Boccalone artisan meats combine sustainably raised, heritage-breed pork, Italian sea salt, and the freshest spices with the rarest ingredient of all: time. Our small-batch, hands-on methods and traditional cold curing techniques can take up to ten times longer than other producers'. Why sacrifice efficiency? Because taking our time lets us focus every step of our process on a single goal: great taste.

	Hand Butchering. Unlike most producers, who merely "dump and grind" thousands of pounds of boxed meat to produce sausage and salami, we work by hand to butcher each individual piece of meat.  This personal attention enables us to best select the optimal cuts for each of our products. The time and effort are essential to ensuring that each of our products includes only the parts best suited to that particular item.
	Small Batches. Working in product quantities a fraction the size of other producers’ permits us to more easily adjust for any variations in ingredients or production conditions that might affect quality. Smaller batches also mean less chance of over-mixing in products such as salami and terrines, which can toughen the final product.
	Personal Attention. All of our salumi are butchered by hand, seasoned by hand, tied by hand, hung by hand, checked by hand, and packaged by hand. This personal attention to detail leverages the expertise of Boccalone’s artisans at every step of the process.
	Less Salt, More Flavor. Adding more salt to salumi makes the curing process go faster, but diminishes the potential for truly great salumi. We believe salumi should taste of meat and spices, not salt. Years of experience have taught us that keeping salt to a minimum takes more time, but produces the best tasting salumi.
	Cold Curing. Most salumi producers force warm air into their aging rooms to evaporate moisture and accelerate the curing process. Boccalone’s aging rooms utilize a different technique enabling us to keep our products as much as 25°-40° F cooler in the drying phase than products aged using forced air systems. Cold curing takes much, much longer, but we’re sure you’ll taste the difference.
	Direct Delivery. Unlike most American salumi producers, whose product is sold by the truckload, we sell more than 90% of what we produce one piece at a time, directly into the hands of you, the consumer.  Currently our full line of products is available only at the Boccalone Salumeria. We also offer a selction products for home delivery through our website.

Our Pigs

The first ingredient in every Boccalone product is great quality pork sourced from properly raised pigs.

We use heritage-breed pigs, including Berkshire and Large Black. We buy whole pigs from small, local farms as often as possible. We also buy from a co-op of family owned farms in the Midwest.

All of our farms practice good animal husbandry:

• Pigs are raised in hoop houses with natural bedding
• Pigs have access to pasture
• Pigs are raised antibiotic and hormone free
• Pigs are fed a diet of soy and corn; some also get a supplement of local whey
• Pigs have farrowing pens, which allow them to give birth in a natural environment
• Some of our producers are certified humane

We are dedicated to sourcing natural, certified humane, pasture-raised, antibiotic- and hormone-free pork. We are continually developing relationships with farmers who raise heritage-breed pigs in order to secure a regular supply of local, sustainable pork.