Hot take: the old butcher in Kalamazoo who told me to stop trimming so close on my first cut was right, and it cost me 2 lbs of yield to learn

Willow Gibson · 2026-10-17T07:15:04.065043+00:00

Worked under him at a shop off Portage Road back in 2019. First few weeks I was taking every bit of silver skin off the ribs, real proud of how clean they looked. He watched me for a bit and said, "You're leaving money on the board, kid." Took me a while to get it. Trim too close and you cut into the meat, lose yield, and the rack dries out. Now I leave a thin cap on and my numbers are better. Still feel a little lazy when I do it though. Any of you got a rule of thumb for how close is too close on pork ribs?

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Hot take: the old butcher in Kalamazoo who told me to stop trimming so close on my first cut was right, and it cost me 2 lbs of yield to learn | Butchers - Free To Speak