Locally founded Belcampo Meat Co., which currently has butcher shop-restaurants in Russian Hill, Palo Alto, and Larkspur focusing on sustainable meats of all sorts, is doing something a little out of the ordinary this August. They're hosting a inaugural series of two Meat Camps at their farm in the Shasta Valley, teaching skills around butchering and cooking meat as well as creating "community through food," and they'll be reserved solely for women and gay men.
And for those women and gay men who enjoy roughing it in actual camping circumstances, this doesn't sound like it will be anything like that. There will be luxury "glamping" tents set up along the farm's orchard, as well as daily fitness boot camps, yoga classes, and workshops on butchery, knife skills, grilling, and breakfast-sausage making. Also, obviously, there'll be plenty of good food all of it very Paleo-friendly and gluten-free. Also, they add, "because you will be tasting delicious meat all day long, we will be serving abundant vegetables at the main meals."
Regarding why they're doing camps just for women and gay men right now, they explain, "We created this camp just for gay men [and women] as part of a broader approach to making our meat camps focused on specific affinity groups. We thought it would be terrific for gay men to come together to learn new skills. However, Belcampo intends to offer lots more types of camps the future - paleo, couples, etc." (They also offer custom corporate camps.)
The price tag for the three-day, all-inclusive "glamping" experience is $3750 per person for single occupancy and $2500 per person for double occupancy. Travel to and from the farm is not included, and it is five hours north of San Francisco, near the Oregon border.
The camps will be led by Belcampo co-founder and CEO (and Eat Real fest founder), Anya Fernald, and President of Belcampo Meat Co., Bronwen Hanna-Korpi. The Women’s Meat Camp will run August 6-9, and the Gay Men’s Meat Camp will run August 13-16.
And please, enough with the sausage fest jokes.
