Butcher

"Boning" redirects here. For the concept in corsetry, see Bone (corsetry). For other uses, see Butcher (disambiguation).

Butcher
Occupation
A butcher's, Tacuinum sanitatis casanatensis (XIV (14th) century)
Occupation type	Vocation
Activity sectors	Manufacturing
Description
Related jobs	Animal husbandry

A butcher is a person who may slaughter animals, dress their flesh, sell their meat or do any combination of these three tasks.^[1] They may prepare standard cuts of meat, poultry, fish, and shellfish for sale in retail or wholesale food establishments. A butcher may be employed by supermarkets, grocery stores, butcher shops and fish markets, slaughter house, or may be self-employed.^[2]

An ancient trade, whose duties may date back to the domestication of livestock, butchers formed guilds in England as far back as 1272.^[3] Today, many jurisdictions offer trade certifications for butchers. Some areas expect a three-year apprenticeship followed by the option of becoming a master butcher.^[4]^[5]

Duties

Primary butchery in a meat packing plant, 1873

Butchery is a traditional line of work. In the industrialized world, slaughterhouses use butchers to slaughter the animals, performing one or a few of the steps repeatedly as specialists on a semiautomated disassembly line. The steps include stunning (rendering the animal incapacitated), exsanguination (severing the carotid or brachial arteries to facilitate blood removal), skinning (removing the hide or pelt) or scalding and dehairing (pork), evisceration (removing the viscera) and splitting (dividing the carcass in half longitudinally).

After the carcasses are chilled (unless "hot-boned"), primary butchery consists of selecting carcasses, sides, or quarters from which primal cuts can be produced with the minimum of wastage; separating the primal cuts from the carcass; trimming primal cuts and preparing them for secondary butchery or sale; and storing cut meats. Secondary butchery involves boning and trimming primal cuts in preparation for sale. Historically, primary and secondary butchery were performed in the same establishment, but the advent of methods of preservation and low cost transportation has largely separated them.

In parts of the world, it is common for butchers to perform many or all of the butcher's duties. Where refrigeration is less common, these skills are required to sell the meat of slaughtered animals.

Butcher shop

"Butcher's shop" redirects here. For the 1583 painting, see Butcher's Shop.

Boucherie du Bac, 82 Rue du Bac, Paris.

A butcher at work in Syria

Some butchers sell their goods in specialized stores, commonly termed a butcher shop (American English), butchery (South African English) or butcher's shop (British English). Butchers at a butcher shop may perform primary butchery, but will typically perform secondary butchery to prepare fresh cuts of meat for sale. These shops may also sell related products, such as food preparation supplies, baked goods and grocery items. Butcher shops can have a wider variety of animal types, meat cuts and quality of cuts. Additionally, butcher shops may focus on a particular culture, or nationality, of meat production. Some butcher shops, termed "meat delis", may also include a delicatessen.^[6]

In the United States and Canada, butcher shops are becoming less common because of the increasing popularity of supermarkets. Supermarkets employ butchers for secondary butchery, but in the United States even that role is diminished with the advent of "case-ready" meat, where the product is packaged for retail sale at the packinghouse or specialized central processing plants.

Primal cut

Main article: Primal cut

See also: Cut of beef, Cut of lamb and Cut of pork

A primal cut is a piece of meat initially separated from the carcass during butchering. Different countries and cultures make these cuts in different ways, and primal cuts also differ between type of carcass. The British, American and French primal cuts all differ in some respects. A notable example is fatback, which in Europe is an important primal cut of pork, but in North America is regarded as trimmings to be used in sausage or rendered into lard. The primal cuts may be sold complete or cut further.

(The quite distinct term "prime cut" is sometimes used to describe cuts considered to be of better quality; for example the USDA uses a beef grading system ranging from "prime" to "canner".^[7])

Metaphorical use

See also Butcher (disambiguation)

In various periods and cultures, the term "butcher" has been applied to people who act cruelly to other human beings or slaughter them. For example, Pompey, a prominent Roman general and politician of the first century BC, got the Latin nickname adulescentulus carnifex, translated as "The Teenage Butcher" or "The Butcher Boy", due to brutal treatment of political opponents in the early part of his career.

References

↑ "Merriam-Webster's Dictionary's definition of "butcher"".
↑ "Employment information for butchers".
↑ "York Butchers' Guild". Yorkbutchersgild.com. Retrieved 2012-04-04.
↑ "Job futures statistics". Servicecanada.gc.ca.
↑ "Master Butcher's Guide". Members.shaw.ca.
↑ sameatshops.ca
↑ USDA beef grading system

Meat

Main articles Entomophagy Meat Fish Game Livestock Poultry Seafood

Poultry and game	Alligator Chicken Crocodile Duck Goose Grouse Kangaroo Ostrich Partridge Pheasant Quail Rabbit Pigeon Snake Turkey Venison

Livestock and Minilivestock	Black soldier flies maggots Bison Beef and veal Camel Cat Cricket Dog Elephant Frog Grasshoppers Goat Guinea pig Horse Mealworm Lamb and mutton Llama Palm grub Pork Mopane worm Yak

Fish and seafood	Alligator Anchovy Basa Bass Carp Catfish Cod Pollock Crab Crappie Crayfish Dolphin Eel Pike Flounder Grouper Haddock Halibut Herring Kingfish Lobster Mackerel Mahi Mahi Marlin Milkfish Orange roughy Pacific saury Perch Salmon Sardine Shark Shrimp/prawn Sole Swordfish Tilapia Trout Tuna Walleye Whale

Cuts and preparation, precooked	Aged Bacon Barbecued Burger Braised Charcuterie Chop Corned Cured Cutlet Dried Dum Fried Ham Kebab Liver Luncheon meat Marinated Meatball Offal Pickled Poached Roasted Salt-cured Salumi Sausage Smoked Steak Stewed Tartare Tandoor Tenderized

List articles	Food and drink prohibitions Beef dishes Chicken dishes Countries by meat consumption Fish dishes Goat dishes Pork dishes Sausage dishes Sausages Seafood dishes Smoked foods Steaks Veal dishes

Related Subjects	Animal rights Bushmeat Butcher Cannibalism Carnism Ethics of eating meat Feed conversion ratio In vitro meat Factory farming Meat cutter Meat paradox Meat tenderness Pescatarianism Plant-based diet Psychology of eating meat Preservation Red meat Semi-vegetarianism Slaughter Slaughterhouse Veganism Vegetarianism White meat

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