Butcher moves to organic meats
[attach]4847[/attach]After 25 years in business, Royal Beef has a new logo, a new butcher and a new vision.
Although owner Carmen Estrela says they’ve always sourced local products — aside from Alberta Certified Angus Beef because she says it’s the best — they’ve recently made the transition to organic meats.
“Free-range is such a loose term and a lot of us don’t really know what it means and the government hasn’t really set strict standards and guidelines and rules to say ‘this is what it is’,” she says. “But hormone- and antibiotic-free, we know what that means.
“It means they’ve been given no chemicals, so actually it is natural.”
She says her goal is to help the next generation, which includes her future grandchildren, eat better by providing healthier food options.
Estrela says she started Royal Beef with her late husband Paul when he was demoted to stocking shelves at a Dominion grocery store after working as a butcher for 16 years.
“We took our savings, we took our pensions and everything and we opened up around the corner,” she says. “Three hundred square feet and that’s how we started.”
She says she went along with the idea even though she thought he was crazy because there were other butcher shops near Woodbine and Danforth avenues.
Over the years, the other butcher shops have closed.
Royal Beef, which her husband named after the Royal Winter Fair and a cutting contest he had won there, was faced with a similar fate when Estrela thought about closing the store after Paul passed away seven years ago.
“I didn’t want to be there without him because it was something that we did together and it was too hard for me to be there by myself,” she says. “Plus, I didn’t know where I belonged.”
She says she felt inspired to keep going after she received an outpouring of support in the form of phone calls and cards from customers. And, she says, her daughter was adamant that she remains open.
Estrela says her butcher Paul Bradshaw, who re-joined the company in May, was first hired as a teenager and used to come into the store with his mom when he was growing up.
“Little Paul, for some reason he had a passion — ‘psycho butcher’ I call it because I haven’t seen that look since my husband and it’s funny that they both have the same name.”
She believes Royal Beef has remained successful over the years because they continue to adapt to meet their customers’ needs. She says her store is also filled with knowledgeable staff and offers service that can’t be replicated at big chain stores.
“If you’ve never cooked a pot roast in your life, it doesn’t matter,” she says. “If you come in, I’ll tell you how to cook it.
“The boys will cut you a piece of meat that will be the best darn thing you’ve eaten all year, I guarantee it.”