PATAK MEATS

By Samantha S. Wallace

When my Aunt Marion, a woman whose tastes and generosity have hallmarked my life, says “It’s time to make the pilgrimage,”—well, it’s time. A native German spending the better part of the last two decades in Atlanta, she maintains her deep European roots and the flavors of her youth spent outside of Frankfurt. Most of those flavors can be recaptured with the help of Patak Meats.

After sampling Tony Patak’s wares at my aunt’s table more times than I can count (Patak’s smoked liverwurst and Hungarian salami are bartered currency in our clan), my pilgrimage finally came this spring. Exiting I-285 and winding our way along Cobb Parkway, she describes the place as a “United Nations of sorts”. Sunk down along a side road in Austell, we finally arrive at the happily named Sausage Chalet, and I begin to appreciate what she means.

Emanating from the high-vaulted, wide-beamed ceiling and among the long glass cases overflowing with delicious, hand-crafted meats are the sounds of purposeful and regular shoppers strategizing among themselves in French, German, Polish. My aunt tells me, “I love to bring a new European transplant here and watch the reaction.” It must feel like home.

With close to 40 different varieties of hand-made sausages and salamis, most between $2-4/lb, there is a familiar taste for all and innumerable new ones to add to a repertoire. I build the makings of a charcuterie tray that day with a lovely honeycombed Hungarian, the rectangular Hunter’s and the classic Hungarian salami with white paper skin.

If you like ham, plan to choose among Blackforest, Gypsy, Polish and Westphalian incarnations. Specialties include smoked pork chops, fleischkase (baked at home) and a cognac-laced truffled pate. And if a particular mustard from the continent or currant jelly calls, the grocery section of the deli is well-stocked. Be prepared for a line out the door during holiday seasons as special order customers abound.

The Pataks keep their meat prices incredibly accessible, mostly due to their wholesale and processing facility attached to the retail operation, complete with FDA inspection office station. On a whim, I knock on the manager’s door, am greeted immediately by the tall, blonde, affable 30-something Kelly Patak, a daughter-inlaw and Director of Marketing for the family business. Within a minute, I don a hairnet and follow her through the manufacturing area, into the smoke room to see it all.

The white-coated workers move with a smooth deliberateness and professionalism. They are people who have honed a craft and, at an average age of fifty, people who have been at it for a long time. Tony Patak is a product of the European apprenticeship tradition himself. A Czech national who first immigrated to Canada at age 18, he followed a rigorous, multi-year tutelage under a master butcher before opening his own shop here in 1981.

Exactly one day prior to my pilgrimage, I had participated in a discussion around the realities of underage and undertrained immigrant workers, many illegal, found in many meat processing facilities in America – and how hard it is for the public to get inside these places. It casts my unannounced and warm-welcomed waltz into the back and well-lit corners of Patak in even sharper relief. This tidy, proud, family-run shop has been producing products with integrity for decades. You don’t have to be from the continent for the flavors to grab you, transporting you across the Atlantic in a bite. That is, until your stores are depleted and it’s time for a visit with Aunt Marion and another pilgrimage to the Sausage Chalet.

Patak Meat Products Inc.
4107 Ewing Road
Austell, GA 30106
770-941-7993
www.patakmeats.com
Monday, 10am–5pm; Tues–Wed, 9am–6pm; Thur–Fri, 9am–6:30pm;
1st Sat each month, 9am–4pm
Cash, check or debit card (no credit cards).