SANDY Leatham doesn't believe in short cuts, SARAH HUDSON reports

As a young bride Sandy Leatham lived in a one-room hut on a Tasmanian sheep farm with no electricity or running water.

"I even cooked my wedding cake in a camp oven over an open fire," Sandy says.

"We had no refrigeration but we had a very cold stream close to the hut which provided water and cooling."

This was not the 1800s but the 1980s and far from being a high-maintenance, demanding bride, she says she couldn't have been happier.

"It wasn't about being a hippy, it was just what we could afford at the time."

About 30 years later she is replicating this pioneering ingenuity in her Benalla butcher's shop, Hook and Spoon.

To call the shop a butchery, however, does not do it justice.

Selling free-range beef and mutton raised on her own Warrenbayne farm, all her meat is dry-aged, a long process that creates the most tender, flavoursome cut.

The only meat she can't supply herself is rare-breed Berkshire pork, which she sources from a free-range farmer in Numurkah.

In spring she sources local, grass-finished lambs.

All parts of the butchered carcass are used, particularly in Sandy's line of award-winning pies, takeaway meals, sausages and even lasagnes.

Her philosophy and methods would be called slow food by today's trend-setting standards, but the mother of four says she is merely doing what she's always done.

"When I started I found what I do is called slow food. I'm actually in a box, a niche, whether I wanted to or not.

"My philosophy is to look after the stock as best I can while they're alive and make the best use of the meat, respecting the animal ... . and I like to be aware of my impact on the earth, how much water and electricity I use.

"I used to always cook on a wood stove. Now I cook what I've always cooked. It's just what works. It feels right."

Sandy trained as a commercial cook in Tasmania, before marrying and moving to the one-room hut.

She and her now former husband moved to Victoria and the 263ha Warrenbayne property a decade ago.

The inspiration for Hook and Spoon came from the shop itself: "It's a 122-year-old butcher's shop in a gorgeous old building and I looked at the building and my skills and the business just evolved".

While she had the cooking skills and the vintage philosophy, Sandy still researched extensively.

She says most butchers wet-age their meat in vacuum-sealed bags, which can change the flavour, while they avoid dry-ageing because the carcass loses weight.

"We hang the beef for 28 days and the mutton for 12 which is recommended by Meat and Livestock Australia and follows research by CSIRO.

"I spoke to a lot of chefs and they all wanted dry-aged meat.

"Using the whole carcass and not buying in wet-aged, boxed meat to supplement our supply means we sometimes run out of product, but we just apologise and ask the customer to come back in a week."

To supply the shop Sandy farms about 200 head of Merino annually and 60 cattle, which are bred with the help of her neighbour, all grass-fed on native bush and herbage, and are free-range with no drenching.

"The only part of the business that I don't completely have control over is the slaughter. It's disappointing that I can't process them at home with less stress and without trucking."

She says she chose mutton, despite its stigma, because she originally farmed Merinos for their succulent flavour.

"When you look at the philosophy of raising lambs it takes more out of the environment. You have to run a ewe for a year and supplement feed to finish the lamb.

"Whereas Merino mutton - rather than an old fat lamb - has finer wool fibres and I think it also has finer muscle fibre and you don't take anything additional out of the environment.

"There's a mutton renaissance society in Britain. Prince Charles is its patron and Jamie Oliver is on the committee. They say the succulence of mutton is unsurpassed by any other meat."

Sandy spends much of her time cooking the meat cuts into the sausages, pies - with handmade pastry - and prepared meals, which include the ever-popular beef burgundy pie, the quirky beef, fig and lemon pie as well as terrines and meatballs in sauce.

Relishes, sauces and spice mixes are also on the menu with the produce supplied locally.

Aside from the shop, her products are also sold at farmers' markets around the state, and delivered around the North East and to Melbourne households.

"Lots of things could be done more easily but I wouldn't feel right about it. I started out using frozen pastry in the pies and I felt like I was cheating the customer, so now we make it from scratch with butter.

"I'm a farmer who is value-adding but I'm also expense and effort-adding. You wouldn't do it if you didn't have a passion for it.

"I feel proud that we do things from scratch and we're not cutting corners."

    CHECKLIST
  • Hook and Spoon, 16b Carrier St, Benalla. Ph: (03) 5762 2044.