Ethos

Livesey Brothers farm in harmony with the environment. All products are grown without the use of pesticides, fertilisers and chemicals.
For instance, spent mushroom compost is ploughed back into the soil to maintain a nutrient balance by revitalising subterranean wildlife, such as earthworms, bacteria and humus. - Sustainability is a key word!  Grass grown on this land is grazed by the herd of Pedigree Hereford Beef Cattle and flock of North Country Mule Sheep providing quality Beef and Lamb for the local communities.

It is our aim to produce the highest quality products of their type in the UK with full regard for the enviornment in which we live.

We don't rush our livestock.  We have selected a slow maturing beef breed, Pedigree Hereford Beef Cattle, that thrives on a diet of 100% grass.  When the animal is fat we take it to our local abbatoir, just 7 miles away.  The carcass is returned to us the next day for hanging in our own on farm butchery.  We hang all of our beef on the bone for a minimum of 6-7 weeks, going up to 12 weeks.  We then butcher the carcass into joints and steaks and then vacuum pack them prior to freezing in our blast freezer.  All of our meat is sold frozen. 

Why do we hang our beef for so long?

Answer: Succulence, Tenderness and Flavour

Succulence

Hanging beef in a properly controlled cold room allows the free water in the meat to evaporate slowly.  Up to 30% of the weight of the meat is lost over a 12 week period through evaporation.  Modern butchers and certainly supermarkets would never dream of losing such a large % of their starting weight as this would be regarded as "Shrinkage" in todays parlance. By allowing the free water to evaporate we ensure that the remaining water left in the meat is "locked into" the fibres of the meat. 

If you cook a poorly hung steak the free water in the meat immediately leaches out of the meat and floods the pan leaving the steak swimming in water until it evaporates into the atmosphere. What is left in the pan is a piece of meat that will be dry and tough. A steak from properly hung beef (hung for more than 6 weeks), on the otherhand, when placed into the pan will hold onto the moisture within it as it is "locked into" the fibres of the meat.  The juices will be released after it has been cooked, rested and served, leaving a mouthwatering tender, succulent and tasty steak.

Try weighing a poorly hung steak before and after cooking and calculate the weight loss, (you have paid for this weight loss in the purchase price of the steak), then try the same experiment with a well hung steak, you'll be amazed at the difference.

Tenderness

During the hanging process the fibres in the meat are broken down by naturally produced enzymes in the meat.  This is a product of time and cannot be accelerated.  The longer the meat hangs the more tender it will become.  Don't be fooled by the term "Aged" beef as this is simply not the same.  As described above hanging causes severe weight loss.  So to overcome this supermarkets and modern butchers will "Age" their beef in vacuum packs.  The meat will sit in a sealed bag in cold storgae during which time the meat is literally drowning in its own blood. This method does allow the fibres to break down, but it doesn't allow for the vital evaporation of the moisture to ensure succulence.  Result - a tender dry piece of meat.

Flavour

Whilst the beef is hanging and the fibres are breaking down in the presence of Oxygen, (unlike vacuum packed meat), the beef will, over time, take on a much more full bodied flavour and mature.  It's rather like the difference between a young wine and a matured wine, there really is no comparison.  Whatever flavour the poorly hung beef may have in the first place simply evaporates with the free water as soon as it sees the pan. 

Why do we freeze our meat?

Many people think frozen meat is inferior to fresh meat sold through their local butchers shop.  This simply is not so if: (a) the meat has been frozen correctly, and (b) the meat is of a superior quality in the first place, which we certainly believe ours is.

We vacuum pack our meat prior to freezing so that the meat will keep indefinitely in your home freezer without deteriorating. We blast freeze the meat to ensure that any ice crystals formed are kept as small as possible. If you were to freeze the meat at home, larger ice crystals may form due to the time taken to freeze in a home freezer, these larger crystals may have the effect of tearing the meat's own fibres, resulting in a poorer quality end product. It would be a shame to undo the care, attention and hard work of the last 3 years by not doing the very last job correctly.

Hanging, packing and selling our meat in this way enables us to kill the animal at the optimum time of the year for flavour, and succulence.  You, the customer can then enjoy the very best beef and lamb throughout the year.

Freezing meat is the the only natural way of conserving flavour, succulence and tenderness. 

New Season Lamb all year - now that can't be bad.