Polmard, a small farm in Saint Mihiel, France, produces the world’s most exclusive meat using a process called hibernation. It allows the meat to be stored and cured for up to 15 years with no loss of quality.

Alexandre Polmard is a sixth-generation farmer, breeder, and butcher in a family that has been producing beef cuts since 1846. However, the business rose to prominence in the 1990s, after Alexandre’s grandfather and father invented a new and revolutionary meat treatment they dubbed ‘hibernation’. Cold air is blown at speeds of up to 120 kilometers per hour over the meat in a -43 C environment at the farm’s state-of-the-art laboratory in Saint Mihiel and this allows the meat to be cured for over a decade, with no loss of quality. If anything, the longer the curing time, the higher the quality, and the price, with one kilogram of 15-year-old hibernated rib steak selling for an eye-watering $3,200.

“I use a very special aging process and I am the first butcher in the world to do it,” Alexandre Polmard told TIME Magazine. “I won’t say my beef is the best in the world because every meat is different. It’s like wine.”

To create the world’s most exclusive meat, Polmard begins with Blonde d’Aquitaine cattle which are raised free-range on the Polmard family’s farm to minimize stress. Then comes the hibernation process which allows the meat to mature over much longer periods than usual. Dry-aged beef is typically matured for a few weeks, while the Polmard hibernation makes it possible to mature it for 15 years, maybe even indefinitely.

 

Polmard’s hibernated meat is the stuff of legends among restauranteurs, few of which can actually say they serve the world’s most coveted steaks in their establishments. Apparently, customers have to put their names down months in advance to reserve Polmard beef cuts, but Alexandre only entrusts his vintage meat to a handful of trusted restaurants around the world. He even pays them a visit beforehand to make sure they understand the subtleties of hibernated meat.