Farm to Table II

Yesterday I wrote a post about getting our quarter cow, and said that the farmer we bought it from offered to have us on a pasture walk they had planned.  I jumped at the opportunity, because not only would I love to see how their cows lived, but I figured I'd learn a lot about farming that I can use down the road when Chad and I have our own farm.

The farm we bought the cow from is called Green Heron Growers, and they have a nice little farm here in Western New York close to where Chad and I live.  It was a pretty drive out to their farm.  It was kind of overcast that day, and it was sprinkling off and on, but we brought umbrellas so we wouldn't be too uncomfortable.

There were several people there already when we pulled up.  It was kind of funny, actually.  We were the only people there who didn't have their own farm, but everyone seemed so.... normal.  Not farmerish at all.  The folks that owned Green Heron Growers themselves looked like they used to be hippies, to be honest! 

Their farm is based very strongly on Joel Salatin's farm Polyface Farms, which is an intensive grazing system that promotes healthy animals, healthy land, and healthy people.  Instead of destroying the land, it improves it by adding topsoil and nutrients.  The animals eat the foods that they naturally eat in nature (GRASS!).  And because the animals are eating naturally and are happy, the meat they produce is healthier for people, too.

The farmers first showed us their baby broiler chicks that were soon to go out to the pasture.

 

Then we headed out to their pastures, and talked about what they're doing to improve the land.  

Even the dog likes eating the grass.

I was amazed when they told us that they actively seeded their fields with lots of legumes (clovers in this case) and lots of different kinds of grasses to provide the perfect balance for the cows to eat.  Not too much protein, not too much carbohydrate, and not grasses that were too tough to eat. 

If you looks close, there really are all kinds of different grasses and clovers in this field.  I'll never look at grass the same way again.

They took us to their chicken tractors next, but along the way, I got this shot.  The farm across the way is an organic Amish dairy farm.

The chicken tractors were really cool.  What these are are outdoor pens for their broiler chickens.  They move them twice a day, so the chickens get a fresh crop of grass and bugs, and so the field gets fresh chicken poop fertilizer all over.  The tractors also help protect the chickens from natural predators, like raccoons, skunks, and coyotes.

 While we were there, he moved it for us so we could see how excited the chickens got when they got a fresh supply of grass and bugs.

After that, we walked on down to where the cows were that day.  Along the way, I caught a couple of pictures of some Amish buggies driving by.  This isn't unique for us to see in our area.  I see Amish people all the time because there's such a large group of them around here.  But I thought it was a pretty picture.

And then, cows!

They have a herd of 37 cows, mostly mixed, but all have Red Devon in them somehow.  He said this was very important to him, because the Red Devon is an extremely docile cow, and he believes that the temperament of the cow in life has a lot to do with how it tastes later on. 

Every day, they move their herd to a new paddock, or small sectioned off pasture.  That way, the land has a chance to recover, and the cows get fresh new grass every day.  This ensures that the cows are eating the very best food every single day, just like they would do if they were in the wild.  

There was a cute little baby cow that had gotten loose from the rest of the herd, and he just kept mooing at us.  When the farmer tried to catch him, he ran around like a little kid!  It was pretty cute.

The farmers actually name each cow born on their farm, that's how much they care about them.  The little calf that got loose was Midnight. 

Then they invited us into the new paddock they were moving the cows to, so we could watch them enjoying the new grass. 

Oh my, they were so loud!  They chomped like mad!  They started out on the other side of the paddock to us, but they just kept getting close and closer and closer.

This one was just a few feet away before she realized she had to turn and go the other way!

The red devon is so docile that he managed to get quite friendly with some of the calves born on his farm.

I accidentally captured his Amish neighbor, so I put a yellow dot there to hide his face; they prefer not to be photographed.

It was a long tour.  We were out in the fields nearly 3 hours, but I learned a lot and it rekindled my passion about farming someday.  I don't think we'll have cows right away, or possibly ever, but we'll definitely be caring for some kind of animals.  Chickens at least, and possibly sheep or goats.  

On the way back to our car, I saw some free range laying chickens in their back yard.

It was really cool visiting the farm we bought our meat from.  It made me really appreciate our purchase, and cemented the idea of buying from them again.  

By the way, did you know hows have whiskers?

 

Farm to Table

Do you remember back in May when Chad and I bought a freezer and ordered a quarter cow on a whim?  Fun times!  Well, it's July now, and we finally got a call from the butcher last week about what kind of cuts we wanted from our cow. 

The conversation went very quickly!  I hardly knew what to say, and the lady I was talking to sounded like she was in a hurry.  All I really was able to manage to get through was that we wanted as much of it as possible to not be ground beef, that yes I wanted the tongue but no I didn't want the heart, and oh yes, could I have the suet? 

On Wednesday of last week, the farmer sent an email to the handful of people they sold some cows to, to let them know the beef was all butchered and frozen and ready to be picked up.  They also said that they were having a pasture walk on Saturday and we were all welcome to come.  That sounded so awesome!  I wanted to go and check out their farm before, but wasn't sure if I could actually face the cow that we'd soon be eating.  But since the cow was already butchered, I'd only really be facing our cow's friends and family. 

So Thursday, Chad went out to the butcher's on his lunch break and brought home this.

Totally 70s kitchen flooring. 

When he handed me the first box, the first thing I said was, "Holy cow!", which made me laugh and almost drop the box.  All together, we got 91 pounds of beef, so each box was about 40-50 pounds!

Now I'm a nerd, deep down.  I needed to know how much meat we got, what kind of cuts we got, how much we paid per pound, and if we actually saved any money going this route.  So before I carted the meat downstairs into our new freezer, I weighed and wrote down how much of each kind of meat we got.

If you're as much of a nerd as I am, you can check out my figures here.  If you're not that interested in numbers and figures, I'll just tell you here the basics. 

We paid the farmer $4.50 a pound for hanging weight of our 1/4 cow, and that included the butcher fee.  Since our quarter came out to be 135 pounds, that's $607.50.  After processing, we got about 91 pounds.  That means we paid $6.67 for the parts of the cow we actually brought home. 

Now, if I went to our local Wegmans and bought the same cuts of organic grass fed beef (although Wegmans doesn't carry organic in all the cuts we got), we would have spent $7.96 per pound.  So it actually was a good deal. We ended up filling our freezer quite well.

It wasn't just about how good of a deal we could get on meat, though.  It's about quality.  It's about knowing that the cows are very well taken care of, that they eat good natural foods, and that they're happy.  I don't know if you can actually taste a difference (some people say you can), but I liked just knowing that we got to make at least one cow happy. 

And he was pretty delicious, too.

 

Paired with my own homegrown veggies as a side, this was the perfect meal!

Tomorrow I'll show some awesome pictures we took on the farm that our cow came from! 

The Problem With Farm Eggs

We live in New York.  No, not The City.  We live in New York state, about as far away from New York City as you can possibly get while still being in NY state.  I know from experience that a surprisingly large number of people think that all of NY is like NYC, but I can assure you it's not.  As a matter of fact, the area we live in is very heavy into agriculture.  This area is the largest producer of concord grapes in the world, and our dairy farms produce more revenue than our vineyards if that tells you anything at all.  We have three large Amish communities in our county alone, and there's lots more across the border in PA.  Our dinky city of 30,000 is the largest city in our county.

So it might shock some of you to find out that it took us a while to find a source of farm eggs.  The problem is that we're city folk, and we really had no idea who to contact to find out where to get eggs.  Just because we're surrounded by farms doesn't mean we know anything about them.  But by chance, I saw a carton of eggs in my mom's fridge with a little tag attached with the name of the farm she bought them from, and I was all like OMG TELL ME WHERE YOU GOT THESE!!!  Lol, down the street from where she lived.  Somehow, in all the times we'd been to my mom's house, Chad and I had never seen the sign that read "FRESH EGGS $2.50 A DOZEN". 

We immediately went out and got two dozen.

I love that green-egg-laying chicken.  Now I just need some green ham.

They're so so so so so good.  I'll admit that when we first started buying them, they weren't really that different from the eggs we buy at the store.  I've decided that it's because it was the dead of winter then, and of course chickens can't really forage in two feet of snow.  But now that there are bugs and grass and other delicious things for the chickens to eat, their eggs are so awesome. 

The egg in the middle is a store bought egg, which, by the way, is from a brand we really like because their egg yolks are a lot darker than other brands we've tried.  So that should tell you how seriously dark the yolks of the farm fresh eggs are.

I even got to meet the guy selling the eggs the other day.  He was amazingly friendly, and seemed so chipper and happy.  I bet he eats lots of eggs himself.

But there's a problem with farm fresh eggs.  Yes, a real problem that can't be ignored.  The problem is.... availability.  Because farm chickens aren't machines.  Because there's a limited supply.  And because demand is going way up as people become more aware of how the happiness of their food affects their own well being.  We went about two months without farm eggs because, every time we went out to buy them, there weren't any there.  After a while, we just stopped bothering to check, because it is a little out of the way now that my mom has moved to a different house. 

My mom and I recently went out to the farm at an off hour, and to my delight, they had eggs!  Chad and I checked again last weekend, and managed, after checking at two different times, to get the eggs we so desired.  I really don't want to bother the farmer with our problem because it's a first-come-first-serve kind of deal, and we shouldn't get any special treatment, but I do wish our supply was more consistent. 

I guess I just have to wait until we move to the country and get our own chickens.  I have to find out what kind of chickens lay green eggs...

We bought a cow!

Chad and I are very orderly people.  Or I guess the truth is that I'm a very orderly person and Chad is easy to persuade.  We have a monthly budget and we divide our money up into nice little groups.  Bills, savings, groceries, and we even give ourselves a set allowance so we don't spend more money than we have.  Up until very recently, we didn't have a single dime of debt (but we also found out that having no debt means you have no credit should you ever need it, so we decided to bite the bullet and get a car loan instead of buying it outright).  It's a very neat little system and it makes me feel very secure about our money.  The last thing I ever want to do is spend more than we have.  The motto in our house is "Use it up, wear it out; make it do, or do without," and we truly live by that. 

But then once in a while, we go mildly crazy and buy something big that we weren't planning on and hadn't saved up for.  It's like feel the need to sneak out and be totally bad once in a while.  This time, we bought.... wait for it....  a CHEST FREEZER!  *gasp*

I had actually been eyeballing a Ninja blender/food processor in Sam's Club (which I've been wanting forever but can't find the justification to actually buy), when Chad happened to spot this beauty behind us.  It's a 7 cubic foot GE freezer with a really snazzy lock.  I guess the lock is to keep neighbors from coming over and stealing your ice cream.

Once we managed to get id into the car and then down our steep, narrow old basement stairs, turned it on and saw that it works, Chad asked, "now what are we going to put in it?"  Lol.

I have big dreams of one day owning a mini-farm, with orchards, a large garden, some laying chickens, and a couple small cows or goats.  Unfortunately, we're currently living on 0.1 acre in a town that doesn't let you have livestock on your land.  I have a decent sized garden out back, but I'd have to be pretty full of myself to think I could fill that cooler with all my produce.

So I looked around the tubes to see what it had to offer.  Local Harvest is a pretty cool website, and offered me up a lot more farms than I knew we even had around here.  It's funny how you can live so close to something and not even know it's there.  But we're city folk; how would we ever get in contact with farmers without the internet?  And I don't want to hear anyone saying, "Oh gee, I don't know...  maybe talking to people?"

I did managed to find a handful of local farms selling pastured chickens, organic pork, and grass-fed cows.  We decided against ordering pastured chickens for now.  Our local Wegmans store sells organic, pastured chickens raised on kind of local Amish farms for an awesome $3.50 a pound.  We may order some local birds from a farmer next year, but for now, we decided just to go for something that's harder to get in the store.

Wegmans grass-fed beef is outrageous.  It starts at $6 a pound or so for ground, and goes up to $14 a pound for sirloin, and don't even think about the $24 a pound tenderloin steak.  We try really hard to buy good quality food, but organic grass-fed/pastured meats are just too much for us.  We can't afford that.  So my goal was to find some beef we could buy, hopefully cheaper than the store would sell it to us for.

And I did!  The first farm I found had so much demand, that they already sold all of their 2013 cows and had most of their 2014 cows sold!  Their beef was the cheapest at $3.50 a pound for a half cow, but it was only grass finished and not grass-fed.  Fortunately, I found an even closer farm selling completely grass-fed cows, who pasture on certified organic pastures, for $4.50 a pound for a half cow, and that includes the butcher fee!

So I hopped on it.  We most certainly weren't planning on buying a cow right away, but I know this will save us money in the long run.  We ended up buying a quarter of a devon cow, which is a small breed, and the farmer said that after processing, we'll have between 100 and 130 pounds of meat.  I figured it out that that means we'll be spending around $5-6 a pound, and that doesn't include any of the bones or the fat which I plan on asking for.

Now I'm all freaking out because I have no idea what to say to the butcher when he calls in July to ask how we want our quarter cut up.  I was a vegetarian for most of my life!  All I know about cows is that you get hamburger and steaks from them.  "Yeah...  um....  can you cut it into...  steaks?  Oh and can I have the liver?  I think cows have livers." 

I'll let you know how it goes in July!  I kind of wish we could go out and meet our cow, but something tells me I'd feel really terrible if I did.  I need more time to adjust to being a meat eater still.