Broussard, LouisianaEst. 1974

Boucherie Noir

Whole animal. Live oak. Fourteen days of smoke.

Start at the chart
Farms
4
Radius
60 mi
Waste
0%

01 — The Chart

Every animal is a map.

A hog gives up six primals and about two hundred pounds. Touch one and we'll tell you what comes off it, and what we do with the parts nobody asks for.

Interactive hog primal chart

Tap a primal

02 — The Counter

What's ready today.

Cut and weighed the morning you order. We ship Tuesday and Thursday on dry ice, or you pick up at the shop.

Prices are per pound and settle at the scale — you're charged the weight we actually cut. Anything within four ounces of your order ships without a second invoice.

Cured meats hanging from iron hooks inside a hazy wooden smokehouse, lit by one shaft of amber light.

03 — The Smoke

Fourteen days, no shortcuts.

The smokehouse out back is the original 1974 building. Live oak and pecan, cold at first, then warm. Here's what happens to a shoulder between the day it arrives and the day it becomes tasso.

  1. Break & trim

    Shoulder comes off the carcass whole. We square it and save the trim for sausage.

  2. Dry cure

    Salt, cane sugar, black pepper. Packed and turned once a day.

  3. Rinse & rest

    Cure washed off, meat rests uncovered to form a pellicle.

  4. Cayenne crust

    Rolled in cayenne, garlic and file. This is the part that makes it tasso.

  5. Cold smoke

    Ninety hours under live oak at eighty degrees. Nothing cooks yet.

  6. Hot finish

    Heat comes up to one-sixty. Fat renders, crust sets hard.

  7. Hang

    Cooled, weighed, hung on the rail. It has lost a third of its weight and all of its patience.

04 — Provenance

Four farms.

We drive to every one of them. If a farm can't take a visit on a Tuesday without warning, we don't buy from it.