Monday, February 18, 2013

Boost for Local Butchers

The horsemeat scandal is doing wonderful things for local butchers, where the provenance of meat is unquestionable. I was in our local last week and the butcher was saying to customers "what you see is what you get, all our sausages are made from the beef and pork from local farmers delivered fresh every week". I think we will see a great move in the UK to "buy local". I know from observation that each local butcher in the Borders gets a sheep and half a cow delivered from local farms every week, that makes up what they sell, so if you want sheeps liver or a particular cut you may find someone else bought that this week and you have to wait. Our family stopped buying supermarket meat a while ago.

Thursday, February 7, 2013

Halliwells Butchers Selkirk

Right on the market Square is a local butcher that matches St Boswells. Their beef sausages are good and the whole display is wholesome and good quality. I particularly like the board naming the farms where their produce comes from. This is the only butcher in the Borders that does this and it should be rewarded!.

They carry a wide range of pies including fruit all home baked and jams and preserves. The staff wear striped aprons and the are clean and look good.

Borders Supermarkets

There are major supermarkets in Galashiels, Berwick, Hawick and Kelso.

Morrisons are in Hawick and Berwick, good stores but pricey we find. However they do have good home baked bread, in fact the only supermarket that has good bread. Their spelt and wholewheat is excellent even by artizan standards.

Sainsbury is only in Kelso a new store and quite small. They do have good quality meat and their fish counter is the only one in any supermarket to carry Hake as a whole fish, important for curry lovers.

Asda is only in Galashiels, its a good store, huge and full of produce. I think it may price compare to Tesco but we find it a bit confusing in layout.

Tesco is in Hawick, Galashiels (A superstore) and Berwick. Tesco is good for people who appreciate foreign food as they have the best selection including from our needs salt fish which we use weekly. No other supermarket carries it or giant papaya. So if your Portuguese or Spanish or French or West Indian or African you use Tesco!

There are no Waitrose in the Borders which is a shame as it might help with variety.