Oregon’s first USDA inspected meat-curing facility was opened in 2009. The meat-curing facility is connected to a restaurant of the same name. All of the pork for their salumis comes from Carlton Farms, a company just south of Portland, that buys pork from growers in the region (stretching throughout the Pacific Northwest) for processing and distribution. Carlton Farms requires their growers to pass a certification to demonstrate that they meet Carlton’s standards for animal welfare, feed quality, and environmental stewardship. Salume production at Olympic Provisions begins with fresh heritage pork shoulders that are hand-butchered to 100% lean prior to cutting and then have hand-cut fatback added to them. Elias Cairo is the head salumist. Cairo is a trained chef who trained formally in Switzerland and work in kitchens there and in Greece. He learned about butchering and curing meats over the years both from his father, a hunter and restaurateur, and from the in-house butcher at one of his Swiss employers, Hotel and Restaurant Stumps Alpenrose. The butcher there was working with animals brought in by hunters that he transformed into primal cuts, sausages, pates, etc. Meats were cured right there on premises. Olympic Provisions produces pates and terrines, fresh sausages, a line of cured salamis (4 chorizo varieties, Alsatian varieties), and cured whole muscle meats (guanciale, coppa, lomo, and pancetta).
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