What "Chef-Quality" Means
A restaurant kitchen doesn't buy meat from the supermarket case. Chefs buy from producers who can answer specific questions: where the animal was raised, what it ate, how it was finished, how it was aged, how it was butchered. A chef wants to know the grade of the wagyu, the breed of the lamb, the cure on the bacon, the dry-age days on the ribeye. The cut has to come trimmed correctly; the fat has to render the way the recipe expects.
That's the meat on this page. Every cut here is selected by our buying team for the same things a chef would look for: producer reputation, sourcing transparency, marbling and grade, breed and feed, and consistency from one order to the next. None of it is the cheapest option at any given protein. All of it is what a serious home cook orders when the dinner matters. For broader options across the butcher counter — fresh and cured, domestic and imported — the full butcher collection brings everything together in one place.
The Wagyu and Beef Counter
Japanese wagyu is graded on two axes: yield (A, B, C) and quality (1-5). A5 is the highest combination, with marbling scores at the top of the twelve-point BMS scale. A4 and A3 sit just below, with slightly less fat marbling but the same buttery, low-melting texture that makes wagyu different from any other beef. Akaushi is the Japanese Red wagyu breed — leaner than the more famous Black wagyu, with a beef flavor closer to a high-grade American steak and a marbling pattern that's still dramatic but more restrained. Both have their place. A5 is a small-portion ingredient, a few ounces seared hot and finished with flaky salt. Akaushi is a steak you can eat as a full meal.
The bone-in cuts — tomahawk ribeyes with their long Frenched rib bones, cowboy ribeyes, dry-aged porterhouses — are the showpieces of any meat counter. They cook slowly toward the bone, get a hard sear at the end, and rest before slicing. Bison sits next to the beef as the leaner alternative: less marbled, slightly sweet, and cooked rare to medium-rare because the lower fat content means it tightens fast at higher temperatures. For grilling specifically, our grilling meats collection narrows the page down to the cuts built for direct fire.
Lamb Merguez and Specialty Sausages
Merguez is North African spiced lamb sausage, originally from the Maghreb — Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia — and adopted into French cuisine through the colonial period, where it became standard in Parisian butcheries and bistro menus. It's made from lamb (sometimes a lamb-and-beef mix) seasoned with harissa, cumin, paprika, sumac, garlic, and fennel, with the red color coming from the harissa and the heat from the chiles in it. The casing is traditionally lamb intestine, which gives merguez its thinner profile compared to a pork sausage.
How to use it: grill or pan-fry over medium heat — the high spice content burns over open flame — and serve alongside couscous with roasted vegetables, in a baguette with harissa mayo for merguez frites, or sliced into a tagine. It's spicy but not punishing, more aromatic than fiery, and rewards a glass of something cold and acidic to drink alongside. Lamb merguez is the headline of the specialty sausage section here, but the page also carries duck, bison, and other game and lamb cuts for cooks working outside the beef-and-pork mainstream. Once a package is opened, vacuum-sealed cuts hold three to four days in the refrigerator; if you're storing cheese alongside the meat for a board, our reusable cheese storage bags keep cut cheese fresh longer than plastic wrap.
Also Worth Exploring
Chef-quality meat rarely arrives at the table alone. The accompaniments that finish the plate — chimichurri, mustards, sea salts, demi-glace — live with our meat spices, sauces and condiments collection. For the cheese course that follows a great steak dinner, the full cheese counter spans soft, hard, blue, and washed-rind selections from across the world. And if you're shopping for someone else, the business and host gifts collection assembles ready-to-give boxes built around premium meats and pairings.
Chef-Quality Meats: Frequently Asked Questions
Merguez is a North African spiced lamb sausage, originally from Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia, that became a staple in French cuisine through the Maghrebi diaspora. It's made from lamb (or a lamb-and-beef mix) seasoned with harissa, cumin, paprika, sumac, garlic, and fennel, which gives it both its deep red color and its warm, complex heat. Cook merguez over medium heat in a pan or on a grill — the spice content can scorch over direct high flame. Serve it alongside couscous, in a baguette with harissa mayo (merguez frites), sliced into a tagine, or with grilled vegetables and a lemon wedge. It pairs with rosé, a light red, or a cold beer.
Bison is leaner than beef, has less intramuscular marbling, and carries a slightly sweet, cleaner flavor. Most American bison is grass-fed and pasture-raised, which contributes to the leanness. Because there's less fat to render, bison cooks faster and tightens up at higher temperatures — cook it to rare or medium-rare, never beyond medium, and let it rest before slicing. Use it where you'd use beef but pull it off the heat a minute or two earlier. Bison burgers, bison ribeyes, and bison brisket all work the same way: lower temperature, shorter time.