Po’s Apprenticeship

Jason Bradly and Bill Smith with their latest fan Po.

“TV cooking shows are extremely powerful, as shown with sellouts of particular cuts in the days after MasterChef shows,” Bill says. “Butchers need to get on the coat-tails of these shows and go along for the ride.”

Jason says, “These shows are great for our industry. In a sense, butchers are close to chefs in the advice we can give.

“We had no hesitation in going on Poh’s Kitchen because we know from past experience it’s fun and customers love it because   they can get involved.”

Before the latest show, Jason and Bill took out a postcard size colour ad in the local paper promoting the show -- and themselves   as Poh’s favourite butchers.

The pair first appeared on TV on the ABC show Beat The Chef, followed by briefly explaining cuts on The Cook and The Chef    before a 10-minute spot on Poh’s Kitchen, again explaining cuts.

Poh invited them back for a full 30-minute show on meat. She became their “apprentice for a day”, although filming spanned four days.

Jason and Bill, who have had a butcher shop together for over 10 years, changed the way Poh looks at cuts of meat.

As one example, Bill followed a recipe using scotch fillet ($32kg) and used the same recipe with oyster blade ($16kg).

Poh, surprised, found both cuts of steak equally tasty and tender.

* This episode of Poh’s Kitchen screened on August 4 and August 5 on ABC1 and ABC2 respectively, but can still be seen on www.abc.net.au/iView until August 18 or watched at www.abc.net.au/pohskitchen

 Source: MBL News Magazine August/September 2010 (1.16mb) mbl magazine august september 2010.pdf