A Premium Business That Didn't Tend to the Basics

2013: the $85 Meat Board
Top to bottom: Broccolini fried in lard, pork chops,
rib-eye steak, lamb chops, goat, tri-tip, Italian sausage

During our infrequent trips through the North Bay we liked to stop at the Belcampo Meat Company in Larkspur. In 2013 the quality of the food and excellence of the staff seemed to justify the premium prices:

The Belcampo Meat Company is "a farm, a processing plant, a butcher shop, and a restaurant [that manages] the entire production chain to bring you delicious, safe, healthy, organic, and humane meat"...

The chops and roasts were prepared skillfully. The beef centers were medium rare, while the other meats were cooked thoroughly without being dry. None of the cuts had thick marbling, but all were tender. Aging and light seasoning brought out complex flavors; a glass of house pinot complemented the dishes perfectly.

Our last visit was in 2018. The prices were higher, and the food wasn't quite as good as we remembered. (Experiences often do become exaggerated with the passage of time.) Maybe the decline wasn't a trick of memory, because the fall accelerated:

Belcampo, whose slogan was “meat you can trust — transparency from start to finish,” had been passing off lower quality meats as its own. Within six months of the controversy, Belcampo shut down in October 2021. Little public attention was paid to the Siskiyou County plant, where all of Belcampo’s popular products, from sausage to steaks, were processed...

The USDA released 81 pages of documents dating from January 2020 to November 2021, which paint a limited yet concerning picture of Belcampo’s plant: the discovery of a leaking, blood-covered box with “discolored” meat inside; mold growing on pallets; pork product giving off a “foul smell.”

Belcampo opened a restaurant in San Mateo three miles away in late 2019. It closed during the pandemic, and we never did get to try it. Initially disappointed, we turned out to be lucky.