Andy Richardson: Too ham-fisted to cut it as a butcher

After all, pigs eat apples. So if I eat bacon I am eating the pig that ate the apple and need worry not about my five-a-day. The apple is simply being passed up the food chain from omnivore to carnivore. The more bacon I eat, the more apples I must be eating and the healthier I will become. Simples!

My obsession with half a pound of streaky has been noted at home. And She Who Must Be Obeyed has no objection. Indeed, though I am months away from a significant birthday, she offered to propagate my interest with a cure-your-own-bacon kit.

Much to her surprise, I declined the offer. This is the reason why.

Some years ago, I decided to make ham. I bought half a large pig from a drop-dead gorgeous Ludlow butchery – the sort that hangs pheasants and rabbits outside the windows in autumn and winter and looks as though it’s not had a lick of paint since it was opened in 1700-and-something.

The butcher asked me how I wanted it to be cut. I replied that I didn’t. My late grandfather owned a butcher’s shop, many years ago, and having inherited more than my share of his DNA, I decided to go native and do it myself. The butcher obliged and handed me four large ‘primals’ from the apple-eating pig. All that pork, all those apples, all of my five-a-day. Yeah, baby.

I picked up the primals and headed home for an afternoon’s amateur butchery. And for those who detect the onset of madness, I’m not the only person to try it. YouTube videos are watched my millions and millions of people who are like-minded.

Sensibly, I did it on a day when Dearly Beloved Wife One was away. Except she’d changed her plans. And so when she came home early and offered a cheery: “Hello, I didn’t expect to see you here,” she found a man up to his arms in pork in her beautiful sparkly kitchen. Armed with only a Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall book and a couple of knives, the man whom she’d wed looked like an extra from a horror movie.

“Would you like a cup of tea?” I said, moving a pawn in front of her majestic queen. She quashed me like a mallet on an egg. Checkmate.

“Andrew,” she screeched. Things were always more serious – and frightening – when she used my full name . . . you can work out what happened next. Adios, Senorita. My butchery session was brought to a premature end and the freezer was filled with meat. I’m pretty sure it burped as I closed the door.

I did, however, sequester a leg, which I intended to transform into ham. I’d read the books, bought the salt, obtained a large tub and even got a butcher’s hook on which it could hang in our deliciously chilly cellar, swathed in ample muslin. And so began the adventures of a wannabe ham-curer.

Disney stories have a happy ending. But I’m no Mickey Mouse (you can write your own gags there).

And so, some time later, when I went to check on the ham, I found I’d not applied sufficient salt and the green mould suggested it wasn’t working out. Thank heavens for Thursday’s bin collection.

My butchery days were brought to a swift and undignified end and I learned to do what everyone else does when they fancy a little protein – head to a supermarket/farm shop/butcher (delete as applicable) and ask a man/woman who knows.

And so, when She Who Must Be Obeyed kindly suggested buying me a bacon-curing kit, I baulked. I have walked that road and have the mildly amusing story to show for it. There’s every chance I’d get bacon-curing wrong. And besides, as much as I love bacon – I must have got through a whole orchard full of apples during my bacon-eating career – I could never eat a whole side. And then I’d have to give it all away. And the bacon would end up cost about £12 a sandwich, or something obscene.

So we have reached an accord. I have solemnly vowed not to pretend to be a butcher on Friday afternoons, despite my carnal instincts. Knives will be left in drawers, primals in butcher shops and Hugh Fearnley books on the shelf. And she has agreed to come up with alternative hobbies to amuse and delight; like yoghurt knitting, competitive dog grooming, milk bottle collecting or soap carving.

There is one exception to the rule, as there always is. When it comes to my birthday, she’ll be the one who brings home the bacon.