Behind the Scenes- Our Smoked Meat!
Hello, everybody! This week I am taking you behind the scenes of Miller’s Meat Market, AND introducing you to another one of our employees! A special two in one combo! Today you will be meeting Andrew Johnson, and learning what his role is here at Miller’s. Every Wednesday Andrew is in charge of smoking the store and custom shop items that we need for the week. Allow me to tell you a little more about Andrew, and his meat smoking responsibilities.
Andrew is more commonly referred to by his last name, “Johnson”, by all his coworkers at Miller’s. Andrew graduated from Beaver River Highschool in 2017, and it was that final year of high-school where his involvement in Miller’s began. Johnson was a standout student in the culinary arts program at BOCES his junior and senior year of high-school, and when the time came for Andrew to start an internship at a local business, Miller’s Meat Market seemed to be a good fit for him. After a tour of our facilities, Andrews interest in Miller’s had peeked and he later found out that he would in fact be interning at Miller’s for about six weeks. However, after his internship and graduation from high-school, joining the Miller’s Meat Market team as a paid employee was not Andrew’s immediate next step. Instead, he headed to further his culinary education at SUNY Cobleskill for a semester. Following this semester of college, Andrew decided to return to Miller’s, where he has been working ever since.
Andrew enjoys working at Miller’s for a few different reasons. He is grateful to work where hours are flexible, while at the same time there is always work to do so he knows he will always be putting in the time he needs to. Johnson’s responsibilities are quite widespread, he runs the polyclip machine which packages burger and sausage, he does some stuffing, and also works at the cutting table from time to time depending on how busy things are. He, surprisingly enough, enjoys cleaning the most! He likes working on Saturday’s which are mostly cleaning days for the custom shop. He likes cleaning up his equipment, and organizing the kitchen so that he knows things are ready to run smoothly during the upcoming week. Another job that he would consider a favorite of his would be wrapping scallops in bacon, and skewering them. Some future goals Johnson has are to be able to purchase and move into a house, and get a new car! Andrew has always loved and been interested in the food industry, even outside of work he loves to cook, grill and have barbeques, and he also loves to golf! During his time here at Miller’s Andrew has learned a number of valuable lessons, one of those being how to drive clutch…in Andrew’s earlier years at Miller’s he would smoke ribs out front for our customers to purchase, and one time Andrew was being taught how to move the smoker so that he could take care of it himself after rib barbeques. Well the learning process had it’s hiccups which included damaging the store chimney, Andrew had (accidently of course) driven the tractor into the side of the store due to his lack of knowledge on clutch driving. However, he assured me that he is now an expert, and that he has not harmed any other buildings with any other vehicles since that day. Thank goodness!
What are Andrew’s favorite Miller’s Meat Market products?
He enjoys beef Pepperjack Hotdogs, beef Cheddar Bacon Burgers & Pepperjack Burgers, and he says you can never go wrong with our bacon!
“Adding our bacon to anything automatically makes it better.” -Andrew
Now that you know a little more about Andrew, I want to tell you more about the meat he smokes every Wednesday. Have you ever had any of our deli meat from the store? Well if you have, it was smoked by Andrew! As far as store items go, he makes the pulled pork, smoked sandwich pork loin, smoked turkey breast, and roast beef. These items can be purchased in our retail store, all four of these items are deliciously smoked in house so they have great flavor and can be eaten right from the package! Fresh meat to make great sandwiches! Andrew doesn’t only smoke items for the store, there also is a list of things that can be smoked in the custom shop. When farmers bring their animals to us, we take instructions on how to cut the beef or pork for the farmers customers. There are some smoked meat options, such as smoked pork ribs, beef short ribs, beef brisket, roast beef and we can also make pulled pork or sandwich pork loin from their pig as well. These are all products that Andrew smokes weekly if custom shop customers have these items on their instructions. Some people also may bring us turkey breasts to be smoked, or occasionally fish! When smoking we only use locally sourced cherry wood, every single time! Andrew has been doing this job every week starting sometime in the first year he got employed here at Miller’s, so he has the routine down pat! He is a very valuable employee who has an important job, and he does that job very well. Below are some photos of our deli roast beef, turkey breast, and pork loin.
It has been a pleasure talking about Andrew, and the meat he smokes every week! If you haven’t tried our smoked deli items in the store, what are you waiting for!? Next time you stop by make sure you give them a try, and now you will know who makes those items! If you don’t live nearby, our deli cuts are also available to be purchased online and be shipped to you. I hope you have enjoyed learning a little more about another one of our employees, and getting some behind the scenes insight into the process of smoking our deli meat and other products! Thank you for reading the blog, you know what to do next week!