Cumbrae's
I finally made it out to the Bayview location of Cumbrae's. I rode out there on my lunch to have a peek at what makes the place so special. I had an interesting experience there and I think it would be best if I were to frame my opinion by giving a little of what I understood to be the background of the place.
My wife has been talking about Cumbrae's for more than two years now. Apparently it is the place of places to go for meat, either to purchase it or to learn how to cut. The story goes that some of the fancier restaurants in Toronto have sent their chefs there to learn how to really cut meat. I had also been lead to understand (though I believe I may have misunderstood, or mislistened, or just plain not paid attention) that Cumbrae's serves a variety of meats from all sorts of suppliers almost entirely made up of local farmers who supply grass fed organic, grass fed, grain fed traditional raised and free range meats.
Well now it is time for me to get to my first impressions of the place. First, when I pulled up on my bicycle I noticed to my dismay that there were no places for me to chain it up. This of course, is not Cumbrae's fault, it's an urban planning issue. I found a parking sign a ways down, chained my bike up and walked back up to Cumbrae's.
Upon entering the place you immediately get the sense that some money has been spent on presentation. The place is nicely decked out; I could just have easily imagined myself inside a newly renovated kitchen on the Bridlepath. The refrigerated display equipment is new and fancy and very not cheap.
Everything is clean. I have worked in meat shops for 24 years and I know a clean one when I see it. Cumbrae's is better than clean. The place is spotless. The meat is adequately cut. It was not cut by an expert, but it was cut proficiently enough. There were no wedge cuts of steaks or chops in the counter, but the presentation is off just enough to know someone young, or someone who fancies themselves to be a chef cut the meat and not an old time Dominion butcher.
It took me some time, but I remembered to notice the smell. Grass fed beef has a smell. It is a gamey smell, a good smell to those who are initiated, but it is certainly an acquired appreciation. Grain fed beef has no smell, like it's sterile. Cumbrae's has no smell. Like I said the place is pristine. But no smell gave me a bad feeling right away.
It is also very dark. It was the middle of the day, there was a lot of light, but the structure of the building is very narrow and so light from the front windows does not penetrate far. Decking the place out with dark tones seems to me ill advised. The electrical lighting inside was adequate, but not good enough for me. If dim lit steakhouse, where you can barely make out your meal and forget about discerning the face of the date you brought with you was the look they were going for here, they nailed it.
I can forgive just about anything, especially something as trivial as poor colour choice, if there is good customer service. Well I didn't get that. When I walked in there were a total of three customers inside the establishment. One was finished checking out and passed me on her way to the door. Another was a young man, dashing in a starving student kind of way, who was handing in a job application to the manager. I was the third customer. There were two clerks behind the counter, three if you count the manager speaking with the job applicant. I stood for a few seconds behind the counter where the red meat was, glanced over twice at the two unengaged female clerks, discovered quickly that they felt no impetus to come over and serve me, so I walked up to them.
I have a nice smile. This is what people tell me. I have a very nice smile. Even people who hate me, there are a few, admit that my smile is beguiling. I had been flashing my smile since the moment I entered the establishment, and I flashed it even harder at the young girl who was going to be serving me. The look she gave me could have frozen the ground beef I ended up purchasing.
"Hello!" I said.
"Hi."
"I was wondering if you could help me out with some of your extra lean ground beef."
"Ok."
"The sign says it is $5.99 a pound, what is that in kilograms?"
"ahhh...."
"It must be something like 13 or something right?"
"Yeah. How much do you want?"
"I would like about two pounds please!" My God this girl looked like someone just ran over her mother. The other two women behind the counter looked just as enthused to be there.
"Oh...is this mince grass fed organic?"
"No. Nothing here is organic. It is traditionally raised, which means no-"
I cut her off. She had no discernable personality which I could damage in any way so I didn't feel too bad.
"No organic anything?" I asked.
"No."
"Oh. I thought you guys had that stuff."
"No."
Long story short, if you want good service, organic grass fed beef the only place still to go is The Healthy Butcher. read more