MORRISTOWN — Fresh, pasture-raised beef, locally sourced breads baked in small batches, raw honey from local bees and other delicious offerings and rustic merchandise are now available at the Dutton Cattle Co.’s new beef shop, located directly behind the family’s The Pike 40 restaurant.

The Dutton family hosted an open house and steak tasting on Thursday evening to celebrate the shop’s opening. Participants sampled ground beef sliders, fresh local greens with a tart, lemony dressing, Harvest Trail Cottage Bakery breads, ribeye and strip steaks from the Duttons’ Ohio wagyu herd raised in Flushing and Lafferty, and grilled peaches and whipped cream for dessert.

Chris Dutton, director of sales and branding, led guests through the menu, demonstrating the differences between cuts of meat and talking about the process of raising and butchering the cattle.

He said the family ranch is home to 500 “mamas” who deliver babies in two calving seasons — 250 in spring and 250 in fall. The mothers are black angus cows, and they are bred with red wagyu, or “Japanese cow” bulls.

Those calves are free to wander the ranch’s pastures and eat grass until they are a year old. At that point, they are introduced to grain. The family raises the cattle to about 28 months of age before they are shipped off to be processed. At that age, Dutton said, they have reached about 1,400 pounds. After they top 30 months, he noted, you can’t butcher them for bone-in steaks.

Brad Ferda provides the breads for the shop every Wednesday. He said he uses raw honey from Raspberry Fields Apiary in Flushing along with grains obtained from local Amish farmers. He grinds those grains himself and bakes only in small batches.

That honey is also available for sale at the shop, and guests on Thursday got to sample it as well.

In addition, the shop offers Ranch Hand brand coffee and spices sourced from Columbus, where Chris Dutton and his family live. But he travels back to Belmont County at least once a week to help manage the business.

He credited his staff and his family for helping to bring his vision of the shop to life. He especially thanked his parents, Rita and John Dutton, who he said “is mostly the reason we are able to do all of this,” since he runs the ranch.

“A little bit of a mission that I have with Dutton Cattle is … making local beef more accessible,” he said, citing a “little bit of guilt” over knowing where the beef he feeds his family comes from. “And I feel like everybody should know where their beef comes from. … I figure let’s be a part of the solution to creating more outlets for people to have more access to local beef.

He said he also wants to create a hub for other producers in the area. He said he would love to expand to offer chicken and pork in the future.

In addition to the guests for the steak tasting, a steady stream of customers stopped to explore the shop on Thursday. Some of those visitors came from Pike 40, where an installment of the annual karaoke contest known as “Pike Idol” was taking place on Thursday evening.

The Pike 40 and new shop are located at 41010 National Road, near Union Local High School.

The new retail beef store will operate in “soft opening” mode for the remainder of summer, with open hours Tuesday through Saturday. For more information, visit duttoncattle.com.