In The News

Evers creates $10M grant program for meat processors
by Hope Kirwan, WPR - 05/23/22

The GOP-led state Legislature gutted Gov. Tony Evers’ plans for an annual grant program for meat processors in last year’s state budget process, allocating only a tenth of the funding originally proposed. But the Democratic governor has found a way around the cut by allocating federal pandemic recovery money for his own program.On a recent Monday, culinary instructor Joe Parajecki stood in front of students in butchers’ whites, their hair tucked up into hats, notebooks at the ready. In one hand, he lifted a well-marbled hunk of striploin, brandishing it like a fish he’d just caught.

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Wisconsin invests in small-scale butchers as demand for local meat rises.
by Lindsay Christians, The Cap Times - 03/31/22

On a recent Monday, culinary instructor Joe Parajecki stood in front of students in butchers’ whites, their hair tucked up into hats, notebooks at the ready. In one hand, he lifted a well-marbled hunk of striploin, brandishing it like a fish he’d just caught.

“This is the danger of big (processing) plants,” said Parajecki, who teaches in the Artisanal Modern Meat Butchery program at Madison College. “Somebody stuck their hook right here” — he placed his thumb into a rip in the muscle — “and destroyed three inches into the strip....Read full article HERE

Meat cutting and butchery is an art.
by Rebecca Lamar, Love Wisconsin

I thought I might be a mortician or forensic scientist coming out of high school, or I thought perhaps I would go into the arts. But I ended up taking a pretty traditional business track through college and ended up in marketing for about 15 years. Then I got disillusioned with the whole corporate America schtick and decided to go to Culinary School.  

My first year they taught a meat cutting elective and I was just mesmerized. Meat cutting and butchery is an art, preparing something for others to enjoy. I worked as the meat manager at the Willy Street Co-op for a while and I started a meat sourcing and delivery business, and in 2017 I started teaching meat cutting...Read full article HERE