There's not much choice in the supermarket, is there?
Not all countries butcher their lamb at such a small size as we do in the UK... I don't know why our farmers choose to. If you've got farm shops nearby perhaps you can buy hogget (year old lamb) or my favourite mutton chops. Both have more flavour and larger size carcass.
I can still get decent sized pork chops here, but have to explain to the butcher what I want.... Nowadays they sell the thickest part of the loin, where the big chops come from, as a roasting joint after they've removed the bones.
I haven't been to the butcher in 4 years for good reason.
The time before last I was in a butcher we'd been long term customers of that was shut down and the family banned from keeping animals for life on welfare and chemicals that shouldn't be in the meat issues. That was the £5 for pork cheeks place.
The last time was the butchers along. I got a mad meat mumbling Butcher and screamed at by a woman called Sadie and while the meat was apparently good, I never went back. Also it was pre cut up by the abattoir which I didn't expect.
I was getting beef skirt/pork roasts, sausages and the butcher had to be told multiple times I wanted 4 of beef skirts and I wanted them trimmed of skin. They were in the bag, out of the bag, then I reminded him I wanted them trimmed of the skin. Yes I was sure. So they all came out of the bag. He had his face down next to the beef and was smoothing it out with both hands and mumbling to it continuously before trimming it (badly) and starting to mumble and trim the next ones. it was the best part of 10 minutes as the clock was behind him to get 3 skirts trimmed. the 4th went AWOL, probably scared of all the fondling and mumbling.
They were then in and out of the bags again, sometimes all in one bag, then in separate bags. I was losing the will to live and telling him the bus was coming and I needed to get the baby home for a feed. I could porting them at home no problem. He flapped more.
It got worse, he stated to panic and the bag jumping continued but with the bags going into my bag for life, the shop bag, out of both, in my bag, then out. I was wondering why he had a job and could I get someone else. the man right beside him. Then I asked how much something was because it had no sign and he put them all in a bag and I had to tell him to stop. I asked for something in a bag not a foil tray as it was going to be cooked in a slow cooker and I may as well not have spoken as and into a foil tray it went anyway.
I abandoned the rest of my order and asked him to put it through. Then the dance with the bags started AGAIN and the bus went past. I should have walked out. He then took my card and disappeared in the back for 5 minutes.
Sadie came in with her son just as he disappeared (he was in his 50s) and I asked do I need to move the buggy, just let me know and I'll happily shift it. She looked through me and her son started to talk about all the colours of the meat-relevant fact.
They were at the far end of the counter so I waited until they meandered half way to the buggy and I started to take the brakes off the buggy when she started SCREAMING at me that I needed to move the buggy didn't I see her son was blind. After him spending 5 minutes talking about what he could see. It wasn't just the butcher that had lost it.
If the beef whisper wasn't still off looking for the yellow brick road I'd have been gone without the meat and left those insane sods to their madness. The beef whisper lunatic that was serving me reached peak something and clearly couldn't cope came back with the wireless handset and handed it to the other butcher to let Sadie pay. Who took her sweet time. After me having been waiting. When he finally got it back he broke it and disappeared for another 5 minutes out the back for a gallop about and the other butcher came to the rescue.
Then there was more dancing with the bags, he was totally losing whatever was left in there and I was telling him that another bus was due and I'd been here for almost an hour and they only come every 30 minutes.
The other butcher hoped to see me again. I barely made the bus, they are 30 minutes apart so it would have been a long wait and I had been in there for almost an hour. The card thankfully hadn't had it's details stolen so I don't know what he was doing besides galloping back and forwards past the entrance.
I was talking to people afterwards about the insane butcher I wasn't listening to their recommendations again. OOOH that's typical of him, it's what he's like, he's only part time and I "was lucky to get him". As if I didn't have a baby and life to get on with rather than "enjoying" the company that brand of crazy so & so. He's "great" a fun feature and people go there when he's on just to get served by him, to experience all that or watch him suffer maybe and secretly laugh.