A morning at Tamar Charcuterie

Tamar Charcuterie sits in a converted stone barn three miles from the Cornish border. The pigs — Tamworths and Tamworth-Saddleback crosses — live outdoors year-round in eight acres of mixed woodland, which is unusual: most British charcuterie producers buy in pork because rearing it is hard and unprofitable.

David Howell, who runs Tamar with his partner Anna, takes a different view. "If you don’t raise the pigs, you can’t make the meat. The fat profile of a wood-foraged Tamworth is completely different from anything you can buy. It’s 30% more intramuscular fat, the fat melts at a lower temperature, and you get this nutty oxidised flavour from the acorns."

The ageing room — a converted stone outbuilding kept at 12°C and 70% humidity year-round — holds about 250 whole salamis, 30 air-dried hams, and a shifting collection of experimental cured cuts. The hams take 18 months. The fennel salamis take 8. The coppa takes 6.

David does most of the ageing by feel. "There’s a smell when a ham is right that you cannot describe. It’s not the meat, it’s the fat. The day it smells right, you slice it."