Professional Meat Cutters Competed in the 2024 Best Butcher Contest
2024 Best Butcher Contest competitors work to turn their top round beef sub- primal into merchandising beef cuts.
Bedford – State College, PA (May 13, 2024) The Beef Checkoff’s Northeast Beef Promotion Initiative (NEBPI) hosted their Best Butcher Contest in conjunction with the Pennsylvania’s Pork Producer Council on May 10th at Penn State Meat Lab during the 2024 Pennsylvania Association of Meat Processor (PAMP) Annual Conference.
The contest brought together six professional meat cutters from across the region to showcase their skills and talents in the art of meat cutting. Joseph Avilla of Windfall Market (Onset, MA), Mark Madden of the Meat Shop (Altoona, PA), Scott Carey of Slate Belt Butchery (Bethlehem, PA), Ron Godshall of Godshall’s Quality Meats (Pennsburg, PA), Allen Baysore of Montoursville, PA, and Ben Buchanan of Unified Meats Inc. (Mt. Lebanon, PA) all with years of experience in the industry.
These butchers showcased their skills in a head-to-head competition where they had 30 minutes to turn a beef top round sub-primal, donated by Cargill into merchandisable cuts, cut a bone-in pork loin, donated by Clemens Food Group into precise retail cuts that accurately represent current yield percentages, as well as give a 2- minute consumer sales pitch and correctly identify 15 fresh beef and pork retail cuts.
The title of Best Butcher went to Mark Madden of the Meat Shop in Altoona PA with his 15 years of in- field experience. Mark got his start in the butchery business working in restaurants, specifically stores with sushi bars. It was amongst some of the most talented sushi chefs he learned how to utilize the whole fish and wanted to apply that same mantra to whole beef, pork, and lamb.
"I love breaking down a whole carcass into familiar, and not so familiar cuts. It's very rewarding to educate a customer on a unique cut - converting them from a "filet-only eater" to a more well-rounded consumer,” Madden stated."
Allen Baysore took home the title of Reserve Best Butcher, Joe Avilla placed third overall, fourth place went to Ben Buchanan, fifth place went to Ron Godshall, and Scott Carey took home sixth place.
This event was designed to celebrate the skills, knowledge and value independent butchers and meat processors bring to the overall beef and pork supply chains. Without the passion and dedication to the craft of butchery and meat cutting, consumers would not have as many beef and pork choices and various cut options available to them in the meat case.
The judges for the competition were Josh Williams from Farmstead Butcher (Frederick, MD) and 2022 competition winner, Sam Davis, Project Manager in the Research, Development, and Commercialization department of Clemen’s Food Group, and Dr. Jonathan Campbell, Associate Professor and Extension Meat Specialist at Penn State University.
The largest share of the contestants’ scores were derived from the cutting portion where they were asked to break down a beef top round and a bone- in pork loin. They were judged on accuracy - how accurately did they fabricate the retail cuts, technique - knife skills, visual appeal- how well did they visually merchandise, label and display their cuts for the consumer, consumer sales pitch - how well did the contestant deliver a concise, factual, appealing, and persuasive sales pitch and accurate yields when it came to the pork loin.
"Josh Williams shared, “Contest like this one make the entire industry better by pushing us all to keep learning and getting better."
The beef and pork product from the contest were then donated to the local State College Foodbank following the end of the competition.
For more information about beef promotion in the Northeast region, visit www.nebpi.org/.
Stay connected with the Northeast Beef Promotion Initiative Facebook and Instagram pages to catch up on how the Northeast region is actively seeking to promote beef.
For more information, visit NEBPI.org or BeefBoard.org
Media Contact: Samantha Augustine, [email protected] or visit the NEBPI website.
###
The Beef Checkoff Program was established as part of the 1985 Farm Bill. The Checkoff assesses $1 per head on the sale of live domestic and imported cattle, in addition to a comparable assessment on imported beef and beef products. States may retain up to 50 cents on the dollar and forward the other 50 cents per head to the Cattlemen's Beef Promotion and Research Board, which administers the national Checkoff program, subject to USDA approval. Internal links within this document are funded and maintained by the Beef Checkoff. All other outgoing links are to websites maintained by third parties.
Share This Page