Meuwly’s Artisan Food Market has been providing Edmontontonians with local charcuterie goodness since the summer of 2018. With a focus in sourcing locally made products, their in house meats, pickles and condiments can be found on menus across edmonton.
Peter Keith, one of three owners at Meuwly’s, graduated from the Apprentice Cook Program in 2012.
What would you say is the most rewarding part of what you do?
For me personally, it’s seeing the connections that we build with other entrepreneurs. It’s really rewarding to be able to buy products or hire someone to work with us who’s also living out their dream and launching their own small business. Being able to take the money that our customers spend at our store and reinvest that in the community and help other people grow into small businesses. That’s been really rewarding.
Peter Keith is one of 3 owners of Meuwly’s Artisan Food Market. | Supplied photo.
What were some challenges you overcame?
I think when you’re opening a small business, you can have the best plans in the world but there’s so much that you don’t anticipate so many challenges that come up, big or small.
Things as small as when you’re building your space and you’re trying to find equipment there’s just so many little details you need to think of. And if you miss one little detail, you might have to change all of the other plans.
When we were building our kitchen and designing what kind of equipment we would use, we needed a large smoker to do our smoked meat. And really in the end, the only thing that would work was so big that we had to take the doors off of our building entirely in order to lower it down into our space.
I would say one of the challenges is for people who like to plan. There are so many things that you just can’t know the answer to until it happens. And then you have to improvise.
How would you say NAIT has impacted your life?
Great question. I think anyone who’s done the culinary programs at NAIT has left not only with a great education but a really amazing network. I feel like the school is entrenched in Edmonton’s food community. There’s a lot of connections. There’s a lot of support that you can get.
People are always, always looking to help out other NAIT grads. There’s a real sense of camaraderie. So I think, aside from everything I learned, graduating with that kind of support system behind me really gave me confidence to take the next steps in my career.
