One of California’s hottest butchery shops, Belcampo Meat Co is now open at Palo Alto’s Town & Country Shopping Village. The shop opened its door not very long ago. If you haven’t visited it yet you definitely should do it in the near future because the concept of this place might change the way you look at meat forever. Belcampo is anything but an ordinary butchery shop. Headed by CEO Anya Fernald, Belcampo raises its own free-range, cattle, pigs, ducks, chickens, geese, sheep, goats and rabbits on the company’s farm in Shasta Valley. They butcher them in a proprietary slaughterhouse with a Temple Grandin designed processing facility; and sell the final products exclusively in their own butchery shops/restaurants. This pasture-to-table model means that each and every one of the company’s meat cuts is 100% traceable, from farm to your plate.
Palo Alto’s Belcampo is the fifth location the company opened in 2 years. The shop itself is pretty small but very light and clean, with a butcher counter on one side and a cashier and the kitchen at the end of the hall. The idea of knowing where your food comes from becomes clear as you are walking to the counter to order and watch the butcher cutting huge pieces of meat, transferring them from the chopping block to the service case or sending them to the kitchen. That is the moment when you realize that the meat you will eat is incredibly fresh. For me the most important attraction is that in Belcampo I can buy anything from a chicken stock to a beef tongue and be completely sure that I’m buying a superb quality product.The restaurant opens at 11 am, an hour after the butchery. The menu is not big, but in my opinion very nice, it offers a variety of sandwiches and as well as delicious sides. My personal favorites are Philly cheesesteak, Braised Lamb Belly Bun, huge juicy Hot Dog and of course crispy and spicy Broccolini which you can take as a side.
There are no tables inside, so you must eat outside on one of the shopping center’s tables. Not sure about dinner, but for lunch, Belcampo is a wonderful choice.