Achieving an old-fashioned lamb flavour depends on using a heritage breed, growing animals out for longer and grass finishing, according to Tony Passamani and Marissa Taylor.
The Margaret River couple are the only producers of Southdown sheep in Western Australia and are making a big splash in having Australia's first complete paddock-to-plate supply chain for the breed.
Branded as Marybrook Premium Produce, they are selling half and whole sheep boxes of nine to 18 kilograms that include cuts individually packaged according to the customer's request and available direct from the farm through online orders or from farmers markets.
A unique part of this business is that the lambs are 100 per cent grassfed, grass finished and grain-free.
Mr Passamani said this was what gave the meat such a good flavour that was highly sought after by their many repeat buyers.
He said lambs were run on the couple's 20-hectare home property at Marybrook and spread across 12 vineyard properties on agistment between this farm and Margaret River.
The sheep go into the vineyard in March after grapes are harvested and stay there until September.
In a win-win scenario, this eliminates the need for the vineyard managers to mow, slash or spray weeds - helping those who are certified organic and reducing costs across the board.
When the grapes are growing during summer, the lambs are moved to adjacent pasture paddocks.
Mr Passamani and Ms Taylor run about 4000 Merino ewes that are mated to Southdown sires to produce their lambs.
They had initially started with the Babydoll breed mated to Merino ewes but found, while the meat was a fantastic flavour, the carcase was not quite big enough.
Mr Passamani's grandfather and father had bred Southdown sheep on their central midlands property until the 1970s.
The Southdown breed originates in England from the Downs region.
Mr Passamani and Ms Taylor are using genetics from the Eastern States, where the Southdowns are more popular and have been selected for a bigger body size.
They said many other prime lamb breeds had a focus on early finishing and that adversely impacted animal structure and negatively impacted meat flavour.
"We had the general store at Carbunup where we sold our lamb and the feedback from customers and our friends was that its flavour was amazing," Ms Taylor said.
"They raved about it."
This evolved into supplying sides of lamb in boxes and the Marybrook Premium Produce brand was born.
In the past three years, Mr Passamani and Ms Taylor have started using modern Southdowns over Merinos to boost carcase size.
Whereas they could get Babydoll-Merino crosses to a 23 kilogram carcase at 10-months-old, they can now get a 26kg average carcase from a Southdown-Merino cross - for the same kill and butchering cost.
"We wanted the taste of the Babydoll with a bigger body," Mr Passamani said.
"We are now achieving a bigger carcase without sacrificing meat taste."
Lambs are drafted into groups of about 200-250 head and run on the vineyards in groups that mature at the same time.
The further south the property, the more grass produced and lambs can be grown out for longer.
At present, they are getting a 22kg carcase at score two and, as the season progresses, this will increase to a 25kg carcase at score three.
As mentioned, the Southdown-Merino cross produces a real old fashioned lamb flavour.
"A big part of achieving this is growing and finishing the lambs on grass and taking a bit longer for them to grow out," Ms Taylor said.
"The meat has marbling from the Southdown and a creamy, delicate fat that you get from a grass finish.
"If you are looking for a good old-fashioned flavour that is melt-in-your-mouth, you can't beat this cross."
The proof is in the pudding and Mr Passamani and Ms Taylor have won the Delicious Magazine/Harvey Norman gold medal award for several consecutive years with their Southdown cross lambs.
Southdowns and Corriedales have also performed exceptionally well in Meat & Livestock Australia's consumer lamb tasting trials, according to Mr Passamani.
"What we are producing is an industry best-practice prime lamb - including meeting sustainability criteria," he said.
Marybrook Premium Produce lamb is processed by DBC at nearby Picton and custom butchered by a local butcher.
The standard kill is 20 to 30 lambs per week and the product can be supplied year-round.
This is made possible by having two lambings at the start of May and in mid-June.
It means lambs are being turned-off from about eight-months-old to 14-months-old, with a range of carcase sizes from about 24kg to 30kg.
Using a local butcher, lambs are processed to a range of cuts specific to the customer's order.
Chops are proving very popular this summer for barbecuing and roasts and racks do particularly well in winter.
Mr Passamani and Ms Taylor attend farmers markets in Manning, Dawesville, Margaret River, Busselton and Boyanup on a monthly rotation, where customers can buy boxed half lambs or individual cuts.
The Marybrook Premium Produce lamb is also supplied to the Yallingup General Store and Cowaramup Gourmet Food Merchants and has a strong following throughout the South West region from online orders.
It has appeared on the menu of Matt Moran at major events held at Optus Stadium and is supplied to a range of South West restaurants, including the renowned Yarrie.
"They only take selected cuts for restaurants," Mr Passamani said.
"That is why we are concentrating mostly on our boxed product that tends to go to repeat buyers.
Also in the Marybrook Premium Produce range are sausages and burger patties flavoured with rosemary, garlic, jalepenos and cheese.
Branded pies and a soft lamb chorizo are also proving very popular and have a regular following at farmers markets.
"We are incredibly proud of the meat and value-add products we are getting from our Southdown flock," Mr Passamani said.
"We've loved the breed of Southdowns for a very long time."
Part of the ethos around the Marybrook Premium Produce brand includes keeping everything local, thereby supporting other local businesses, and farming sustainably without compromising the health and wellbeing of the flock.
"The market response to the product and the way it is produced has been huge and we seem to be growing our customer base rapidly," he said.
