Everything you need to know about... meat!

So we went to see our old friend Peter Gott, who rears pigs, sheep and wild boar on his farm in the Lake District and sells his meat online, as well as at the market in Barrow-in-Furness and at London’s Borough Market. We’ve enjoyed his produce on many occasions and knew that he would have the answers to our questions on everything from sirloins to sausages.

Where’s the best place to buy meat?

If you have a local butcher’s shop, get to know the butchers and ask their advice. Find out where their meat comes from and which cuts they think work best for each dish. A good butcher will be able to tell you what to choose for that curry you want to make and how long to cook your Sunday roast. If you want an unusual cut, they should be able to order it for you.

These days, though, not everyone has a friendly butcher nearby and most of us buy our meat in supermarkets. If possible, head for the butchery counter, rather than the shelves of prepacked meat, and ask questions.

The more the supermarkets find that people want to know about what they’re buying, the more interest they will take.

There are also many excellent online suppliers who will deliver their meat to you quickly and efficiently. Find out as much as you can about a supplier before ordering and don’t be afraid to ring them up and ask for more information.

And then there’s the old-fashioned way – markets. Farmers’ markets have become more and more popular in the last ten years and if you get to know the stallholders you can buy great produce. Don’t assume that everything on a market stall is good though; it’s still worth doing your research.

So what’s the difference between one type of meat and another?

All of us farmers have got to make some money or we can’t survive. And one of the ways of making more profit is by getting the animal ready for the table in as short a time as possible. For example, you can get a commercial pig breed to 70 kilos in 16 weeks by feeding it a protein-rich diet and keeping it in a shed. For a rare breed pig it’s more like 28–32 weeks so that’s more feed, more expense, more time for the farmer.

Trouble is that the taste of that 16-week pig isn’t quite there. It’s a bit bland, a bit flabby. At about 22–24 weeks there’s a pH change in the meat and the flavour starts to develop. And if that pig has been allowed to move around and live a more natural life it will taste better still. The Italians and Spanish produce a lot of cured ham, but they never cure a pig until it’s had its first birthday, when the flavour has had a chance to develop. There’s a very good reason why it’s worth choosing meat that’s come from a properly reared animal and that’s taste.

What about ageing/hanging?

Beef and some game meat, such as venison needs to be kept for a while before being sold in order for the flavour to develop. A steak that’s been aged for 28 days will have much more taste than one that’s been aged for just a week. The traditional way of ageing meat is to hang the carcass in a cold place for the required time – butcher’s shops have special chilled rooms for hanging. There needs to be plenty of air around the meat so it dries out slightly as it hangs.

But now there’s another way of ageing meat – in vacuum packs. The meat is cut up and put into vacuum bags and the air removed. People say the result is just as good, but I don’t think so. It might be tender, but the taste isn’t there, and without oxygen the meat develops a slightly tinny taste instead of ageing naturally. If the label on a piece of meat says ‘aged’ not ‘hung’, this is probably the process it has been through.

A third method I discovered only recently when I was visiting a slaughterhouse is to attach electrodes to the animal shortly after it has been slaughtered. The electric charges are said to change the pH of the meat and people claim that this is the equivalent of hanging it for three weeks. I might be old-fashioned, but I don’t agree. I prefer the traditional way.

So what do you look for? How about beef?

First off, a bit of fat marbling the meat. I know we’re all told to eat lean meat, but the little trails of fat you see distributed through a piece of meat are what give it flavour and also keep the meat juicy as it cooks

• Aged meat – or as I’ve explained, ‘hung’ is better.
• Traditional breeds – look for British breeds such as Galloway and Dexter. These are the best.
• Colour – darker colour is generally a good guide with beef. Choose a dark red steak rather than a bright red one.
• The best beef comes from grass-fed animals kept in beef herds (rather than dairy herds).

And lamb? What’s spring lamb and when is it available?

Depends on the breed – it’s possible to get good lamb all year round. Spring lamb is beautifully tender and is best served pink. It has a good but not a strong flavour because it’s younger.

With some of the traditional breeds, such as Herdwick and Swaledale, the lambs aren’t born until April – it’s too cold up in the Lake District where they live. Herdwick spring lamb is in the shops in September. But the spring lamb you see in the shops in early April will have come from lambs born at Christmas to faster-growing lowland breeds such as Texel and Beltex.

Hogget is lamb that is one year old – they say it comes from a lamb that shows a second tooth. Mutton should be three years old, but you don’t see it much, as most goes to the halal suppliers. I like to cook my lamb on the bone for the best flavour.

What do I look for in pork?

You want a bit of fat cover – that’s what pork is all about. And look for some marbling too, particularly in cuts such as shoulder. You can always trim external fat off once the meat is cooked. I believe pork is best on the bone. The bone transmits heat, helping the meat cook properly, and gives flavour. Traditional pig breeds include Tamworth, Gloucester Old Spots, Berkshire and British Saddleback.

I like to cook my pork pink and then leave it to rest to finish nicely, but I know this is counter to most official advice. This is not a good idea with commercial pork but with rare breed meat and wild boar, pink is good. But if you’re not sure, don’t take any risks.

What about bacon? What should we buy?

Bacon is pork that has been cured or brined. The cuts generally used are belly for streaky bacon or loin for back bacon. The buzzword now on bacon is ‘dry-cured’. That’s what you see on fancy packets and menus and that’s the traditional way to cure bacon. It is covered with salt, saltpetre and seasonings and left to cure for several weeks.

Back at the beginning of the 20th century the brining method became more widely used and this worked well too. It was quicker than dry curing and more consistent – dry curing could be a bit hit-or-miss depending on the quality of the saltpetre. Then in the 1960s chemists got involved and they discovered that if you added phosphates as well as saltpetre these held water in the bacon so it lost less weight. (Normally in curing you lose a third of the weight.) This bacon is cheaper, but you get that nasty scummy stuff coming out when you cook it and it doesn’t taste half as good. There are laws about this now, but you don’t have to declare added water until it exceeds 10 per cent and that’s too much for my liking.

The same applies to ham. Check the label or ask your supplier and go for ham with no added water. Ham with water and other additives has a pink slimy wet look. Proper ham is paler in colour with a drier surface.

Once cured, bacon can be sold as it is – unsmoked or ‘green’ – or it can be smoked over wood. Watch out for cheap bacon that just has smoky flavouring added.

And sausages?

With sausages, you certainly get what you pay for. Buy the best you can afford, as good-quality sausages will give you a much better result and they’re still a fairly cheap meal. Basically, a sausage contains minced meat – usually pork although there are many variations now – plus some fat, seasoning and filler such as breadcrumbs, rusk, potato starch or rice flour. A good sausage should contain 80 per cent meat, but there are products on the market that contain only 42 per cent meat or less.

So once we get our meat home what should we do?

Meat is best kept in greaseproof or waxed paper in the fridge. If you’ve bought meat that’s wrapped in plastic or in a poly tray, take it out of the packaging as soon as you get it home – the plastic makes it sweat. Pat the meat dry with some kitchen paper and put it on a plate, loosely covered, in the fridge. This is particularly important with pork, as you’ll never get good crackling from damp pork. Always be careful to store your meat away from other foods in the fridge. Keep it in the bottom part of the fridge so there’s no danger of any blood dripping on to other items.

What about freezing? Does that spoil a good piece of meat?

I’d sooner freeze a piece of meat than mess around adding lots of preservatives and additives to extend its shelf life. I believe if you freeze meat for just 4–6 weeks it can even improve the texture, as long as it’s sealed properly. If meat is left in the freezer for much longer than that it can develop a rancid taste.

And what about choosing the right cuts for a dish?

Meat from the hardest-working parts, such as the muscles supporting the head and front, are full of flavour but need long slow cooking – they’re good for casseroles, braises and so on. They are less expensive than meat from the middle parts, but they can’t be cooked quickly.

Middle parts do no heavy work. Cuts from the middle, such as rib, sirloin and fillet, can be cooked quickly and served rare and still be tender. Medium-worked muscles at the rear provide cuts such as topside and rump. These can be grilled, roasted or braised.

The Hairy Bikers' Meat Feasts is out now.