every week throughout the year. 

The courses are popular with everyone from home-chefs, smallholders, people dreaming of giving up the 9 to 5 for Good Life-style self sufficiency, through to those who just have a passion for understanding where their food comes from and want to learn a new skill.

Lamb or pork butchery courses

Our butchery courses are all run in small groups of no more than 4 people. We like to make sure that they are as hands on as possible, so we keep the numbers small and make sure everyone is involved. Because of our focus on high-welfare, ethical livestock farming and on the traditional skills of the ‘no-waste’ nose-to-tail butcher we place a focus on working with whole carcasses and teaching the full process of butchery from start to finish. 

We offer a choice of lamb or pork full day butchery courses. The full day butchery classes include breakfast and lunch and cover everything from discussion about the best tools and equipment to use, what to look for when selecting good quality high-welfare lamb or pork before then spending the day breaking down the whole carcasses into a selection of joints and cuts (including learning the all-important butchers knot!). On the pork butchery course we also include a session on how to cure your own proper butcher’s bacon. 

“Absolutely fantastic course, if you have interest in knowing where your food comes from then this course will really interest you as it did I. The tuition is superb, never a moment where you are standing around doing nothing, Its very hands-on, Paul is obviously very passionate and knowledgeable about his profession which shows”

Derek W. Sept 2019

Sausage-making course

The sausage-making course is designed to demystify and teach the process of sausage-making for the home cook. A well-made sausage using good fresh ingredients and the best high-welfare free range pork is every bit as good as any whole cut of meat. We want to break down the image of sausages as the ‘hiding place’ for all sorts of odds and ends and to demonstrate that a proper sausage is a million miles away from the processed supermarket ‘banger’. We teach a method that uses no preservatives or chemical additives, and one that can be used at home.

Most importantly after all our butchery and sausage-making courses our guests get to take home a selection of their handiwork to share with friends and family.

“Excellent course and I can’t recommend it highly enough. Very informative and run by wonderful people”

Jason N

How to buy

Our butchery and sausage-making courses are available to buy online here. They make an excellent gift for Christmas or birthdays so as well as offering specific dates on our website we also offer the option to buy an undated gift certificate. This will be valid for 12months from the date of purchase and all the recipient has to do is select a date from our website and when they’re ready and we’ll book them a place.

Come and join us on of our courses. Learn a new skill, make some new friends, and take home a selection of produce to enjoy at home.

 

“I can wholeheartedly recommend the butchery course at Garlic Wood Farm to anyone who is interested in learning or simply loves cooking or preparing their own food from scratch. I was gifted the lamb butchery day as a very welcome birthday present and when I attended the course I had a truly enjoyable day along with three friendly livestock owners where we all learned and practised solid butchery skills, completely breaking down a whole lamb into individual, neatly tied joints. Communication was timely and comprehensive and Paul was an excellent host, plying us with home grown bacon rolls and delicious coffee when we arrived and fantastic beef hot pot for lunch, followed by wonderful home-made scones and clotted cream – yum! He took us through the whole process of lamb butchery skillfully and with great patience, explaining and demonstrating, then supervising as each of us followed his lead. He understands his craft very well and is passionate about helping others to learn, answering any question and helping/correcting as necessary. I came away proudly bearing some delicious different cuts of the lamb and with lovely memories of a great day”

Paul B, Mar ’19

 

Meet Roly

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Camilla and Roly Puzey bought their family and their flock of sheep from Oxfordshire to the stunning setting of Saddlescombe Farm in the South Downs in 2013.

The farm is set in a valley of the South Downs at Devils Dyke. It’s just 5 miles from the centre of Brighton but the landscape feels like it has barely changed in the near 1000 years of continual farming that have taken place here. The site is a unique example of a Downland farm and is home to a hugely diverse flora and fauna – all of which requires sensitive stewardship by Roly and Camilla as they run their 450acre sheep and beef farm.

Roly is keenly aware of his role as custodian of this unique landscape and his responsibilities to farm in harmony with nature. The chalk grasslands of the South Downs are some of the most diverse and delicate ecosystems on the planet. In recent decades chalk grassland has increasingly been ploughed for agriculture, so that today only 4% of the South Downs National Park is made up this habitat. Saddlescombe farm contains sizeable areas of this unique and rare ecological resource so farming must be done sensitively and in balance in order to maintain this diversity. For example the sheep and cattle graze areas of the farm in rotation and avoid certain key areas of landscape altogether in order not to overwhelm the natural wildflower mix. If grazed too heavily the landscape could degrade and decline until it becomes a monoculture of grasses – without the wildflower mix it currently supports, and with the resultant loss of key chalk grassland species like the Adonis and Chalkhill Blue Butterflies.

All this access to the flower-rich grazing of the South Downs helps to give Roly and Camilla’s lamb its sweet and delicate flavor. The sheep are totally free-range and 100% pasture-fed (with the exception of some limited supplementary feeding of ewes expecting multiple births just prior to lambing). Roly also has a herd of the county’s historically native Sussex cattle breed which are slow-maturing, 100% pasture fed, and produce a near perfect beef carcass as a result.

As well as farming the landscape Camilla and Roly are passionate about engaging with the community and helping to bridge the gap between those who produce our food and those who buy and consume it. They are proud of what they do, open, friendly and always willing to invite people to see how they farm. Every year their lambing open days offer thousands of visitors an incredible chance to see the farm, experience the work, and to see the team at work delivering and caring for newborn lambs. They also offer shepherding days and are active in doing everything they can to educate and inform the public about the work that goes on in running a commercial sheep farm. Roly’s pride in his produce and his commitment to putting himself front and centre in promoting it goes as far as personally delivering the lamb to us at the butchery each week.

Saddlescombe Farm is our main source of lamb throughout the year, and a fair bit of our beef, because of the unrivalled quality of the produce and because Roly and Camilla represent everything we believe ethical meat production should be.

Sussex Street Food & Butchery Finalists 2018!

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A hectic 2017 ended with some great news for us when we made it through to the final three in the Street Food category and the Butchery at the 2018 Sussex Food & Drink Awards. In a fantastic day at Horsham local produce market we went head-to-head with some of the finest street food traders from across Sussex and played our part in producing a feast of great food for the panel of expert judges and local shoppers. Our dish for the finals was our own-cured salt beef paired with nettle bubble & squeak, caper & seaweed creme-fraiche and a chestnut and alexander butter. We drew our inspiration for the dish from the incredible range of ingredients available to us in Sussex. At the heart of the dish was our own spice-infused salt beef from the wild-range Longhorn beef farmed on the Knepp Castle estate, and we wanted to compliment this with a range of simple, locally foraged, but creatively paired ingredients. We thought we’d come up with a winning dish and we were thrilled that the judges agreed and put us through to the final 3.

Toby and his events team work incredibly hard across the year catering everything from weddings, to parties, local fetes, food and music festivals. At every event we attend we’re amazed at the diversity and quality of the street food on offer (don’t get me wrong, there’s still plenty of rubbish out there, but the tide has definitely turned..) and it’s really gratifying to see our efforts being recognised as part of this growing food movement.

It was doubly gratifying when we discovered we’d made it to the final three of the Sussex Butcher of the Year category in the same awards as well! As with the Street Food category the judges recognised our commitment to working with the best local producers and in dedicating ourselves to combining quality with sustainability and ethical practice.

When the awards dinner came round in February 2018 we were delighted to be crowned winner in the Street Food category! Unfortunately we missed out on the Butcher of the Year prize…. but we’ll be back.

We love what we do and we always strive to do it to the best of our ability. It’s nice when that commitment pays off.

Paul & the team.

 

 

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