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16 The Cheese Guide BY GREG GONZALES Dry-curing meats was a matter of survival hundreds and thousands of years ago, but in today's United States, charcuterie is all about flavor. Today's consumer will come to your store wondering where their food comes from and how its origin affects the flavor, and they're part of a growing movement that compares to that of gourmet cheese and craft beer, with no sign of slowing. To catch this rising wave, it's crucial to be able to tell the difference between true gourmet charcuterie and the rest. Being ahead in this movement before it gets big means attracting a customer who can afford high-dollar items. According to Ariane Daguin, CEO of D'Artagnan, people seeking out American charcuterie tend to have a higher salary, and they care about whether the meat came from a sustainable farm, whether or not the farm was local and how the animal was treated. And it's certainly possible to stay ahead right now. "I'm still talking about a very small niche, a very small part of the population," said Daguin. According to Phil Gatto, Co-Founder of True Story Foods, what makes truly good charcuterie is that craft producers use heritage breeds of animals that are humanely raised, antibiotic- free and hormone-free. "Those breeds usually take a little longer to grow, and end up with a deeper color, more marbling, which gives them more internal fat, and that natural fat brings a sweetness to the flavor profile," he said, adding that the exercise these animals get out on the pasture also helps with marbling. And it's not just pigs – Daguin cited a heritage breed of chicken used at D'Artagnan that eats vegetable scraps and takes longer to raise, which results in a truly unique flavor experience. "A chicken that's 100 days old is basically three times more expensive than a chicken that was processed at 30 days old – and the taste is more than three times better, but the price is three times higher," she said. For Chris Eley, Owner of Smoking Goose, quality charcuterie really is all about the animal itself. "You can't make something great starting with a poor-quality product," he said. "I used to work with a guy when I was young who would always say, 'You can't make chicken salad out of chicken [manure].' So we're always focused on how the animals are raised. That's the key to the quality of our product. Our job – we buy a high-quality animal, a heritage breed raised properly, fed well, it was stress-free – our job is to not screw it up." Any additional herbs or spices, Eley said, are there to bring out the natural flavor of the meats – not to enhance or cover it up. That's not to say there's an absolute rule about ingredients in craft charcuterie. Bill Miner, Owner of Il Porcellino, said his company makes a variety of salamis, some traditional and some non-traditional, to keep curious customers coming back. "We What to Look for as American Charcuterie Movement Rises make one salami called a Queso Salami, and we use a cheese in there called Queso de Mano from Haystack Mountain, which is a local creamery here in Colorado," he said. "It's a Manchego-style cheese we put in there, so you get a bite of cheese in your salami. It's not a lot, just a little bit, and it's pretty unique. We're using local wine from Denver, local beers in some recipes, juniper berries, which is an indigenous ingredient from Colorado. But then we make traditional things like sopressata, finnochionna, coppa, things that people know. You can be different, but you also have to make products people are familiar with so they sell." However, when factoring in which charcuterie is right for your store, think literally about how a region affects flavor. Pigs raised at the foothills of the Ozark Mountains tend to eat acorns from nearby oaks and hickories, flavors that carry subtly into the meat. "It's called terroir," said Daguin. "It works the same with wine. You take exactly the same grape, you grow it in one place and another, and it makes a very different wine – sometimes, it's less than half a mile away, and it makes a huge difference." We can think of charcuterie like cheese, too; milk from a cow that eats dray hay in the winter will taste quite different from milk made by the same cow grazing on fresh green grass in the spring. "You cannot say, 'I have the best terroir to raise a beef," said Daguin, but the origin certainly can be an indication to charcuterie-seeking customers of what flavors to expect. Enamoring your customers to craft charcuterie is partly a matter of education. Even though consumers have constant access to a smorgasbord of beautiful charcuterie with a single search of #charcuterie on Instagram, they'll likely be more engaged with your products if your staff can tell them all about the meats from your area, or how the wagyu beef raised in Texas you carry is truly one of a kind. Your customers will thank you. "In many cases, it's subtle, but the people who can sit down and take the time to eat the product taste a difference, and it's greatly appreciated," said Gatto. "So part of this is about educating people about which characteristics good-quality crafted products let you experience." Eley said he's part of a group working on a charcuterie certification exam, like the Certified Cheese Professional Exam, which could help retailers decide which meats are the best. However, according to Angela Bozo, Education Director at the International Dairy Deli Bakery Association and one of the people making the exam a reality, it won't be ready for another two years at best. Meanwhile, these meats continue to get more love than ever in the U.S. In other words, there's no better time than now to become a charcuterie expert and start stocking the best meats in town.