One of the best ways to tell someone you love them is with a romantic home-cooked dinner for two! A thoughtfully prepared menu can take the dinner to the next level.

Lamb, salmon, scallops (and other shellfish), pork, beef, and chicken are popular main course options for many couples. But, you might be wondering how you can help your customers pick the best meat for a romantic dinner?

Pasta with grilled vegetables and sausage

A quick and straightforward meal to cook is a simple pasta with grilled vegetables and sausage. In most pasta dishes, the sausage (and its seasoning) are usually carrying most of the flavour for the meal.

It means you’ll want to recommend customers choose a fragrant and perfectly seasoned sausage. Cumberland, Lincolnshire, and any spicy varieties of sausage are all excellent selections to recommend!

Mustard-crusted lamb

Another type of meat that is perfect for a romantic meal is lamb, mustard-crusted or not. The best cuts of meat for cooking mustard-crusted lamb include the leg (roast), ribs (rack) and loin.

Like with beef, you should recommend customers look for white marbling as this fat will help keep the meat moist during cooking. You can suggest that your customers select cuts of lamb with a pink to a pale-ish red colour.

Seared pork chops with mash

No matter how expertly cut and prepared by a butcher, pork chops are easily overcooked. An overcooked pork chop can be tough and challenging to eat, which isn’t very romantic.

The trick to preparing a perfectly cooked pork chop, which you’ll want to pass onto your customers, is to pull the pork chop from heat (oven or pan-seared) when it’s slightly pink in the middle.

This is because the meat will continue to cook a little bit from the residual heat — generally, this is the part where the pork chop goes from being done to overdone.

Rib-eye steak with chips

Lastly we have a British classic - steak and chips!

steak and wine

You’ll want to remind customers the rib eye comes from the ribs which means it has a little bit more fat than other cuts like sirloin — this is what can impact the cost and flavour of the meat. The fat, known as marbling, when cooked is what gives this section of beef a rich, full flavour and a melt in your mouth experience.

Rib-eye is a perfect steak for a romantic meal for two!

To prepare your shop for the Valentine’s Day rush, you can prepackage steaks in packs of two (if you don’t already) and consider running a special on the day, for last-minute buyers!

To help you ensure your butcher shop is running at peak efficiency, we sell a range of butchers knives and even overwrapping machines — to speed up your production! If you have any questions or need advice, please give our friendly team a call on 01254 427761.