Earlier this month, the Swinery—a West Seattle butcher shop and restaurant known for cured meats—changed owners. All seemed to be well in the pig pen. Then today, the Swinery set off a controversy involving founder Gabriel Claycamp, the new owners, the King County health department, and renowned moustache-possessor Joseba Jimenez de Jimenez.
The Stranger received a tip this morning alleging that health inspectors had shut down the Swinery. However, the department’s website had no such record, but it did have an inspection report from July 15 citing the Swinery for “insects, rodents, animals present” and “improper cold holding temperatures,” with a re-inspection to occur within two weeks.
New Swinery-partner Joey Brewer assured us that the Swinery was not, in fact, getting shut down, and that the only recent occurrence was a change in management.
- Kelly O
- Claycamp with his precious bacon in better days
Meanwhile, Claycamp (who has tangled with food-and-beverage laws himself) says he has been separated from the Swinery for about three weeks due to a fight with his business partner. However, the special food-processing authorizations for curing meats—what the Swinery is known for—are in Claycamp’s name. Claycamp alleged that the health department came in yesterday to make the Swinery throw out the products that it was no longer allowed to sell, meaning everything except fresh sausage and fresh meat cuts. Claycamp hadn’t heard about the health department’s inspection report, but he described the whole situation as “big drama” and “all sorts of yucky.” According to Claycamp, the health department had been sending the Swinery warnings for the past two weeks to stop using Claycamp’s meat-making plans without him. Claycamp said he even offered to share his meat-making plans, which were his property, and to train new employees to get the store back up to code, only to be ignored. At the end of the day, he said, the new workers of the Swinery “just need education—it’s not like they’re incapable.”
Plenty more helpings of pork after the jump.
Back to the Swinery, where Brewer had more to say. Regarding Claycamp’s report that the health department made the Swinery throw out its meat, Brewer pointed the finger at Claycamp’s charcuterie program, saying “I’m not 100 percent sure if [Claycamp] was fully approved to produce those kinds of meats,” and that the new ownership “opted not to continue” with it, “just to be on the safe side.” When asked more pointedly about the program, Brewer said this:
They were all done wrong from the beginning. They were experiments of Gabe [Claycamp]… When Gabe left, he was using a number of methods that the health department had advised him on numerous occasions not to use.
Instead of curing its own meats, the Swinery will now be focusing on local and sustainable meats, featuring Zoe’s Meats instead.
- Harvestvine.com
- Swinery Savior?
The we got a call from Joseba Jimenez de Jimenez. He reportedly swooped in to save the Swinery a week and a half ago. “Everything was going wrong,” he says. The new owners hired him to turn things around, recommending just starting over. Jimenez says he threw out the meats of his own volition, not on the orders of the health department, because he was uncomfortable with the “nitrates and nitrites,” byproducts of the “very scientific” curing process. “How can you cure the meat without a Ph.D.?” he asked. How indeed, Mr. Moustache, how indeed…
Jimenez also said that he has suspended the Swinery’s vacuum-packing operations, because they were “vacuum-packing without a plan,” and that there are “not any kind of nitrates and nitrites at this time” nor ever again for the Swinery. He does, however, hope to restart vacuum-packing once the Swinery receives a clean bill of health.
As for the health department claims, Jimenez said “the relationship we have with the health department is very good,” and that it was he himself who called for the inspection, to learn what needed improvement. Asked about the citation about animals, Jimenez said the Swinery needs “a screen door for the flies, nothing about rodents.” Jimenez sagely concluded:
I have been training to do business, and especially the food business, training them to do more recipes, and sell at the markets. There have been a few little—I don’t know if intentionally or unintentionally—miscommunications with the old and the new owners, and I don’t think it is nice because I am stuck in the middle.
I also have knowledge that the swinery has been torturing animals, killing them without cause, and selling their corpses. Why doesn’t the health department or SPD put a stop to this??
i just ate an entire box of zatarains red beans and rice
@1: Because pigs are yummy.
Who eats pig corpses?
Jews? No.
Muslims? No.
Hindus? No.
Buddhists? No.
Sikhs? No.
Rastafari? No.
Zoroastrians? No.
Christians? Yes.
Eating pig corpses is the Christian version of rural Koreans eating dogs. Korea banned selling dog corpse decades ago, though. Some conservative Christians unfortunately still eat pig corpse. Hopefully we will see a ban here soon.
#4 – don’t forget about us godless heathens. People with no belief in a religion also like bacon!
@#4 and maybe we’ll see a ban on trolls as well
Unpaid intern you have definitely earned your check with this one. I agree the lead for this story is a food establishment meant having flies (oh my!!!) not Master Chef Joseba Jimenez coming aboard.
animals at Norm’s too.
the difference? norm’s is good. and safe.
@4, you forgot at least 2 billion Asians. Most Buddhists eat loads of pork. So do lots of Hindus and Zoroastrians.
I wonder why the vast majority of vegans and vegetarians I met are also on anti-depressants?
When an establishment is known more for its history of health violations and overwrought personal dramas than it is for its cuisine, you know there are problems. Maybe its time for them to relocate to someplace like Modesto.
I don’t understand how Claycamp keeps getting people to go into business with him. Seems like anything he’s involved in quickly descends into drama, posturing and bullshit.
Oh for christ’s sake. That bacon is the most wonderful stuff ever. I thought I had a stable source for it…..now it’s gone again. ARGH!!!! Say what you will about Gabriel’s personality, but his food is amazing.
Even when claycamp was part of it, he didn’t have the legal permission to make those meats. here’s the history of the swinery health reports. Note that they’ve always been cited for “Variance not obtained for specialized processing methods”
Routine Inspection/Field Review 07/15/2010
55
-Inadequate hand washing facilities
-Noncompliance with risk control plans, variances, or mobile food unit plan of operation
–Improper cold holding temperatures (>45° F)
-Insects, rodents, animals present; entrance uncontrolled
.
Consultation/Education – Field 05/03/2010
N/A
.
Routine Inspection/Field Review 01/12/2010
20
-Variance not obtained for specialized processing methods
-Noncompliance with risk control plans, variances, or mobile food unit plan of operation
.
Consultation/Education – Field 12/09/2009
N/A
.
Routine Inspection/Field Review 12/02/2009
15
-Variance not obtained for specialized processing methods
-Improper labeling, signage
4 – sorry but Koreans still eat dog and you can still get it easily; Buddhists and non-kosher-observing Jews eat pork also.
Also don’t forget pagans, animists and pantheists all eat pork. And Koreans do amazing things with the pig.
This guy seems to be his own worst enemy. I really wanted to love Culinary Communion, but it turned out to be more of a vehicle for his ego than a real teaching institution. I really wanted to love the Swinery, but again, it was more about Gabe than the meat. Can we just stop talking about him and hope he goes away? Please?
haha. the absolute irrelevance of all of this is lovely.
@18 so irrelevant you had to post about it! 🙂
Get over the bacon, people! The recipe is a rip-off from “Charcuterie” by Michael Rulhman and you can make it yourself. And know for sure there aren’t any flies or critters roaming around when you do it, and pay less than half of what they charge at the Swinery.
Gabriel Claycamp, wonderful man, beautiful father, faithful husband, amazing chef, and on of the highest ranking dungeons and dragons player ever. All lies for the record. He cheats on his wife religiously, he sends his kids off to day-care so he can cheat in his wife and find the perfect cougar to fund his next fantasy in the culinary world, oh and he is a complete slob to boot. The Stranger should be writing a story on how disgusting a persons home could be. Now that would worth reading. If anyone from culinary communion is looking for the refund he promises you can find him at Beverage Place or any number of other bars in West Seattle. I’d tell you to go to his house, but he’s usually not there with wife and kids as a good man should be.