Excellent Housecured Meats at Moccia's Italian Meat Market

I treated myself last week to an afternoon exploring new (to me) stores around town. (It was a treat mostly because I was out in the car.) I went to two places that are relevant to the blog, one of which is the subject of today’s post.

Moccia’s Italian Meat Market (www.moccia.ca/index.html) is located on E. Hastings, not too far past Commercial Ave. I went there in search of house-cured prosciutto, but left with a variety of their salamis instead.

I purchased three salamis - their entire selection that day. (I found the whole place to be rather sparse in terms of merchandise, to be truthful, but in the end, this was irrelevant.) One I believe was the Friulano. The other two don’t appear to be listed on the web site. One had pieces of fig in it, the other had duck in addition to the pork. If my memory serves, the one with figs was the same as the Friulano, but with the addition of figs, and the one with duck was a different recipe altogether. But I must admit, I wasn’t listening very attentively to the clerk as he explained the selection; I was too busy swooning over the sample he had given me.

As it turned out, all three were excellent. Increadibly flavourful. When I first put a piece in my mouth the experience was one of the whole, but then the different flavors came to the forefront one by one, the pork (VERY high quality), the subtle spicing, the sweetness of the fig, the wine, the savory duck, then the whole again, in rolling waves of experience.

This is no ordinary commercial salami. You don’t taste the effects of preservatives or long storage or transportation, but rather, craftsmanship and pride in product. It is worth the trip across town, at least for special occasions, or just to turn an ordinary evening into a special one. According to their website various stores around the city sell their products, so you may not have to make your way to their store, although I suspect that the selection is better on site. As I said, I went for proscuitto. Their website doesn’t list prosciutto and so I can’t be certain that they actually make their own. However, when I asked about it, I was told that it wasn’t ready yet. This gives me hope for the future (because it suggests that they do indeed make it), as well as an incentive to visit again (although I don’t really need another one - the salami itself is enough). I must remember to thank the waiter at Mistral for letting me in on this place! (http://bcfoodandwineadventures.blogspot.com/2008/07/mistral-french-bistro.html)