San Francisco Blog

Farr at a butchery demo at Bloodhound earlier this month

You know that old Bismarck chestnut: "Laws are like sausages -- it is better not to see them being made." In fact, we live in an age when sausage-making has achieved the status of participatory sport (though we're not so sure that, when it comes to law-making, that's such a good idea -- see Prop. 8). Chef-turned-pork-king Ryan Farr of 4505 Meats is riding the zeitgeist the way a Hell's Angel rides a hog. Not only have his ethereally light chicharrones achieved local cult status, his butchery demos and sausage-making classes have a giddy following perfumed by a whiff of cultural watershed.

Here's your chance to touch the back-fat-larded magic. Farr has announced three more SF sausage class dates: Saturday, May 30, 10 a.m.-1 p.m.; and Sunday, June 7, 10 a.m.-1 p.m. and 2-5 p.m. Each class follows the same drill: hands-on demos of chicken-beer sausage, chili and fennel pork sausage, and roasted garlic and spring onion beef sausage. Classes are $70, and you'll get to haul home five or six pounds of links. Snack on chicharrones, hot dogs, and, naturally, the class's efforts. Given Farr's godlike aura, class sizes are ridiculously limited. Sign up by contacting the sausage sensei himself.