Fargo’s Jesse Plemons Learned How To Butcher From Salt & Time

Fargo star Jesse Plemons spent a day shadowing the staff of Salt & Time to prepare for his role as a butcher in the current season of the FX series, as he revealed to the Wall Street Journal. Eater spoke to co-owner and head butcher Bryan Butler about the actor’s foray into Austin butchery. Plemons, who lives in Austin and is a regular customer, asked if he could shadow the shop for a day as training. He spent about four to five hours there during a late February day.

Butler was impressed when Plemons broke off a pork shoulder from a rail, which is a method typically used in meat processing plants. "He did a really good, clean cut," he explained. "He got it in one full motion." The actor also cut out some pork chops, which were later sold in the retail section. "Everything that he did with the knife is as good as I could have ever expected out of somebody who just walked in the door with no previous experience," Butler said.

All the while, Plemons took notes and phone video recordings as he went into "full sponge mode," as Butler described,"trying to absorb everything he could: the ambiance, demeanor, the way we worked with heads down and a sense of urgency." Butler didn’t see last week’s episode, where Plemons’ character "got rid" of a body using his butcher skills, but he was quick to note, "We absolutely did not tell him how to dismember a body and grind it up."