Australia’s First Slow Meat Symposium in Daylesford

“Eat less meat, of better quality.”

Slow Food Central Highlands in collaboration with Australia Food Sovereignty Alliance is hosting the first Slow Meat Symposium in Daylesford on 3 – 4 September 2017.

The Slow Meat Symposium will bring together supporters, enablers, and enactors of the Slow Meat philosophy to discuss and debate all things around the ethical and ecologically-sound production and consumption of meat.

Farmers, butchers, chefs, restaurateurs, retailers, administrators, and anyone interested in how animals are raised for meat are welcome.

The Symposium will be held with farm visits, butchery and cooking demos, feasts, and of course stimulating plenaries, and debates around how to progress the Slow Meat and food sovereignty agendas in Australia and globally.

There is an optional extra day (5 September) for the many farmers across Australia keen to see a revival of regional abattoirs in the face of steadily declining access to processing for small-scale, pastured livestock farms, led by international guest Amanda Carter, owner of Cool Hand Meats and operator of North Carolina leading small-scale poultry abattoir Foothills Pilot Plant.

The 2017 Slow Meat Symposium is a collaboration between Slow Food Central Highlands and the Australian Food Sovereignty Alliance (AFSA). Matthew Evans, host of SBS’s Gourmet Farmer and For the Love of Meat, and author of nine books on food, will present his vision for a slow meat future at the Symposium.

River Cottage Australia’s Paul West will MC the main day, and discussions around the ethics & ecological impact of the production and processing of meat will be led by local regenerative livestock farmer and butcher Tammi Jonas of Jonai Farms & Meatsmiths, and purveyor of ethically-raised meats Grant Hilliard of Sydney’s acclaimed butcher’s shop Feather & Bone.

Gary Thomas, leader of the Slow Food Central Highlands said:

“Slow Meat is a philosophy for living now, and a vision for the future. The Slow Meat Symposium with AFSA will be an exciting and positive exchange of what we are doing, and how we can do it better”.