PEOPLE, ANIMALS, AND HEALTHY SOILS

Pasture to Plate, Vancouver’s Top Choice Butcher Shop for the past three years, offers pastured meat and delicatessen. The company was established in 2000 by Jasmin and Felix who are originally from Switzerland. The two got married in 1979 and decided to move to Canada. They started ranching in Redstone BC over 40 years ago but after 20 years of conventional ranching they wanted to make a change for the better. They began to transition their ranch to organic and biodynamic certifications and direct marketing of clean, natural meats to consumers to offer a more meaningful business. They originally were selling at farmers' markets which lead to their own butcher shop on Commercial Drive in Vancouver that opened in 2011. The family business has three generations working together. Felix and Jasmin still run the ranch and have their finger on the pulse of the entire operation. Their daughter, Barbara Schellenberg, is the general manager of the shop in Vancouver and the abattoir, Chilcotin Harvest. Her son, Garrison Pauls, is the head butcher at the Vancouver shop. Situated in Redstone sits Rafter 25 Ranch, where organic ranching and farming practices are applied, although no longer certified, organic and biodynamic practices are still followed. The animals are born and raised on the ranch and are respectfully harvested at Chilcotin Harvest. “Today the

ranch hosts many families and live-on-site staff, the yearround Kinikinik Restaurant & Store, and beautiful rental accommodations,” says Barbara. Every two weeks the P2P refrigerated truck takes the 10-hour drive down from the ranch to Vancouver to replenish the ranch raised meat and eggs at the P2P Butcher Shop. The truck brings back certified organic food supplies for the Kinikinik Restaurant and Store. The team at Pasture to Plate encourages the public to visit the farm. As food producers, transparency is a key-value, along with sustainability and integrity. The saying at P2P is “We are about People, Animals and Healthy Soils.” In the fall of 2019 Pasture to Plate started offering home delivery in the Vancouver area, positioning them well when the pandemic hit. Come fall 2020 they were able to deliver across the province, which helped grow their business and customer base. “We have an ongoing aim to reduce waste and to increase comestible yield per animal, we really want everything edible to be used,” says Barbara, “Since we have our own abattoir, Chilcotin Harvest, we have also been able to open our doors to help other small producers bring the finished product to their customers.” In the near future Pasture to Plate will be launching an app that will offer a user-friendly platform to allow customers to customize orders with ease. 

WHAT IS BIODYNAMIC FARMING?

“Biodynamics is about working with the land and environments natural rhythms, including weather, seasons and lunar cycles. We find it a simple and natural way of working with the land, plants and animals.” - Barbara Schellenberg

The Ultimate 100% BC Meal

INGREDIENTS

• 1 beeswax aged Prime Rib Steak from P2P

METHOD

Allow the steak to come to room tempature before cooking, leave it out for an hour or two prior.

Remove the beeswax from the steak.

Preheat oven to 450 degrees.

Generously salt the steak all over with 1 Tsp of fine sea salt from Vancouver Island Sea Salt (hand harvested off the BC coast and available at the butcher shop).

Heat a cast iron pan until very hot, lightly smoking; add 1 Tbsp. of P2P pork lard to the pan and melt, leaving at heat high.

Put your steak in the pan and sear for 2.53 min or until the steak easily lifts off the pan without sticking. Once nicely seared flip it so the fat cap is down and sear the fat cap for 30 seconds, then flip to sear the other side of the steak for 2 minutes.

Move the pan with the steak to the oven for 4 minutes (rare), 6 minutes (medium rare); then return the pan to the stove (no heat), add 2 Tbsp. soft butter from a local dairy to the pan and a sprig of fresh rosemary from your patio, spoon it over the steak to coat all sides. Move the steak with the juices to a plate and cover with a bowl or lid, let rest for 10 minutes.

Serve the steak with a generous wedge of room temperature, Castle Blue Cheese from The Farm House dairy in Agassiz (also available at the butcher shop) and a glass of rich BC red wine.

VISIT

P2P Butcher Shop: 1420 Commercial Dr, Vancouver, BC

To learn more about P2P and shop their amazing products visit: www.pasturetoplate.ca

Story by Sierra Simpson