Everyone, this is Max. Max, this is Everyone
I’d like to introduce a fresh face to The Meat Market: Max Gitlen, our new butcher! Born and raised in Albany, Max grew up traveling between New York City, Upstate New York, and The Berkshires (he learned to ski at Butternut when he was three), soaking up the food-centricity of our region, and watching his mother craft a vegetable garden out of a vacant lot near their home. Though he studied architecture in school (Brown University) and toured as a DJ post graduation, he found he couldn’t stop thinking about the potentials of food. Putting aside the beats, Max began working at a Boston-based non-profit called The Food Project, one of the first organizations in the country that sought to unite youth of all stripes through the fun, frustrating business of farming. Seeking to spread the value of local farming even further, Max helped to set up a program that would match low income families’ food stamps at farmers’ markets. He noticed that despite a growing interest in sustainable food practice among his peers, there weren’t nearly enough people willing to get their hands dirty with the nitty gritty of sustainable food production. So, Max set out to get his hands dirty.
It was around this time that his father began raising sheep on a refurbished farm in Greenwich, NY, and Max was inspired; since most of the people he knew that were actively involved in food production were farming vegetables, he decided to focus on animals. As he put it, “if I’m part of a commune some day, someone’s going to have to bring the steaks.” He spent three months apprenticing at Formaggio’s Kitchen in Boston, learning the ins-and-outs of charcuterie production, then moved to New York and spent nine months with Liz Clark at Bubby’s, breaking down whole steer and pigs, before heading back to Rhode Island to work at Farmstead. The more he cut, the more he realized how all his interests seemed to funnel: from biology to architecture to environmental sustainability, all were aligned under the knife.
In many ways our shop espouses the very values he aspires to as a butcher. As he sees it, the key to sustainable meat production is local sourcing of whole animals, and the only way to do that viably is to have a solid business foundation that can take advantage of the whole animal; we agree, hence our extensive charcuterie program and fantastic cafe. As we talked, he noted how rare this type of business was, particularly outside a major city, and how tricky a business like this can be. He sees our business as an opportunity not only to provide a great product but to further the aspirations of local food, to provide the highest quality food to all people, to keep the lines visible between producer and customer, and to build a community that can thrive on these principles.
We here at The Meat Market are very excited to have him as part of the team, and he can’t wait to work with us, and with you, to make the shop better and better. “I’m excited about learning with our customers. We’re all in this together, we’re on the same team. I want the customer to go home with what they want, and I want to hear what works for them, what doesn’t, and how to make the experience better for everyone. It’s a collaboration between both sides of the counter, and it takes trust on both sides. I want to keep on learning, keep on experimenting, and bringing all that knowledge to the community.” Hear hear, Max, and welcome aboard!
FYI Max Gitlen is my Son! More on the Meat Market @ www.themeatmarketgb.com
