The quest took him through the winding backroads of Buffalo. He first checked the headquarters on Howard Street, hoping for a retail window. He found the industrial heart of the operation, but no ham for sale to a lone wanderer. A friendly dock worker leaned out and whispered, "Try the old-school delis, Pops. They guard their stock like gold."
Old Man Miller didn’t just eat ham; he curated it. And in our corner of Western New York, that meant exactly one thing: . But when the local market’s cooler kicked the bucket during the hottest July on record, the neighborhood went into a collective panic. The "Smokehouse Secret" was suddenly in short supply.
Miller headed home, the ham buckled into the passenger seat like a prized passenger. That night, the neighborhood smelled like victory and hickory smoke.
Miller, a retired locksmith with a nose for hickory, wasn't about to settle for a generic supermarket slab. He hopped into his rusted '88 pickup, declaring he’d find the "mother lode" or die trying.