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Normandy
A pig breed from the Norman Bessin, born of a 19th-century cross, almost wiped out by the war and subsequent industrialisation — the Porc de Bayeux survives today thanks to a handful of breeders and a brotherhood that refuses to let it disappear.
Pork from Normandy.
The Porc de Bayeux — also known as the cochon de Bayeux — originated in Calvados in the mid-19th century from a cross between Blanc de l'Ouest sows — a Norman breed that still survives today — and Berkshire boars, a black pig of English origin. Present on almost every farm in the Bessin, it owed its success at the time to its capacity to make use of the whey produced during farmhouse cheesemaking, which it consumed in large quantities. In 1928, the Syndicat des éleveurs de la race de Bayeux was founded to organise and defend its breeding and maintain its herd book, with headquarters in Bayeux.
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Numbers were heavily reduced during the Second World War before regaining ground until the 1960s, when the herd book was reorganised — before a final blow brought the breed to the brink of extinction: in 1977, the last breeders ceased production with the end of farmhouse production of ripened cheeses, on which the animals' diet partly depended. In 1984, the Institut Technique du Porc (now IFIP) included the breed in its conservation programme: only 15 sows and 5 boars then remained across 4 breeders. The syndicate resumed its work in 1993, and the Livre généalogique des races locales de porc (LIGERAL) was established in 1996; in 1999, the Ministère de l'Agriculture officially recognised the breed as endangered and facing abandonment. Population numbers have recovered very slowly since: around thirty holdings now raise Porc de Bayeux, predominantly in Normandie, accounting for roughly 150 breeding sows. This low number of breeding animals limits the available genetic diversity: a 'retrempe' programme, supported financially by the Région Normandie, recrosses Blanc de l'Ouest sows with boars to recreate families that are genetically further removed from those already present in the breed. For its part, the Confrérie gourmande du cochon de Bayeux, chaired by Marie-Chantal Eudine, works to safeguard Norman gastronomic heritage and promote the cochon de Bayeux in all its forms.
Appearance
White coat marked with rounded black patches of limited size, head with a slightly concave profile, broad forehead and snout, thin and drooping ears, long and thick trunk, straight back, broad rump.
Taste
Flavourful, marbled meat, prized both as fresh meat and in high-quality charcuterie.
a hardy breed, easy to raise, well suited to outdoor life rather than intensive farming.
litters of 5 to 10 piglets, fattened to a slaughter weight of around 125 kg.
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Long threatened with extinction alongside the breed itself, Porc de Bayeux meat is gradually reclaiming its place on market stalls: it is sold through short supply chains by a few breeders, notably at the Bayeux market, and appears on menus in the town's restaurants. Its marbled meat is just as well suited to a roast — braised with cider, cream and Calvados, in the purest Norman tradition — as to farmhouse charcuterie: rillettes, pâté, ham.
The Porc de Bayeux carries no official quality mark (PDO (AOP)/AOC/PGI (IGP)/Label Rouge/Organic): it is a local breed with very low numbers, recognised as an endangered breed facing abandonment by the Ministère de l'Agriculture in 1999. It is the subject of a conservation programme run by the IFIP (formerly ITP) and the breed's Syndicat des éleveurs, as well as a genetic diversification programme supported by the Région Normandie to limit the risks linked to inbreeding.
Farm
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