ROCHESTER, N.Y. — What’s a holiday celebration without that big meat dish? Butcher shops this time of the year are prepared for a big holiday rush. But what if you don’t eat meat? A Rochester shop has the answer.

’Tis the season for eating. And Rob Nipe is ready.

“This is the roast,” he said, as he prepared product for sale to hungry holiday customers.

Nipe owns Grass Fed on Monroe Avenue in Rochester, with his wife, Nora Rubel. Behind the counter, customers can find everything from deli ham to bacon to breakfast sandwiches. It is a butcher shop built on a principal of no meat.

“It’s generally a positive experience, which is great,” said Nipe. “That's what you hope for.”

Grass Fed is a vegan butcher shop. All of the meats and other items on the menu are plant-based. The recipes started six years ago when the couple went vegan.

“One of the things we wanted to do is try to make meals that we kind of remembered and had kind of missed,” he said. “And so it started me down the path of trying to make some vegan meats.“

Grass Fed was recently mentioned in an article in one vegan publication which named Rochester America’s best small city for vegans. A city which welcomed this unique mom and pop butcher shop when it opened two years ago.

“For someone that maybe hasn't like thought about it, there's the question of, well, if you're vegan, why do you make something that looks or tastes like meat?” Nipe said. “I think for a lot of people, myself included, right, I didn't become vegan because I didn't like steak. I became vegan for other reasons.”

“Our thing is, it can’t just be good enough for vegans,” said Rubel. “It has to be delicious.”

Nips says when he first started, there was a lot of trial and error in perfecting his vegan meats.  Finding the right taste may take time. Some things are worth the wait.