Josh Turka, owner of the 5th Quarter Butcher Shop is purchasing the Mad River Taste Place, the business that houses his butcher shop.
Turka opened his retail business, the 5th Quarter Butcher Shop in November 2022 after having joined the Taste Place staff in the spring of 2021. After he joined the Taste Place he began working in wholesale butchery as well. He is purchasing the business from founder Robin Morris with the sale slated to close at the end of this year.
Turka and his wife Ashley moved to Vermont from Boston after a decade of working in the restaurant and butchery business. He grew up in Philly and while bouncing around after college and grad school he and his wife Ashley lived in Rome and became passionate about food.
“I wanted to base my professional life around it. In 2015/16 I looked outside of the restaurant world and saw opportunity in the market for locally-raised and properly-handled meat,” Turka said.
Landing in Waitsfield, working for former Taste Place manager Mary Tuthill helped move Turka’s plan forward and that momentum has continued. This spring he received a $160,000 grant from the Vermont Department of Ag which allowed him to expand his production space at the Taste Place. The grant was super competitive he said and one reason his application was successful was that he was able to demonstrate that he was sourcing at least 50% of his meat from Vermont (he sources 100% of his meat from Vermont) and that he would be able to increase his wholesale production, purchasing more meat from Vermont producers, co-packaging onsite and doing contract work for Vermont farmers.
That means growers can send him an animal for butchering and packaging including offering value-add services such as making sausage or bacon. Those growers receive packaged products with USDA stickers that they can sell at farmers markets or to restaurants and other commercial venues.
Turka’s new space is almost complete and he now has two full-time staffers working with him. He is excited about the future, the Taste Place and owning/managing the business.
He praised Robin Morris for his vision as well as his mentorship over the years.
“Since I started here, Robin (and Mary) were super supportive of me and the new manager here, Ryan is as well. They’re very invested in the local food economy,” Turka said.
Turka loves what he does. He loves butchering beef because of the many intricacies of working with a larger animal. He also loves working with pork because it is so versatile. He said one of the best-selling products is the Guanciale which is a cured product made from pork jowls. The facial fat in that product makes it delicious he said, noting that the quality and flavor of fats changes from the various parts of the animals.
Morris started the Mad River Taste Place in 2017 and prior to that he started the Mad River Food Hub in 2011. The food hub became an accelerator for local food producers and led indirectly to the creation of the Taste Place.
Morris was inspired to open the Taste Place after visiting Michigan where there were many similar food hubs.
“What we found was that it wasn’t about making food, it was about communicating and selling food. The goal of the Taste Place was to talk about local producers, educate our visitors and hope they’d buy the product when they went home,” Morris said.
“Over the years, we’ve sold millions of dollars of local food and educated thousands and thousands of visitors to The Valley about our local makers,” Morris said.
This year is the best year ever for the Taste Place, Morris said and it was really important to find someone like Turka to steward the business.
“I’m really excited for him. I feel very lucky to have met Josh four years ago. He’s a great asset for The Valley,” he added.
