Worth The Trip: The Corner Butcher in Fenton

Okay, “genius” would be too much. Hyperbole... Advertising flack...

“Inspired,” though? Yes, you could call it that.

For a while you’ve been running Max’s Meats & Deli, up in Florissant, even though you live way down in Fenton and the commute’s beginning to get a little old and so you start thinking that, well, they eat meat right down here in Fenton too, don’t they? And they could use a good little deli here, couldn’t they?

And that, more or less, is how Mike Diffley, his wife, along with partners Brad Childs and Adam Day, ended up in a free-standing place just a few blocks south of the intersection of I-44 and Highway 141 that often becomes lakefront property when there’s a healthy thunderstorm or two.

There are thousands of newish homes in this fast-growing part of the county; a lot of people who want the kind of special, personal service a butcher shop can offer, getting their steak cut just a little bit thicker, their roasts trimmed exactly to order. The market for this market’s ready made. Taking advantage of it?

Inspired.

Walk in and there is a meat case that is is basically a Sear’s Wish Book for meat lovers. Protein laid out like a quilt of neatly arrayed pink and red.

—Grass-fed beef.

—Chicken “grillers,” breasts rolled around ham, salami, banana peppers, and cheese and bacon wrapped, ready for the coals.

—Pork chops 3 inches thick, brawny Porterhouse steaks (right), ribeyes like dark fat rubies, along with salamis, sausages, and enough deli meats to supply most of Manhattan—including some uncured ham, sliced gossamer thin, with a delicate sweetness that will spoil you for any other version.

—And the only place we’ve ever seen in St. Louis where you can get “city chicken,” which is a classic dating back during the lean years of the Depression when real chicken was something of a luxury, especially in urban areas. Ground pork and beef are pressed into drumstick shapes. Put a sheen of oil in the hot skillet and add these and it’s a meal from the past.

It’s the deli, though, that’s starting to bring in customers for lunch or to pick up sandwiches for an early dinner. That’s why we were there.

Mike explains that he had a lot of experience in the meat business, but serving lunch? He knew nothing. So he hired a couple of cooks. One of them, Michael Hager, had more than twenty years of experience in the trade. Rather than use his own ideas or some reliable, generic menu, Mike says, “I asked them to come up with sandwiches and sides they’d make for their friends coming over to watch the football game.” A menu, in other words, assembled from the guys who were going to be doing the cooking. Like we said, inspired.

And what did those guys come up with?

—A “grouper Rueben” (right), which is just like a very good regular old Rueben: Russian dressing, a stack of soury-sweet kraut, Swiss cheese, piled fat between sliced of marbled rye—but with a fillet of moist, meaty, perfectly grilled grouper instead of corned beef.

—A Cuban sandwich that uses the original only as a starting point, going off on a multi-layered catalogue of flavors. Pulled pork replacing the original’s roast pig. Piquant horseradish pickles. Housemade salami and ham and an addictive aioli-type sauce bright with cilantro.

—Marinated, grilled, and sliced beef tenderloin (below), with candied onions, banana peppers, and Provelone on a crusty French baguette. A $9 trip to heaven.

There are sides: creamy slaw, the place’s signature barbecued beans, a couple of potato salads, one with red skins that would pass muster at any picnic below the Mason-Dixon Line, and a lovely macaroni salad that comes, they claim, from a “Grandma Bonnie” who is apparently slaving away back there in the kitchen.

We’re sitting in the tiny—and we mean tiny—dining area, which has four tiny tables and there is a constant flow of people coming in, picking up lunch orders, many of them recognized by the women working behind the counter and there is a sense this place has, in a few short months, become a neighborhood joint.

Hager, the chef, wanders out to talk with us, describing some of the sandwiches we didn’t try, like one with chicken salad, another stuffed with meatballs, and something called an Italian Gooey Louie (above), a double grilled cheese packed with pepperoni, ham, and caramelized onions. We didn’t get all the details: he brought with him a tub of chocolate mousse.

Chocolate mousse tends to dull our attention when it comes to other details. Chocolate mousse, with a graham cracker crust, topped with whipped cream and chocolate chips practically incapacitates us.

They opened Corner Butcher in part because Mike Diffley and his wife got tired of the long commute up to Florissant. Which is ironic because a lot of people, once they try this place, are going to be perfectly willing to make the long trip to Fenton to eat and shop there.

Ironic, yes. But also, inspired.

The Corner Butcher

2099 Bentley Manor

Fenton, Mo.

636-529-8400

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