Carnivores delight.

Today I decided to re-visit an old time favourite butcher of mine, in the Sydney suburb of Chester Hill. It is set up in a one-time smallish supermarket which went bust or relocated. I think the owner is Croatian as a lot of the groceries he sells seem to be from that part of the world.

Europeans from all across Sydney make a pilgrimage to this shop. Being a native of South Australia with a German tinged heritage, it reminds me of home too.

You walk into the shop and the first thing that hits you is the smell of smoked meat. You don't know what you want to buy but you want to get some of that scent! The second thing to hit you is the sight of rows and rows of orange and brown coloured smoked hams, speck, sausages and wursts hanging from rails around the entire perimeter of the store. This is no ordinary butcher.

Then there are other things that hit you in his store. The little old European ladies stocking up on all sorts of goods "just like we used to get at home". A mind boggling variety of brandnames, sweets and biscuits I've never seen before including about a half dozen varieties of sauerkraut. The young first generation Australian couple deciding which to go for the Kranskies or the smoked frankfurts. The enormous varieties of sausages and wursts in the display case. The patient and efficient central European lady serving me as I tried to decide what to order.

I eventually walked out with a couple of bags of smoked goods, a jar of good Polish sauerkraut and a lovely "hollow" sounding white Vienna loaf.

I just fried up some short cut bacon and it was the best I've ever tasted since my grandmother's home cured stuff. The black cat approves too!