Is Bounds Green outdoing the grand dame charcutiers of Bologna?
I don’t know what springs to mind when you think about charcuterie. One would doubt it entails sign on a door in an industrial estate in North London.
Jane Grigson’s weighty book on the subject doesn’t mention tile shops or the petrol station near the giaratory, or the North Circular. Black Hand probably doesn’t match your traditional idea of a charcutier, but this industrial estate in Bounds Green is where you’ll find Hugo of Black Hand slowly working away in a corner and producing something amazing.
Some of London’s best food producers are hidden out of sight in such places. Hugo was previously a chef, having worked at Nuno Mendes’s old place in Bethnal Green, and later as a baker at E5 Bakehouse. He began making charcuterie at home, which eventually developed into a full on pursuit. He’s an affable chap who spends his working time, chopping, curing, slicing and drying meat, making sausages, bacon, salamis and air dried collars. I gave him a call, and asked if he’d show me around.
The premises were somewhat nondescript and when I arrived , his equipment was all put away and cleaned for the day. We discussed the changing scene of hospitality, and how the past few years have seen rapid change and an increasingly competitive environment that has forced businesses to find their unique selling points and to be at the top of their games.
Black Hand sources rare breed pigs of the Berkshire and Old Spot varieties. Hugo also uses the occasional Mangalitza, beasts bred for their fat with a dark, flavoursome meat. It’s not just pork though; Hugo utilises old European ideas with innovative British flavours, and that means using a range of the country’s best meats. In his drying room you’ll find delights such as juniper cured lamb rumps and lamb, lemon and bay chorizo. Why not? Free from the confines of local traditions found in Southern Europe, Hugo’s creativity has come into its own.
It’s this combination of traditional British flavours and continental mastery that I find so affirming. Hugo is showing our European neighbours that we can not only recreate their Saucisson sec, coppa, and nduja, but we can also produce what cannot be found across the sea. Treacle cured bacon is an outstanding example of why I’m proud of British produce, and I love that it’s being made only a ride on the Piccadilly line away. It’s a uniquely British product with the perfect balance of smoky, salty and sweet. It’s ideal.
Treacle cured, bacon.
Hugo gave me some sausages to take home. I feel a little bad for not being able to show you what they looked like, but they didn’t last long once cooked! I often find that British sausages are often disappointing, even when they’re from expensive butchers’, not coarse enough, or poorly seasoned. I hate to admit this, but I buy Italian. The Black Hand sausages might be the finest British sausages I have ever encountered , combining the outstanding quality of local meat with Continental finesse . Maybe the secret is Hugo’s training as both a chef and a butcher. Does it matter when your supper tastes so tremendous?
Black Hand’s range is exceptional . There’s bacon for breakfast, snacking saucisson secs for bar food, nduja for crostini, salamis for charcuterie boards and everything in between.
Jack Faulkner is a chef in London, This article is written for Foodchain; watch this space to hear more from the Black Hand story.
“I have to go back to Bounds Green soon. I want a day in the life of this London Charcutier” Jack Faulkner
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