Conger Meat prepares for holiday season
CONGER — Deer season opens this Saturday, and Darcy and Jeremy Johnson, the owners of Conger Meat Market, predict a good season.
“All of the corn is out in the fields, so I think compared to last year, we’ll be even busier,” Darcy said. “Last year, there was still corn in the fields so the deer were harder to see.”
This is exactly why the Johnsons are increasing their hours over the next couple of weekends. This Saturday and next, Nov. 6 and Nov. 13, Conger Meat Market will extend its hours until 6 p.m. Jeremy will also be in the market on both Sundays, Nov. 7 and Nov. 14, to take in deer.
They are also ramping up their staff. Darcy said they typically employ 20 people at the Conger and Northbridge Mall locations combined. During deer season, however, they will run a second shift at the locker with four to 10 people, as well.
According to Darcy, Conger Meat Market is especially popular during deer season for one reason in particular.
“We’re one of the few places that still makes dry venison and jerky products,” she said. “Those are very time consuming and a lot of times, lockers are just too busy to do it.”
Other popular items, staples to many patrons year after year, include summer sausage, deer sticks, ring bologna, wieners and breakfast sausage.
7 comments:
I feel the same way about the little butcher shop we found up in Piedmont.
Yeah, and we also have Manchester Lockers and the king of them all, Nick's Meats in Hayward.
" include summer sausage, deer sticks....."
At first glance, I read, "deer ticks".
Steve,
Those East and West Coasters don't know what what deer sticks are. I have no idea what they use to whet their beer appetites. Frickin' Beer Nuts?
Gunnar,
On my first night out in grad school in coastal Massachusetts, the bartender offered us Portuguese Shrimp as a snack with our beers.
You bet!
He returned from the back with a wry smile and served a big bowl of puffed cheese curls, many of which were hanging over the rim, cocktail-style.
I still call 'em that today.
Good lord. My Ma worked extra hours during the season at "Smokey Phil's" packer back home.
Venison jerky and summer sausage will always remind me of being a little kid in those days when we all got a week off of school for the start of "deer".
It was fun, but if you didn't have a freezer full of venison and the hog to go with the frozen creamed corn and canned green beans, you may just have had a hungry winter.
I feel old talking about it.
Old,
You feel old now? Man, you got no idea how the years of nostalgia are going to weigh you down. Good to hear from you. I'm glad you're doing okay, even if you are feeling a little long in the tooth today.
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