We're celebrating St George's Day and Great British Beef Week

Photo: © childsdesign

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Happy St George's Day… and it's Great British Beef Week!
So what better way to celebrate than with the finest meat from our AFT producers.

Try some delicious traditional and rare breed beef from:

Paganum Produce in the Yorkshire Dales
Paganum Produce is a small artisan butchery & charcuterie based at Church End Farm near Malham in the Yorkshire Dales. With five generations of butchery, curing and farming experience.

The Blackface Meat Company in Scotland for their four year old ‘aged’ Galloway Beef
A family business, rearing Galloway cattle and Blackface sheep on their farm in the South West of Scotland.
All animals feed on a totally natural diet ensuring tender, richly aromatic and savoury meat.

The Beefsmith in South Norfolk for their Red Ruby Devon Beef (one of the oldest native breeds in the UK)
The cattle roam acres of pasture year-round and are allowed to mature over 24 months ensuring the art of slow maturing enriches every bite with sumptuous fuller flavour.

Pilkington Farms (Offley Hoo) in Hertfordshire for their Longhorn Beef
Passionate about the production of quality meat and many of their methods meet or exceed organic standards. The animals are totally free range and graze in the traditional parkland and rolling hillsides of the eastern edge of the Chilterns.

The Wildman family are back on ITV's The Dales

The Dales returns to ITV1 on 13th May at 8pm with a brand new third series.
The Dales, presented by Adrian Edmondson visits this beautiful area of Yorkshire and the people who live and work in some its remote communities.

Adrian Edmondson will be meeting up with the county's characters again following their exploits, trials, and tribulations. One of those people will be Chris Wildman of Paganum Produce and the series will be featuring the grand opening of the new butchery and farm shop, with Adrian performing the ribbon cutting ceremony as well as the Wildman family's eldest son Will and his farming exploits.

To find out more about Paganum Produce visit the page on The Artisan Food Trail here and to find our about the butchery and charcuterie courses on offer visit the page here

Bacon lovers unite

Photo: © childsdesign

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How wonderful would it be if the internet had the power to transmit aromas? If it did, we’d be uploading the olfactory delight of sizzling bacon to accompany the picture.

This week is Bacon Connoisseurs Week, but why only be a connoisseur for just one week of the year? Devoted lovers of bacon will tell you that it is something they could not live without. Bacon at its best brings back memories whether it’s the holiday breakfast cooked in a dented frying pan, atop a Calor gas stove on a windy British beach or simply lazy Sunday mornings. Bacon is a satisfier of appetite, a comfort, a restorative – some would say, a hangover cure.

Whatever your relationship with bacon, choose the best and buy British at the very least.
Bacon on The Artisan Food Trail is a real step up in terms of quality, craft, animal welfare and above all, flavour. This special flavour is what you get from rare breed pigs that have led a happy, natural life. A pig’s life outdoors which allows it to root around and run about in the fresh air, added to its particular breed, produces full flavoured meat with the all important fat. Remember fat equals flavour.

The rare breeds on the food trail include British Saddleback, Tamworth, Iron Age, Gloucester Old Spot, Large Black and English Lop, Middle White, and Oxford Sandy & Black. Not all of these breeds go into making bacon but the pork is just as wonderful, so well worth a try.

The following producers all rear pigs for pork, some produce bacon and other pork charcuterie products as well as pies and sausages.

Samphire in Norfolk has bacon in either smoked or unsmoked, available in various cuts. Pork, sausages and pork pies too.

Paganum Produce in the Yorkshire Dales create their own dry-cured streaky or back bacon as well as pork charcuterie including their famous Yorkshire Chorizo and of course the best home-reared pork.

Pilkington Farms in Hertfordshire cross-breed rare breeds to produce pork which has just the right amount of fat and flavour that their customers prefer.

Orchard View Farm in Buckinghamshire produces smoked streaky or back bacon as well as their award winning pork along with pies, sausages and ham.

Learn butchery and charcuterie skills in The Yorkshire Dales

A start of a new year is often full of resolution making and one that's always good to go for is to learn something new.
There are several Artisan Food Trail members that offer hands-on courses to enable people to broaden their food horizons, whether it is the gentle art of perfecting new recipes or really getting to grips with where their food comes from.

For those of you that have been reading our blog and saw last year's ITV series 'The Dales' with Adrian Edmondson, you'll know that after months of hard work Paganum's new artisan butchery and charcuterie building opened in September 2012.

Now in full swing, Paganum's owner Chris Wildman has started running a number of butchery and charcuterie courses to teach the skills of his trade. The courses run throughout the year and Chris has kindly given one place on his full-day butchery skills course for us to offer to one lucky Artisan Food Trail competition winner.

Paganum's one day course will cover:

• Basic pork butchery
• Primal cuts
• Knife skills
• Nose to tail uses of the pig – you can eat everything but the squeak!
• Sausage making – create your perfect sausage
• Bacon curing Basic charcuterie
• Tour of the farm, meet the pigs and other livestock
• You'll be treated to great Dales hospitality – refreshments and lunch will be provided.

The course is being held on 22nd March 2013 in the butchery on the farm near Malham in The Yorkshire Dales.
So if you'd like the chance to win a place on this informative yet enjoyable course. Sorry, this competition has now closed.

Quality meat from Yorkshire

You’re probably making plans on what to put on the Christmas table this year, so if you’re looking for some top quality poultry, meats and charcuterie, Paganum Produce offer a wide selection.
Buying couldn’t be simpler as everything is available online or if you prefer the old fashioned method of communication, the people at Paganum are more than happy to take your call.

Stars of the Christmas table

Herb Fed Bronze Turkey
"For a bird with taste" these free range bronze birds are fed on fresh herbs from Thirsk and feed produced in a local mill for a true Yorkshire bird with a difference, moist & full of real turkey flavour.

Yorkshire Rib of Beef
Paganum Yorkshire Dales beef is sourced from breeds that give superior eating qualities and includes Short Horn, Welsh Black, Highland and Belted Galloway. All beef production and suppliers farm using traditional methods by farmers who are committed to animal welfare, sustainable agriculture and conservation.

Yorkshire Lamb
The lambs sourced by Paganum are from the Yorkshire Dales. Blue Faced Leicester rams crossed with Swaledale ewes produce superior tasting lamb, with the guarantee of traditional farming methods.
The lambs are grazed on a mixture of rich lowland Dales pasture and the high moors, where clean air and limestone grassland contributes to the assurance of great tasting lamb. The lamb is matured slowly, producing more succulent tasting meat.

Charcuterie

The festive time would not be complete without a variety of cured meats.

Yorkshire Bresaola
Marinated and cured Yorkshire Beef, first marinated then cured and air dried to produce a fantastic Italian style Beef Bresaola, serve with oil & lemon.

Pickled Yorkshire Beef
Prime Yorkshire Beef wet cured or pickled to the traditional Wildman Family Recipe. 
1.5kg Pickled Joint ready to cook, slice and enjoy, proper old fashioned fayre.

Yorkshire Pancetta
Dry cured home reared Malhamdale Oxford & Sandy Black Pork. 
A fantastic 400g (approx) slab of our own Yorkshire Pancetta, special cure, dry aged and peppered.

Yorkshire Guanciale

Dry cured home reared Malhamdale Oxford & Sandy Black Pork Jowl (cheek). 
A fantastic 300g (approx) slab of our own Yorkshire Guanciale, cured with juniper, thyme and garlic, dry aged and peppered.

This is just a selection so remember to visit the Paganum Produce page here on The Artisan Food Trail to read out more about them and to find links to their website and contact information.

British Sausage Week: 5th – 11th November 2012

British Sausage Week is back and is being celebrated with stand-up star and comic genius, Al Murray’s ‘The Pub Landlord’. He has taken on the coveted crown of 'King of the Sizzle' when he tours the country during the week, rallying troops to stand up for British bangers.

Types of sausage
There are many regional sausages throughout the British Isles that use traditional recipes that go back many generations.
There's the long coiled Cumberland sausage which is meaty with a coarse, chunky texture and black pepper giving a spicy bite; The Lincolnshire sausage, an old fashioned favourite scented with sage; West Country ones with pork and apple and maybe a touch of cider and Oxford sausages that contain veal, as well as pork. These are just a few of the many varieties made and the list continues to grow as producers experiment with different flavour combinations.

With a national competition that will reveal the land’s finest bangers, a host of delicious new recipes to try out and plenty of opportunities to get involved, it will be impossible not to stand up and be counted.

Cooking
We can't resist a nicely cooked sausage. They should be cooked carefully over a medium heat so they cook slowly allowing the outside to gently caramelise so it becomes slightly sticky and the inside should be juicy.
Don't have the heat too high or the sausage will burst and definitely do not prick them, this will make all the tasty juices escape.

Where to find the best sausages
And of course we have the best of British sausages right here on
The Artisan Food Trail.
All the producers on our food trail that make the finest sausages using
meat from animals that have a led a healthy and happy life, so when you buy sausages make sure you choose British, local and bangers made with passion.

More often than not the animals are rare breeds too which means that these sausages have an unsurpassable flavour and texture. The sausage mix is skilfully blended with a variety of herbs and spices from the mild to the spicy to suit everyone’s preferences.

So whether you are making a hearty casserole, a Toad-in-the-Hole or just good old Bangers & Mash make sure you choose the best.

Samphire's Simple Sausages  Photos: © childsdesign

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Samphire
Samphire is an award winning smallholding in Norfolk rearing rare breed pigs and sheep. Ethical farming is at the heart of Samphire and they have been recognised by the RSPCA for their commitment to animal welfare.

 It’s not just their regulars who love their rare breed meat, Gary Rhodes said their sausages were the best he'd ever tasted

For more information visit Samphire on The Artisan Food Trail here

Capsicana Chilli Sausages  Photos: © Capsicana taken by childsdesign

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Capsicana Chilli Co
Capsicana has teamed up with a whole host of independent butchers across the the UK to bring you an absolutely delicious chilli sausage! They use a variety of authentic Mexican chillies to make their special chilli & spice blend and their selected butchers combine this with their fabulous sausage-making expertise and hey presto...  the best chilli sausages in the UK!!
Perfect for the BBQ, spicing up favourites like bangers & mash or making a Mexican style sausages and bean casserole.

Details of butchers using Capsicana’s chilli sausage blend 
available here 
For more information visit Capsicana Chilli Co 
on The Artisan Food Trail here

Paganum Produce

Yorkshire producer, Paganum’s selection of Premium Pork Sausages made in their traditional butchery to age old family recipes.


For more information visit Paganum Produce 
on The Artisan Food Trail here

Grand Opening of Malhamdale Butchery & Charcuterie

After months of hard work the 'Grand Opening' of Paganum's new artisan butchery and charcuterie building will take place on Tuesday 11th Sept 2012 from 6.00pm.

Comedian, actor and TV presenter, Adrian Edmondson will be officially opening the butchery and cutting the ribbon at the Kirkby Malham farm in Yorkshire.
Earlier this year Chris Wildman, who runs Paganum, was featured on ITV's 'The Dales' when Adrian Edmondson visited just as the new charcuterie was still being constructed.

The opening is bound to be an exciting event and Chris Wildman says, "Come along and meet our pigs, take a quick tour of the Butchery, enjoy a bite to eat, could be a BBQ, a hog roast or maybe a suckling pig, sample some Yorkshire Chorizo washed down with a local beer and even watch a demo."

Where is it?
Paganum Farm Butchery, Cow Close Lane,
Kirkby Malham, Skipton, Yorkshire BD23 4DP


View AFT_Paganum Produce in a larger map

To find out more about Paganum Produce visit their page on 
The Artisan Food Trail here

Yorkshire Chorizo

Chorizo is probably one of the most versatile pieces of charcuterie to have at hand in the kitchen. The rich meaty sausage is flavoured with smoked paprika which gives a deep red colour and great depth of flavour. It can be eaten just as it is as a snack – sliced or in a sandwich – and can be used in cooking to bring a distinctive flavour to variety of dishes.

Read full review

We were impressed by the quality of the Yorkshire Chorizo and have awarded both varieties our Artisan Food Trail Approved badge.

For more information about Paganum Produce visit the producer page on The Artisan Food Trail here
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The Artisan Food Trail's Best Bangers for British Sausage Week

British Sausage Week give us a chance to showcase our producers who make some great British sausages.
These aren’t the cheap, sad insipid offerings you might find in the supermarket, but brilliant bangers with bags of taste, great texture made with meat from animals that have led happy and healthy lives.

More often than not the animals are rare breeds too which means that these sausages have an unsurpassable flavour and texture. The sausage mix is skillfully blended with a variety of herbs and spices from the mild to the spicy to suit everyone’s preferences.

So whether you are making a hearty casserole, a Toad-in-the-Hole or just good old Bangers & Mash make sure you choose the best.

Photos: © childsdesign

Samphire
Samphire is an award winning smallholding in Norfolk rearing rare breed pigs and sheep. Ethical farming is at the heart of Samphire and they have been recognised by the RSPCA for their commitment to animal welfare.

 It’s not just their regulars who love their rare breed meat, Gary Rhodes said their sausages were the best he'd ever tasted

You can buy sausages online from a selection as follows:

The Samphire Sausage
An excellent partner to mashed potatoes and onion gravy, this sausage is a great all rounder with subtle seasonings of traditional spices and herbs. Ginger, mace and nutmeg provide the base to the top notes of sage, onion and coriander.

Sausage Selection – Six of the Best!
Samphire will put together a selection of their most popular sausages, ringing the changes as they create new flavours.
All sausages are made from our rare breed, free range pork and do not contain any colourings or flavour enhancers – they aren't needed!
For more information visit Samphire on The Artisan Food Trail here


Annie’s Market Garden
All ingredients are locally produced and sourced and all products are made at Annie’s.
The fantastic meat they produce (their customers will tell you so) is a direct result of the way they look after their animals. They graze freely in the orchards around the farm amongst the buttercups, wildflowers and natural pastures. 
Annie’s offer a range of exceptional Rare Breed meat products – Highland beef and also pork and lamb.

Annie’s Market Garden Pork Sausages
Traditional British breeds of pork (Berkshire & Gloucester Old Spot) are reared naturally and slowly, as nature intended. Annie’s are hoping to continue breeding the Berkshire pigs to help keep the bloodlines going. Annie’s firmly believe that for a great taste, time is needed – the rewards, great tasting native & rare breed pork perfect for making the best sausages.

For more information visit Annie’s Market Garden 
on The Artisan Food Trail here

Photos: © Capsicana taken by childsdesign

Capsicana Chilli Co
Capsicana has teamed up with a whole host of independent butchers across the the UK to bring you an absolutely delicious chilli sausage! They use a variety of authentic Mexican chillies to make their special chilli & spice blend and their selected butchers combine this with their fabulous sausage-making expertise and hey presto...  the best chilli sausages in the UK!!
Perfect for the BBQ, spicing up favourites like bangers & mash or making a Mexican style sausages and bean casserole.

Details of butchers using Capsicana’s chilli sausage blend 
available here 
For more information visit Capsicana Chilli Co 
on The Artisan Food Trail here



Paganum Produce
Yorkshire producer, Paganum’s selection of Premium Pork Sausages made in their traditional butchery to age old family recipes.

Classic Pork Sausage
Handmade special recipe Classic Pork Sausage in real skins and hand linked in the traditional way.

Gluten Free Sausage
Handmade special recipe Gluten Free Pork Sausage. A very high meat content gluten free sausage suitable for Coeliacs.

Pork & Honey Sausages
Handmade special recipe Pork & Honey Sausage in real skins and hand linked in the traditional way. A mild sausage, kids love 'em!

Cumberland Sausage
Handmade Cumberland Recipe Sausage in real skins. Great cooked in the oven in the traditional ring.


Chipolata Pork Sausage
A thin, short pork breakfast sausage, traditional at Christmas.

Gourmet Venison, Pork, Cranberry & Apple Sausage
Venison, Pork, Cranberry & Apple Sausage, real skins & hand linked in the traditional way.

Elite Sausage Box
Contains: Pork Leek & Chive, Ploughman’s Sausage, Prime Yorkshire Champion Pork Sausage thick, Prime Yorkshire Champion Pork Sausage thin, Pork & Caramelised Onion Sausage 
All pork is free range, outdoor reared in woods in Yorkshire.

Paganum Sausage Selection
Box of Paganum Sausages, real skins and hand linked in the traditional way, includes Classic Thin Link Breakfast Pork Sausage, Thick Pork & Honey Sausages and the Traditional Cumberland ring.

Visit Paganum Produce on The Artisan Food Trail here

Choice Cuts: Paganum Produce

Paganum Produce is a small artisan butchery and charcuterie based at Church End Farm near Malham in the Yorkshire Dales.

With five generations of butchery, curing and farming experience supplying a traditional product range increasing a range of traditional meats, sausages, dry cured bacon and charcuterie with the benefit of an online shop and direct-to-door delivery.

The Name
“Paganum” is Latin for “Rural Tradition” and was chosen because rural tradition is something that they are passionate about. Traditional methods of farming for slower grown, happier animals. Traditional and rare breeds able to thrive in the outdoor life of the Yorkshire Dales. Traditional ways of hanging, preparing and cutting meat for a fuller flavour. And traditional standards of service where every customer counts.

History
The company is now headed by Chris Wildman and butchery runs deep in his family, the original butchers shop was opened in Bentham, Yorkshire in the mid 1800s by John Wildman (Great Great Grandfather), previously it existed as an on-farm butchery and following his death in 1894 the shop passed through a succession of Wildmans.

Provenance and Preparation
All meat and gourmet produce is fully traceable to family farms and small artisan firms in the Yorkshire Dales.

Sourcing locally means that all farmers and producers are known personally. They've all been chosen by Paganum for their commitment to animal welfare, sustainable agriculture and conservation.

All produce is British giving full confidence in that it's been produced here, not just packed here. They can absolutely guarantee that all fresh beef and lamb is fully traceable to the beautiful Yorkshire Dales.

Special cuts can be provided as well as advice on the best type of meat for a particular recipe and how to cook whichever joint you choose. It's all down to preparation, hanging and cutting. Beef is hung for a minimum of 21 days, to ensure maximum taste and tenderness.

Yorkshire Chorizo
Paganum is also home to the Yorkshire Chorizo, a fully cured sausage using British pork and made in Yorkshire, of course.

Visit Paganum Produce on The Artisan Food Trail here