tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-74743205042822916852024-03-13T23:34:01.379-07:00Pasture2PlateA front row seat to what it takes to get great food on your table. Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.comBlogger70125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7474320504282291685.post-2436947857222354672018-11-29T14:55:00.001-08:002018-11-29T15:08:30.641-08:00OMG, it's yarn!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: georgia, "times new roman", serif;">When I left off last on the chronicle of this journey from
sheep-to-socks I had just gotten the hang of spinning after months of
frustration. Turned out the the root of the problem lay not only in understanding
the mechanics of the wheel, but of </span><i style="font-family: georgia, "times new roman", serif;">spinning</i><span style="font-family: georgia, "times new roman", serif;">
in and of itself.</span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Cakes of double-ply hand-spun yarn.</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">After taking Abby Franquemont’s spinning bootcamp class at
Maryland Sheep and Wool this past spring, I sprung for her book, <i><b><a href="https://www.interweave.com/store/respect-the-spindle" target="_blank">Respect the Spindle</a></b></i>, to get a better understanding. Having both top and bottom drive
spindles, I experimented, but cats and spindles had become an insufferable game
of Battleship. I lost. After each being caught up once one way or another with
the wheel, the cats steer clear when I sit in the rocking chair and start to
treadle. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">My summer and fall were spent spinning a variety of professionally prepared rovings as they were much easier to spin than my nep-infested roving from the ram. Spinning with a higher quality wool also gave me the win needed to keep me moving forward. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">With all available spindles full, it was time for a plying
lesson. This stage presented itself perfectly as I was able to pair it with an
alpaca neck roast dinner with my fellow fiber enthusiast and teacher. She keeps
camelids; I do not but was at my butcher’s on a day when a four-year old female
who failed to breed was being slaughtered for meat. “I want the neck roast,” I
chirped. A few swift cuts and I was handed a four-pound slug of meat. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Alpaca: it's what's for dinner.</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br />After our meal we began by transforming a bobbin’s worth of
single-ply into a cake using a gadget she had brought along. A quick lesson on cake-winding
completed, my hand-spun wool was starting to look better. Unfortunately, that feeling
would be short-lived once I began plying from a cake and encountered “yarn barf”,
the not-so-technical term for when a tangled rat nest emerges from the
center-pull yarn of the cake requiring mind-numbing patience to unravel before
continuing to ply.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Plying, for the uninitiated, is when multiple strands of
single-ply yarn are twisted together using the wheel. Plying from the ends of a
single cake is a bit of a work-around for not having multiple bobbins set up on
a holder (a.k.a. lazy kate) to feed into the orifice of the wheel. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">The second gotcha, much easier to overcome than most of my
challenges thus far, was remember that the wheel spins counter to the direction
in which the single-ply was originally spun. I spin clockwise so my plying
would be counter-clockwise. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Lazy Kate</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">My cake had a bad case of food poisoning and puked the
entire time during my first attempt at making a double-ply yarn. It was during
this time I had the realization that if I had spent the time spinning a second
bobbin of the same roving in order to ply using a lazy kate, </span><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"> it would have been
faster. Instead of falling victim to the frustration of untangling for hours I spun
a second bobbin of a project using purple and green rovings I purchased last
year on my trip to New Hampshire.</span><br />
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<tr><td><a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-fjsQH-UZphQ/XABNficmhyI/AAAAAAAAH2w/X9kAcYLIEyQ09S_lbIsNmOnlqcMowkB-ACLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_4611.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1600" height="320" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-fjsQH-UZphQ/XABNficmhyI/AAAAAAAAH2w/X9kAcYLIEyQ09S_lbIsNmOnlqcMowkB-ACLcBGAs/s320/IMG_4611.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px;">Another yarn barf while plying from a single cake.</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">During the spinning I had alternated between the two colors
in an attempt to create a variegated yarn when plied but realized my error. I
should have spun whole bobbins of the same color and then plied them. I’m cool
with the learning process and my finished double-ply yarn turned out better
than expected. <o:p></o:p></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">After plying it was time to wind the yarn off the bobbin using a gadget made from some wooden dowels and plastic T's called a niddy noddy. Who comes up with these names?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Using a niddy noddy allows you to gain a better ideas of how much in length the finished yarn hank is. While on the niddy noddy I tied the hank in four places before removing the yarn and soaking it in warm water for a half hour. Similar to the felting projects, the yarn needed fulling which is basically thwacking the hell out of it while damp against a hard surface. When the yarn hank had dried I wound it back into a cake using the gadget my teacher has left with me since she got herself a newer, much fancier unit. </span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Plied yarn on niddy noddy. </td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">With several empty bobbins I’ve returned to spinning the ram’s
fleece from which my goal is to make a pair of socks. The roving isn’t as easy
to spin as professionally prepared fleece, but I’m working through it. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br />In the mean time, I started a simple knitted scarf project
with my purple and green double-ply yarn and am attempting a pair of socks from
purchased yarn, however Judy’s Magic Cast-On is more like an evil spell cast
upon me straight from the devil himself. Note to YouTube instructors: slow down
so we can see what you are doing and don’t cast on five stitches and then move
on. Do it over and over and over slowly so challenged folks like me can get the
hang of it.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-wui1Ca74TRA/XABxH08QoPI/AAAAAAAAH3g/mtXy3fxh8KM5v19r3TCFSmj6H2gP1UHWwCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_5784.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; font-family: "Times New Roman"; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-wui1Ca74TRA/XABxH08QoPI/AAAAAAAAH3g/mtXy3fxh8KM5v19r3TCFSmj6H2gP1UHWwCLcBGAs/s320/IMG_5784.JPG" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">I’m still having fun felting here & there and would love
to try weaving, but not until my socks are done. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">One step closer but back to the wheel for now….</span> </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A felted picture from a class I took over the summer. </td></tr>
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<br />Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7474320504282291685.post-44008627318471143512018-06-27T16:18:00.000-07:002018-06-28T07:10:50.177-07:00Investing in my Craft<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-e430Ic5hZKo/WzQZhSGUgoI/AAAAAAAAHt0/yBd3uc8REsk7pZ8sBS0JffvsTCwNLcGJACLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_4006.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-e430Ic5hZKo/WzQZhSGUgoI/AAAAAAAAHt0/yBd3uc8REsk7pZ8sBS0JffvsTCwNLcGJACLcBGAs/s320/IMG_4006.JPG" width="320" /></a>When it comes to new hobbies, I tend to be conservative in my financial investment until I know this is something I truly want to pursue. Since embarking on this journey of Sheep2Socks my biggest investment has been time thanks to the generosity of friends from whom I have borrowed equipment and picked their brains. Given the proximity of the Maryland Sheep & Wool Festival--one of the pilgrimage stops for fiber enthusiasts--I decided to take a class. Mind you, this was back when I was still spinning wool breakfast sausages in abject frustration.<br />
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"The classes fill up at lightning speed," I was told by everyone. So I treated it like trying to get tickets to a popular concert, my finger hovered over the BUY button at the appointed time that EventBrite opened online registration. I sat in the van after market waiting for 2:00 PM. 2:00 PM came and went with no change to the event status. 2:02 PM, "Damn, I need to refresh the page to get it to work," I thought stupidly to myself. Four spots left in the class. Buy. Checkout. Pay with PayPal. Success. I had scored a spot to Abby Frankquenmont's Spinning Bootcamp and I felt like I had just scored front row tickets to Hamilton.<br />
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-A8hYu2aic_8/WzQZhf4R3CI/AAAAAAAAHt4/Qm5iI0djYO8k0xwLnEiuGS5nuNEwSujcQCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_4012.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-A8hYu2aic_8/WzQZhf4R3CI/AAAAAAAAHt4/Qm5iI0djYO8k0xwLnEiuGS5nuNEwSujcQCLcBGAs/s320/IMG_4012.JPG" width="320" /></a>In the time between signing up for the class and the day of the class I had finally gotten the hang of spinning, but the mechanics and lingo were still swirling in the ether of my mind. What was all this about twist everyone talked about? I just knew that my roving was passing through my fingers and on to the bobbin as the wheel spun around.<br />
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The day came for class and I put on clothing without horn holes or farm stains and headed south of the Mason Dixon. I thought the class would be at the fairgrounds, but the address led to a convention center at a golf course a few miles past the fairgrounds. Parking the van between a Porsche and Masserati, I hauled out the borrowed Ashford and headed to find the class.<br />
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<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-CyZKifhf5P4/WzQZhbIui8I/AAAAAAAAHtw/7NNZS8Y-3U83HuT4fLSuXcpc2quzZwu1QCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_4013.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-CyZKifhf5P4/WzQZhbIui8I/AAAAAAAAHtw/7NNZS8Y-3U83HuT4fLSuXcpc2quzZwu1QCLcBGAs/s320/IMG_4013.JPG" width="240" /></a>There were eighteen participants, including myself. Women of all ages and a token male. There was an assortment of traditional wheels, both Castle and Saxony, and a few e-spinners, including the instructor's which had a tachometer her performance engine mechanic husband had installed for her so she could prove a point in an online slap-fight with another spinner. Who knew it could be such a competitive arena?<br />
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One of the main reasons I chose this class was for the instructor's personal experiences as the child of cultural anthropologists studying textiles in Peru. I knew this chick was going to be as interesting as she was informative. An excellent instructor in spinning as well as history, economics, design and mechanics, Abby is also an opinionated woman; I felt right at home.<br />
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Also the wife of a performance car mechanic, Abby was able to explain the technical aspects of spinning in terms with which I was familiar. What held interest for me, though, was the idea that textiles were an act of independence.<br />
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You ever notice how when you take up an interest in something it tends to begin popping up everywhere? So there's this wonderful conversation with a group of people about spinning for fun versus necessity.<br />
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The following month I listened to <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Jeffersons-Daughters-Three-Sisters-America/dp/1101886242/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1530139249&sr=1-1&keywords=jefferson%27s+daughters" target="_blank">Jefferson's Daughters: Threee Sisters, White and Black, in a Young America by Catherine Kerrison</a> in which it detailed a number of issues that were discussed in the workshop. At the time of the Revolutionary War most textiles were imported from England. In the struggle for independence, domestic textile production became an act of rebellion. Founding fathers who were also farmers and plantation owners planted flax, cotton and hemp to be transformed into cloth onsite. Young slave girls not yet capable of working in the fields were put to work in small mills processing fibers, spinning and weaving. Young women of the house were traditionally gifted a fine spinning wheel for their 16th birthday although their spinning was limited to the finer wools that were gentle on the hands. Despite Sally Hemming's children to Jefferson were still slaves, he rewarded them with positions of relative ease compared to that of the other slaves. For instance, one of Sally's daughters worked in the textile mill, but she was only allowed to spin wool and was able to remain at her work in the mill far past when most girls were sent into the fields.<br />
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Another take-away from the workshop dealt with the physical and mental mechanics of spinning. Instead of spinning for hours and hours to learn a particular skill, Abby suggested just fifteen minutes at a time and then sleep on it so the brain can process what the hands had done. Instead of sitting for an hour to spin and getting up stiff, I now break up my spinning time into ten or fifteen minute increments during the day.<br />
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The big break-through came when I began switching from spinning my nep-infested (nep is a new word meaning small knots of fibers that are a result of second cuts during shearing) to professionally carded roving. The first win was with a tie-dyed colored ball of Merino gifted to me by one of my regular market customers. Working with variegated roving allowed me to see the twist thus understanding the dynamics I had been missing until then.<br />
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-REborF2QvcY/WzQZ7seNGFI/AAAAAAAAHuQ/yd4zQrI3gF8PjZFs3zKjNz0BvUeFaA-YACLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_4439.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-REborF2QvcY/WzQZ7seNGFI/AAAAAAAAHuQ/yd4zQrI3gF8PjZFs3zKjNz0BvUeFaA-YACLcBGAs/s320/IMG_4439.JPG" width="240" /></a>Then I broke into the bag of gorgeous roving given to me by my chicken processor's mother. "Take this, I'll never use it. It's been taking up space in my closet for years," she said handing me a bag of mystery fiber and a huge box of locks. Only after Abby's workshop did I realize the value of her gift. The mystery roving was the color and consistency of an old biker's beard, but the long staple (meaning the length of individual fibers) made roving flow through my fingers.<br />
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Now I felt comfortable to begin to experiment with different tension settings and the speed of the flier.<br />
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The shearer has been here which means I've been on this humbling journey for a year now. Things I though would be easy have required much practice and patience. With all of the bobbins I possess now almost full it's time to move on to the next step of this process--plying.<br />
<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-VG-knvkkdKA/WzQZ7kLm4oI/AAAAAAAAHuU/71Th4BDEHVMU-uDmw-DvzkvxvBsJOTargCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_4440.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-VG-knvkkdKA/WzQZ7kLm4oI/AAAAAAAAHuU/71Th4BDEHVMU-uDmw-DvzkvxvBsJOTargCLcBGAs/s320/IMG_4440.JPG" width="320" /></a><br />
Stay tuned......<br />
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Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7474320504282291685.post-62374021543529324072018-03-20T17:42:00.000-07:002018-03-20T19:12:02.892-07:00She was more than just a cat. She was my friend.<br />
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<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-sbLMdHwDRlE/WrGn71pz-vI/AAAAAAAAHmI/x18fR7yCKaQjOTJMJeAtEeLYKJfTVEOcACLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_3214.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-sbLMdHwDRlE/WrGn71pz-vI/AAAAAAAAHmI/x18fR7yCKaQjOTJMJeAtEeLYKJfTVEOcACLcBGAs/s320/IMG_3214.JPG" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><b>RIP Megs</b><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">It is with great sadness I enter spring this year with the
loss of Megs the Merciless, my feline companion for over twenty years. Yeah, I
know, that’s old for a cat. And some people will say, “It’s just a cat,” but spend
that much time with something/someone sharing your bed, hogging the pillow, stealing
the covers, being there each night when you go to bed and greeting you first
thing in the morning…you get a little attached. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Megs came to me as a tiny kitten while I was working in the
IT department at Elixir Technologies. She was so tiny with her barely
perceptible squeak I said she was only a megabyte and the name stuck. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">At the time I was living in a funky 1950’s era mobile home
smack dab in a citrus and avocado orchard. Critters were everywhere, especially
rats, mice and opossums. My two-legged house mate had issued a NO CATS edict,
but the vermin were outmaneuvering the traps and poisons, coming into the
bathroom through the spaces between the floor and the pipes, raiding my Tampax
box for bedding they shredded in the walls at night while we were trying to
sleep. It was a losing battle with us on the wrong side. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-LE2J4XGIX-A/WrGn7BmGRuI/AAAAAAAAHmE/Yf0MR_pDQjkAGazri8CAdsK0HRMsOFfLgCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_2188.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1196" height="320" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-LE2J4XGIX-A/WrGn7BmGRuI/AAAAAAAAHmE/Yf0MR_pDQjkAGazri8CAdsK0HRMsOFfLgCLcBGAs/s320/IMG_2188.JPG" width="239" /></a><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Shopping at a neighbor’s yard sale one day we spied a
rat-sized live trap. “Why are you selling this?” asked my anti-feline companion.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">“We got a cat,” was there reply so the cat ban was lifted. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The next day at work came an office wide email—Free Kittens.
It was meant to be. The next day I arrived at my desk to find a mewing tabby in
a cat carrier next to my CPU. She went home with me and has remained my
faithful companion until today. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">From the very beginning, Megs was a hunter. Even though the
orchard rats were bigger than she, lizards under the carport were her first
quarry. She didn’t even kill them, just grab them by the tail which popped off
as a natural escape mechanism. When she finally grew into her glory, she would
bring several offerings a day to the front door—rats, mice, bunnies, snakes and
once a raccoon kit. She avoided hawks, owls and coyotes. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">For two years her best
friend was Rosa, a black Lab puppy we were raising for the National Disaster
Foundation. Rosa would run with a blanket upon which Megs would cling for dear
life as her pal would leap off and on to the porch, the blanket flying with kitten
in tow. Rosa would carry Megs around by the leg and be scolded for doing so,
but them Megs would rub against the puppy’s mouth teasing her to take up their
game again. During long walks through the orchard in the morning and evenings
with the dogs, Megs would follow along racing up trees and ambushing the dogs. When
Rosa left for her professional training, Megs was visibly depressed for several
days over the loss of her friend. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">When the time came to move across the country from California
to Pennsylvania Megs won the award for the worst traveler. The horse had a
trailer, the dogs had a futon in the back of the truck and Megs had a large dog
crate with a cardboard box for a litter pan. She was none too happy and “sang” the
song of her people for three thousand miles. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-g0KYIbShBLQ/WrGn-IRwo9I/AAAAAAAAHmY/nsg1Up3xXDUxpUv8NNqWtqN98uSy56vmQCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_4294.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1196" data-original-width="1600" height="239" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-g0KYIbShBLQ/WrGn-IRwo9I/AAAAAAAAHmY/nsg1Up3xXDUxpUv8NNqWtqN98uSy56vmQCLcBGAs/s320/IMG_4294.JPG" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Half way through the trip we
stopped for a few days in Texas at my companion’s mother’s home. She was a
dyed-in-the-wool cat hater capturing wayward neighborhood kitties in a live
trap, tormenting them with hose and them calling animal control to dispose of
them. Once, she clipped the whiskers off her next-door neighbor’s pet cat with
a pair of garden shears out of spite while it was being held by the owner. I
had made arrangements to board her with my horse at the local veterinarian’s
clinic, but when I arrived she was turned away due to an outbreak of contagious
cat disease. She had to go with us. Imagine my surprise when I woke the next
day to find our host with Megs on her lap, a cup of coffee in one hand and a
cigarette in the other. “I thought you didn’t like cats?” I asked hesitantly.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">“I don’t,” she replied in her clipped German accent adding, “but
this cat is not going to shit in my garden.” Megs sat there purring. Was it
because she was out of her crate or because she had won over the cat-hater? <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-xWd3hvnDIh8/WrGn8sGsBpI/AAAAAAAAHmQ/abF-h8FbNfcTp5s0ePvPeAti-WP9jwWSACLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_3317.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1196" data-original-width="1600" height="239" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-xWd3hvnDIh8/WrGn8sGsBpI/AAAAAAAAHmQ/abF-h8FbNfcTp5s0ePvPeAti-WP9jwWSACLcBGAs/s320/IMG_3317.JPG" width="320" /></a><a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-L4ENfd-WbUo/WrGn4IrpE8I/AAAAAAAAHlo/vI2kV4C3X5AV1CzvSN9EVdtVbvgHFEhHwCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_0977.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1196" data-original-width="1600" height="239" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-L4ENfd-WbUo/WrGn4IrpE8I/AAAAAAAAHlo/vI2kV4C3X5AV1CzvSN9EVdtVbvgHFEhHwCLcBGAs/s320/IMG_0977.JPG" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">After ten days we arrived at the farm which was right on the
road. I had visions of finding her splattered on the asphalt, but in all the
years there she managed to avoid tragedy while numerous barn cats did not. She
opted for the opposite direction, hunting down in the pines where there were
plenty of bunny nests. Bush-hogging days were her favorites when she would
pounce on moles, voles, mice and of course, baby bunnies exposed in the mowed
grasses. She nabbed chipmunks, squirrels, baby groundhogs and once, a fledgling
owl. Much to the horror of our bird-watching neighbors, she raided the bird
nests in their ornamental trees grabbing one at a time, bringing it home to eat
and then going back for another until the nest was empty.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Her modus operandi also got her into trouble with the
farming activities when she chewed the heads off a few dozen turkey poults one
year. While the initial loss was around a hundred bucks, had those turkeys
grown up for Thanksgiving dinners they would have brought in well over a
thousand dollars. It wouldn’t be the first time someone who slept in my bed
caused thousands in damages. From then on during poult brooding Megs was
unhappily confined to the house. Angered by this, she tore through a second-story
window and escaped for another pre-Thanksgiving feast. We learned to Megs-proof
the brooders. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ZMTEwSM-lxs/WrGn5X1yLiI/AAAAAAAAHl0/7GYE8rf3jG4KbUmF5mU3H54i_9zRuMiIQCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_1370.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><br /></a><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Like our walks in the orchard, Megs</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">would tag along with
walks around the farm with the dogs, the bottle baby goats, the calves and the
horses.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ZMTEwSM-lxs/WrGn5X1yLiI/AAAAAAAAHl0/7GYE8rf3jG4KbUmF5mU3H54i_9zRuMiIQCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_1370.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1196" data-original-width="1600" height="239" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ZMTEwSM-lxs/WrGn5X1yLiI/AAAAAAAAHl0/7GYE8rf3jG4KbUmF5mU3H54i_9zRuMiIQCLcBGAs/s320/IMG_1370.JPG" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">A year into the farm in Pennsylvania I brought home a friend
for her, Bugs. Megs was having none of it. They were mortal enemies for many
years until a visiting dog grabbed Bugs by the neck violently shaking her. She
lay on my bed for two days unable to get her bearings. I was afraid she was
going to die. It was at the height of market season when I had three market
days in a row over the weekend and not the funds, let alone time, for a trip to
the emergency vet clinic. I came home to find Megs in bed next to Bugs with her
tail draped over her once hated housemate in a gesture of comfort. Bugs
recovered and the outright fighting between the two ceased.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Although a new feline friend was not to her liking, the
first Great Pyrenees puppy—Sherman was love at first sight. They play racetrack
around the house for hours at a time, bounding on to the furniture before
falling together in a fit of exhaustion. Despite his enormous size, she was the
one to play rough always going for his lips causing him to freeze while she
retracted her needle-like claws. He would hold her down in his massive paws and
lick her while she yowled, but she never physically protested. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">When Sherman was
hit on the road in front of the barn one morning, Megs entered another
depression like that of when Rosa left. She never became attached to any of the
puppies to enter her life again and was equally indifferent to a tuxedo kitten
rife with lice, ear mites and eye infection that was dumped in the driveway at
four am one July morning. She tolerated Lucky, but neither played or fought
with him. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">One summer I thought I had lost Megs for good when she
disappeared for nearly two months. An owl, a hawk, the road, a leg trap…who
knows, she was gone. As suddenly as she had disappeared, she reappeared seeming
none worse for wear, fat and clean, however, she seemed to stick close to the
house. It wasn’t until the Amish family a few doors over were walking by one
days when they noticed her sunning herself on the bench in front of my house. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">“Oh,
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">there’s </i>our kitty,” the woman said as
her little girl rushed to grab Megs who eluded the child’s attempt. I explained
that Megs was mine and had traveled from California with me several years
earlier. She would not be going home with them. The woman was incensed I would
do something so mean as to take away a child’s pet. I didn’t give a shit what
she said, Megs was my cat. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">When a tame orphaned deer was left at my farm, Megs befriended Buttercup who would lick Megs' ears. Whenever the doe would see Megs, she would rush over to lick the kitty slick. <a href="https://youtu.be/I-i2rDk591A" target="_blank">I was fortunate to catch one of their sessions on video. </a></span></div>
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-9RC9u6p7xaU/WrGn9t1ceqI/AAAAAAAAHmU/Cmtzwj30beouf2IG7VWbuiFs4NcR7wATQCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_3949.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1196" data-original-width="1600" height="239" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-9RC9u6p7xaU/WrGn9t1ceqI/AAAAAAAAHmU/Cmtzwj30beouf2IG7VWbuiFs4NcR7wATQCLcBGAs/s320/IMG_3949.JPG" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Megs had a wicked sense of humor. She <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">knew </i>when someone wasn’t a cat or animal person, making it a point
to win over their hearts or harass the daylights out of them until they left
the property. Once, she shed a huge gravid tick the size of a lima bean on a
friend with a tick phobia. She didn’t run when he tossed her off his lap
shrieking at the top of his lungs. Each time he would visit, she would make a
bee line for him, but for pet people, she could care less. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">When I gathered up all the critters to move to a different
farm four years ago, Megs only had twenty minutes to sing. She, along with Bugs
and Lucky, were forced to share my bedroom and the master bath for a week until
I opened to door to their new home. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-B-Vw19JkXoU/WrGn4FCrJEI/AAAAAAAAHls/-FxuxvcpQvU73azQK1Gbqok6bGvtcSHBACLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_0311.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1196" height="320" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-B-Vw19JkXoU/WrGn4FCrJEI/AAAAAAAAHls/-FxuxvcpQvU73azQK1Gbqok6bGvtcSHBACLcBGAs/s320/IMG_0311.JPG" width="239" /></a><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The road was a quarter mile away. The house sat in the
middle of a hay field. There were <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">three</i>
porches on which to laze in the sun—one for each cat which suited them all just
fine. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">About a year into her third farm it became apparent Megs was
aging. She could still catch and wolf down baby bunnies. She knew there was a
mouse trap on the counter and would jump up when it snapped, stealing the
entire trap to go and eat the mouse out of the bale wire. I found a stash of
traps under my bed recently. But she wasn’t grooming herself. Tufts of excess
fur were matting on her haunches. She was staring to shrink from her sleek, yet
muscular self. I bought a pet brush and we learned to deal with it. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Another year went by and while her body continued to shrink Megs
continued to hunt, to eat, to jump up and down on the bed. Her one eye grew
cloudy with what else… a cataract! She was <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">old.</i>
When the weight really began dropping off her I splurged on wet cat food, the
nice stuff which she gobbled two cans each day. She could still hear because
she would dance in excitement each time the mouse trap snapped, waiting for me
to drop it in front of her to promptly gobble down. Even when she quit eating
the fancy wet cat food, only licking the gravy off the chunks, she could still
devour an entire mouse and not barf it up. I tried to entice her with raw chicken livers, another favorite, and she turned up her nose. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">This past summer Megs developed an ulcerated tumor on her
side. The vet said she could sew it closed but it would require anesthetizing
Megs and wouldn’t guarantee it would not open right back up. I didn’t want to
take the chance and instead kept the open sore clean and medicated. It didn’t
start to expand until about a month ago. Then it began to smell. I considered
having her euthanized, but each time she would jump up on my lap showing no
pain with a relatively clean sore. Then it began to
ooze. The fur fell out around it. She quit eating altogether, but anytime I sat
down she climbed up on my lap and purred. I knew the end was near. I would not
terrify her by loading her into a strange carrier and
taking her somewhere to be put down out of convenience for me. She was not in
pain. She was not suffering. She was going to die on her own terms. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">For the last few weeks she mostly slept, ate little and
spent her time awake when I was around. Each morning when I would wake up, she’d
be waiting outside of my door as I had to quit letting her sleep in bed with
me when she refused to get out of the way when I rolled over. She tried to get
as close as possible and I was afraid of squishing her. To be honest, the oozing
sore was also something I did not want in my bed. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
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<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-EjYeTiW07aU/WrGn-Wl-YyI/AAAAAAAAHmc/jTPV_djLrogecdaYzVf1X6KXH7C3oDx0QCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_E3503.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-EjYeTiW07aU/WrGn-Wl-YyI/AAAAAAAAHmc/jTPV_djLrogecdaYzVf1X6KXH7C3oDx0QCLcBGAs/s320/IMG_E3503.JPG" width="240" /></a><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Last week, Megs had her celebrity fan moment when my
neighbor’s brother gave me a ride to the mechanic to pick up my van after I had
some maintenance done. He is none other than Dale Midkiff who played Doctor
Louis Creed in the Stephen King thriller, Pet Cemetery. We had been joking
about Megs smelling like Church, the cat-returned-from-the-dead. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">“Would you do
me a favor, Dale? Hold Megs and let me take your picture,” I asked. He obliged,
adding to hurry up because she smelled like death and he was going to puke.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I swore she smiled having played the part to a T. I placated Dale by
letting him cuddle the house lamb which smelled like a wool sweater for a few minutes.
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">This morning when I woke up, Megs did not greet me at the
bedroom door as usual. She was laying on the floor in the living room with Bugs at her
side. They hadn’t laid like that since Bugs’ encounter with the nasty dog. Megs
couldn't stand up. Her eyes weren’t focusing and the pads on her paws
were ice cold. I wrapped her in a towel and a blanket and laid her on my bed.
As I went about my work today, checking in on her regularly, I could see she
was gradually shutting down, fading just as I had seen with my grandmother as
her breathing grew irregular in her final hours of life, an occasional large
inhale, a small squeak when I squeezed her paw or stroked her fur.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As a farmer, I know death isn’t pretty. </span></div>
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<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-YqQlkg4ZUWs/WrGn4ExAfxI/AAAAAAAAHlw/w3g5jvXCEs4rx-6g6gmMCJN4YIX16-d6wCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_1138.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-YqQlkg4ZUWs/WrGn4ExAfxI/AAAAAAAAHlw/w3g5jvXCEs4rx-6g6gmMCJN4YIX16-d6wCLcBGAs/s320/IMG_1138.JPG" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">In the early afternoon as her breathing grew shallow and irregular, I got
a telephone call from an acquaintance who suggested I bang her on the head with
a shovel or shoot her and get it over with.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I hung up, blocked their number on my iPhone and went back to ensure
that Megs faded quietly</span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">across the rainbow bridge. </span></div>
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<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Or5hl4pF11U/WrGn8csiOvI/AAAAAAAAHmM/_emLtNBwpMYjHBDWjHaMqg4wtJE6dqvoQCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_3598.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1536" height="320" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Or5hl4pF11U/WrGn8csiOvI/AAAAAAAAHmM/_emLtNBwpMYjHBDWjHaMqg4wtJE6dqvoQCLcBGAs/s320/IMG_3598.JPG" width="307" /></a><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Megs passed peacefully wrapped in her favorite blanket on my bed on the
first day of Spring despite a snow storm. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">She likes to leave kitty tongue marks on butter left out and in the pan when grease congealed. Salmon skin was her favorite thing next to whole mice and she would be underfoot singing each time I opened a package of salmon. The vacuum cleaner didn't frighten her, but helium balloons were on par with evil clowns for her. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">On an impulse last Sunday, I
purchased several dinner plate dahlia bulbs, something I’ve never grown. Megs will
be buried in my flower garden next to the porch on which she loved to sun
herself, the dahlias marking the spot. I’m certain they will be gorgeous and
make me smile just as Megs did. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br />Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7474320504282291685.post-84434881130167302602018-02-19T20:15:00.000-08:002018-02-19T20:24:45.054-08:00The Pests Patrol<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-EePkPMZ-7XM/WoudnmWQF0I/AAAAAAAAHkE/JNpjosJjUZUkBKCQyi2Cnbl524TQ71xeACLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_3366%2B%25281%2529.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-EePkPMZ-7XM/WoudnmWQF0I/AAAAAAAAHkE/JNpjosJjUZUkBKCQyi2Cnbl524TQ71xeACLcBGAs/s320/IMG_3366%2B%25281%2529.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
No, I don't have bugs in the wool...well, kind of. Not bugs, but cats and this season's house lamb, appropriately named Purl. Since my spinning lesson last month in which I <i>finally got the hang of spinning</i>, I've tried to sit down at and spin a few minutes every day. Audio books, not so good, but Ottmar Leibert , UsefulTree or Ray LaMontagne--absolutely.<br />
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There's something meditative about settling in at the wheel, focusing on the mantra of pinch, draft slide and letting the mind go to become lost in the feel of the fiber as it passes through my fingers. I try to evoke images of the end product, a pair of thick socks that rise a few inches above the ankle, thick enough to pad my winter boots, especially the ones that snap into the bindings of my cross country skis, which sadly, I've only been able to use once this year.<br />
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<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-w5rCSNus5mo/WouaIwu85JI/AAAAAAAAHjg/GHFJEuHeeGgXOQ25-2wmcMhM6J_dmNlvgCEwYBhgL/s1600/IMG_3096.MOV" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="240" data-original-width="320" height="225" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-w5rCSNus5mo/WouaIwu85JI/AAAAAAAAHjg/GHFJEuHeeGgXOQ25-2wmcMhM6J_dmNlvgCEwYBhgL/s400/IMG_3096.MOV" width="400" /></a></div>
I finished the gray roving and successfully spun it off the bobbin on the spindle to a storage bobbin. That new Milwaukee drill came in handy for more than just hanging gates. With trepidation, I pulled out one of the bats I carded from the Tunis ram's wool last summer and sat down in front of the wheel with an empty bobbin. Just like that, I was one step closer to my socks as the bat transformed into a full bobbin over the course of several days.<br />
Since I did not scour the wool, using only a mild detergent, not all of the lanolin was washed out of the fiber. When I spin my own carded bats from the ram's fleece my fingers become soft as the traces of "grease" permeate my skin.<br />
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<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-kHBLAX-pY4k/WoudnTBKEpI/AAAAAAAAHj8/xL9SewfD1VclmZPOnMh5_RKV2kwkIAU8wCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_3370.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-kHBLAX-pY4k/WoudnTBKEpI/AAAAAAAAHj8/xL9SewfD1VclmZPOnMh5_RKV2kwkIAU8wCLcBGAs/s320/IMG_3370.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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At the same time, I've been practicing knitting. I frogged it (rip it, rip it) at least a dozen times before mastering the German twist cast-on to prevent the gap when knitting in the round. I'm about done with a hat now in the final stages as I attempt to switch from connected needles to double pointed for the final few rows. Megs insists on helping making it all but impossible to proceed.<br />
<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-HlnW8LIMGkA/WouaDQtqFpI/AAAAAAAAHjc/aiVQ6bPcqRkABDPbmc6jNppSwtr-TcUlgCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_3181.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-HlnW8LIMGkA/WouaDQtqFpI/AAAAAAAAHjc/aiVQ6bPcqRkABDPbmc6jNppSwtr-TcUlgCLcBGAs/s320/IMG_3181.JPG" width="240" /></a><br />
But tonight as I sat down to spin, the critters decided that it would be more fun to chase each other through the wheel as I treadled, to grab at the roving and to bat at the hook. Purl took it a step further, punching me on the legs with her nose as if to say, "Play with me! Give me a bottle!" Finally, she sat at my feet for a few precious moments as I realized the wool I was spinning was her grandfather's and some day in the not too distant future I will shear her wool, too, eventually spinning it into yarn and making something for myself or those I love. And that is the ultimate satisfaction of this journey. Onward to the next step...plying.<br />
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<br />Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7474320504282291685.post-38904820420540539482018-01-21T17:56:00.001-08:002018-01-21T17:56:31.114-08:00Pinch. Draft. Slide. <span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Those three words made months of frustration disappear as the white practice roving--nothing special--twirled into ropey sausages each time I sat down to spin. I felt I would never get the hang of spinning and my quest for sheep to socks would end in failure. Determined to give it another try with coaching from a friend who had first inspired me to take on this project, I invited my fiber friend over for a day. She brought her own wheel, a lovely <a href="https://woolery.com/spinning-wheels/lendrum-spinning-wheels/lendrum-original/lendrum-spinning-wheel-double-treadle-complete-package.html" target="_blank">Lendrum double treadle wheel</a>. </span><br />
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-anRMzFf2HyE/WmVDvp5kA_I/AAAAAAAAHhM/M7wZTJPLdvswT0gLdX0jE3gq3rD_6Gq9QCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_3068.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-anRMzFf2HyE/WmVDvp5kA_I/AAAAAAAAHhM/M7wZTJPLdvswT0gLdX0jE3gq3rD_6Gq9QCLcBGAs/s400/IMG_3068.JPG" width="400" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Once again she quickly diagnosed I was working with non-functioning equipment--a broken spindle on the Ashford and a loose footman on the Clemes & Clemes. Despite a dab of glue and an overall tightening of nuts and screws on my two borrowed wheels, she set me in front of her wheel, beginning an in-depth instruction as to how each part of the wheel affected take-up, the size of the spun fiber and the types of wheels. I practiced treadling to understand the motion of just getting the wheel to spin consistently in one direction. With roving in hand under her watchful eye, she began drilling me--pinch, draft, slide. </span><br />
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-OkRhHpJ7oSU/WmVDvRDT-QI/AAAAAAAAHhE/rXUmxT4WqSUuoG4f_MHf8PsOV7bntGpgQCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_3069.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-OkRhHpJ7oSU/WmVDvRDT-QI/AAAAAAAAHhE/rXUmxT4WqSUuoG4f_MHf8PsOV7bntGpgQCLcBGAs/s400/IMG_3069.JPG" width="400" /></span></a><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Pinch the fiber so the twist happens in front of my fingers and not on the entire string of fiber from which I was to pull the fibers held in the opposite hand--the drafting. Working in the "triangle" as it was described, after the draft, my pinching fingers were to slide down the fiber releasing the twisted portion to be drawn on to the spindle. Pinch. Draft. Slide. Pedal. And like learning to ride a bike, suddenly the roving was spinning into yarn that actually <i>looked </i>like yarn. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Once the glue dried on the broken bobbin, the Ashford was back up and functioning properly. I sat down in front of the wheel and over the course of a few hours spun an entire bobbin. Now I was back on the road toward my goal with a new enthusiasm. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Next up after spinning will be plying, which is twisting two strands of yarn together in the direction opposite in which they were spun. This will involve yet another piece of equipment called a "Lazy Kate" however, I've been told that a shoe box and chopsticks work just as well. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In the mean time, more woolmakers are being born.....</span><br />
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<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-eLr14Zo-tCQ/WmVEtTZJc5I/AAAAAAAAHhg/W2zA3bQZOtI_CLZToyblOvhF1JwtbC4yACLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_E3028.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-eLr14Zo-tCQ/WmVEtTZJc5I/AAAAAAAAHhg/W2zA3bQZOtI_CLZToyblOvhF1JwtbC4yACLcBGAs/s320/IMG_E3028.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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<br />Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7474320504282291685.post-73088797974533559942017-11-03T18:29:00.001-07:002017-11-03T18:29:39.602-07:00Felting Fun<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-JsEdJ2Xtem8/Wf0EshLXFQI/AAAAAAAAHQA/56jYjoDKbqU5tdHrITqk8USQ9MHm7QvBwCPcBGAYYCw/s1600/IMG_2417.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-JsEdJ2Xtem8/Wf0EshLXFQI/AAAAAAAAHQA/56jYjoDKbqU5tdHrITqk8USQ9MHm7QvBwCPcBGAYYCw/s320/IMG_2417.JPG" width="240" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Patience is not one of my virtues, but I'm learning. After cleaning the Ashford wheel and playing around with it for a few days my frustration was mounting. I needed a win with all this wool or I was in danger of chucking it in the bin and admitting defeat. I'll raise them, shear them, pick, wash and card the wool, but after that I'd need to outsource anything that took hand-eye coordination and patience. But after a gracious offer from one of my fiber arts mentors to sit and spin with me earlier this week I found out my frustrations weren't as much my utter lack of talent, but yet another equipment malfunction. </span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Not only was the Ashford's flyer broken, the tensioning band for the spindle was worn out. A quick fix with some fishing line and a hair band had the wheel up and running and me actually spinning. For continued work it will take another trip to the hardware store for wood glue and something a bit more substantial than four-pound test. </span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></div>
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-dc4bKfN-iCU/Wf0FN6dnZZI/AAAAAAAAHQ0/F5e9ifjcHCAB-TtiGY1b2vbV_l7_hsWUACLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_2300.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="200" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-dc4bKfN-iCU/Wf0FN6dnZZI/AAAAAAAAHQ0/F5e9ifjcHCAB-TtiGY1b2vbV_l7_hsWUACLcBGAs/s200/IMG_2300.JPG" width="150" /></a><a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-u3Lb2z13zEA/Wf0FN2r6ncI/AAAAAAAAHQw/rvy4pbAxNHEgY59_191zQ2qJQy0tf3SDwCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_2298.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-u3Lb2z13zEA/Wf0FN2r6ncI/AAAAAAAAHQw/rvy4pbAxNHEgY59_191zQ2qJQy0tf3SDwCLcBGAs/s320/IMG_2298.JPG" width="240" /></a><a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-bxvwCiig20Q/Wf0FN-2IODI/AAAAAAAAHQs/umOelHqME7ocFPw7cNot5U8noQF7tVJJwCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_2297.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="200" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-bxvwCiig20Q/Wf0FN-2IODI/AAAAAAAAHQs/umOelHqME7ocFPw7cNot5U8noQF7tVJJwCLcBGAs/s200/IMG_2297.JPG" width="150" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Still, I was itching for fun fiber project that would only require hours...not months, so I signed up for a Felted Scarf Class at the </span><a href="http://www.councilforthearts.net/" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;" target="_blank">Chambersburg Council for the Arts</a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">. The first night we made scarves using a technique called nuno felting which uses silk material as a base for the raw fibers. The process included bubble wrap, soapy water, a pool noodle and manual labor. Oh yeah, towels....lots of towels. </span></div>
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<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-PBX_AI-ucxI/Wf0FQG1OEQI/AAAAAAAAHRE/rqQ3JzU2ByUOflfUEkEIpTJxhiRBytKOgCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_2342.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; display: inline !important; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-PBX_AI-ucxI/Wf0FQG1OEQI/AAAAAAAAHRE/rqQ3JzU2ByUOflfUEkEIpTJxhiRBytKOgCLcBGAs/s320/IMG_2342.JPG" width="240" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The following week we made scarves using only wool roving in a process called "spidering" which was easier than the nuno felting with similar results. With two new felted scarves, I was feeling satisfied about making a little progress, but it was still a far cry from a pair of socks. The socks are still the goal, but I'm going to give felting a pair of slippers a try since LL Bean has discontinued making hand-stitched fleece-lined moccasins for women and my last pair are almost worn. . </span><a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-tpFRgnZP1hs/Wf0FPdRziBI/AAAAAAAAHQ8/lo-hbyvaeOIHBjc769bXVSKaZ5lZxPUowCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_2303.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="150" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-tpFRgnZP1hs/Wf0FPdRziBI/AAAAAAAAHQ8/lo-hbyvaeOIHBjc769bXVSKaZ5lZxPUowCLcBGAs/s200/IMG_2303.JPG" width="200" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Continuing with the theme of helpful generosity on this journey, when I mentioned my new hobby to my chicken processor's mother she offered me two bags of fiber that she'd had squirreled away in a cedar chest for many years. "I'm never going to use it and I want the space," she said as she handed over a garbage bag of gorgeous roving and a box of cream colored raw locks.Using them, I embarked on my first home solo project--a set of wrist warmers. Not too shabby. Now if winter would ever show up. </span></div>
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<br />Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7474320504282291685.post-44961984222954768132017-10-17T10:54:00.001-07:002017-10-17T10:54:36.906-07:00Equipment Malfunction<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">"I've spun thousands of skeins of wool on that workhorse," is what Annie had told me when she lent me her spinning wheel. Despite the complete dismantling, refinishing, replacing visibly broken pieces and reassembling, the pitman crapped out just as I was starting to get my mojo working on the wheel.</span><br />
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<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Zu3oQTryWxM/WeZBzJWe6eI/AAAAAAAAHMc/chBy9thEfZgscWdKB3cpV5uW5SPHa1fYgCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_2101.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Zu3oQTryWxM/WeZBzJWe6eI/AAAAAAAAHMc/chBy9thEfZgscWdKB3cpV5uW5SPHa1fYgCLcBGAs/s320/IMG_2101.JPG" width="320" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">You ask, "WTF is a pitman?"</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It is the rod connecting the wheel (the big round piece) to the treadle (the thing you peddle) that is the driving piece of hardware. As the wheel goes around, the drive band attached is wound over the flyer pulley and the bobbin pulley...kind of like a serpentine belt on a diesel engine. The bobbin inserts into the flyer which spins around the bobbin as the fiber is drawn in through a metal tip with a T hole configuration that is inserted into a piece of leather attached to vertical piece of wood inserted in the top cross piece.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And the worst part---it's totally my fault.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">When I refurbished the wheel I couldn't find a bolt with a smooth collar so I bought one with threads the whole way to the hex. Those grooves chewed right through the end of the pitman. A telephone call to the manufacturer who is still in business, a credit card number and a delivery from UPS a week later and I was back in action. </span><br />
<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-cjLd7DFUgTo/WeZCMccASBI/AAAAAAAAHMs/hlVc7QcWeW0wfklot7HklM56WfCGkkT4wCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_2288.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-cjLd7DFUgTo/WeZCMccASBI/AAAAAAAAHMs/hlVc7QcWeW0wfklot7HklM56WfCGkkT4wCLcBGAs/s320/IMG_2288.JPG" width="240" /></span></a><br />
<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-hWp_AK58m7E/WeZCL9IasWI/AAAAAAAAHMk/pYdz-B68kWAfQDUEsC0taojXFAk2-1yFwCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_2290.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-hWp_AK58m7E/WeZCL9IasWI/AAAAAAAAHMk/pYdz-B68kWAfQDUEsC0taojXFAk2-1yFwCLcBGAs/s320/IMG_2290.JPG" width="240" /></span></a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">However, during that lull a friend stopped by to drop off a spinning wheel that needed some TLC. "Fix it up and use it, would you," she said setting a very dusty <a href="https://www.ashford.co.nz/products/spinning/product/traditional" target="_blank">Ashford Traditional</a> spinning wheel in my living room. Unlike that damn diesel runabout I've been working my way through the electrical system in order to get it to run, the wheel's manufacturer had the schematic and operation manual freely down-loadable from the web site. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">An evening with an old t-shirt, a bottle of Murphy's Oil Soap and a few drops of 3-in-1 oil the old Ashford was back in business even with my poor spinning skills. Gradually with practice I'm getting the hang of it, but to get a better grip on my roving am considering taking a spinning class. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In the mean time, I'm going to also start playing with felting. Tomorrow night at the <a href="http://www.councilforthearts.net/" target="_blank">Chambersburg Council for the Arts</a> I'm taking a Nuno Felted Scarf class and a Felted Hat class next month. </span><br />
<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-kKssVKCmt8o/WeZB7GQBfvI/AAAAAAAAHMg/FP1WKMSZNQ0WRKpeLlQCB-Xu3wKHtvEXACLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_1866.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-kKssVKCmt8o/WeZB7GQBfvI/AAAAAAAAHMg/FP1WKMSZNQ0WRKpeLlQCB-Xu3wKHtvEXACLcBGAs/s320/IMG_1866.JPG" width="320" /></span></a><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This afternoon I have plans to shear a very dark wooled cull ewe with a long staple fleece (and a very bad attitude) for a felted rug prior to her ride on the Sausage Wagon. Actually, she'll be the Guest of Honor at one of Jose Andres' award-winning restaurants, <a href="http://www.zaytinya.com/" target="_blank">Zaytinya</a>, in Washington, D.C. so no humble sausage for her. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Nothing goes to waste. </span><br />
<br />Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7474320504282291685.post-30659984384782885712017-09-12T21:53:00.002-07:002017-09-13T14:43:13.904-07:00Tinkering Comes First<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
I love to fix things. Tear them down, clean all the parts, replace worn or broken pieces, refinish and then reassemble. The process gives me a better understanding of structure, function and a good dopamine rush when everything works as it should, especially when there are no leftover parts after everything is back together.</div>
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<span style="text-align: center;">Slowly I've been tackling the spinning wheel. Once all the wood parts had been sanded it was the weather that put the breaks on the polyurethane coating. That's not something done in the living room unless one wants to do an Oracle of Delphi imitation. It seemed like each time my schedule allowed me to work on the wheel, it was raining, cold and humid--not conducive to refinishing wood. </span><br />
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During the weeks, incremental steps forward were inserted into weekly errands. At trip to the hardware store yielded new screws. The piece of leather that attached the pitman to the treadle (I'm getting hip to the lingo) was the trickiest part. Old halters and reins scavenged from the barn proved too thin for the slot. The harness shop in my old neighborhood was no longer in business. I remembered there was an Amish harness repair shop at a farm where I once purchased guinea keets. It was near my poultry processor so popped over one week.<br />
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-zpXxFiM_n4M/Wbi4eain54I/AAAAAAAAHII/g-zhMj9YYbkuh6iQkjtv3nsxP1RQEmQWwCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_2028.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-zpXxFiM_n4M/Wbi4eain54I/AAAAAAAAHII/g-zhMj9YYbkuh6iQkjtv3nsxP1RQEmQWwCLcBGAs/s320/IMG_2028.JPG" width="320" /></a>There was a woman hanging clothes on the line and I asked her if the shop was still in business. She said it was and then proceeded to tell me that she didn't think she should sell me a piece of leather without first asking her husband and he wasn't home. It took ever molecule of self-control not to scream, <i><b>"Are you f%#king kidding me?"</b></i> Instead, I pulled out the piece of leather and explained what it was for. I appealed to the farm women sisterhood of self-sufficiency. She buckled and we walked over to the shop. The miracle, a small piece of scrap on the floor the exact thickness I needed a bit larger in size of the wheel's piece. I wasn't going to press my luck by asking if I could use his tools to shape the leather and punch holes at either end as she had a look of fear simply by being in the domain of males according to her culture. I thanked her, offered to pay her, but she declined. After all, it was a scrap on the floor.<br />
<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-pQBWVIEhNyo/Wbi4ehwjJeI/AAAAAAAAHIM/6ZcaDwAoTNccTVXI0LUbF0VgPoU2ds1dgCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_2027.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-pQBWVIEhNyo/Wbi4ehwjJeI/AAAAAAAAHIM/6ZcaDwAoTNccTVXI0LUbF0VgPoU2ds1dgCLcBGAs/s320/IMG_2027.JPG" width="320" /></a><br />
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The weather finally cooperated and the wood was bathed in a few generous coats of Minwax on the front porch, curing on a warm sunny day. Unfortunately, that darn piece of leather was still giving me trouble. I didn't have the proper tools to shape the piece or to punch the holes. Sure, I could have bungled it with a nail, hammer and woodblock for one hole, but the other was more an oval, larger in diameter for the play of the treadle.<br />
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<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-BkcskpLFqXs/Wbi4ekyBb7I/AAAAAAAAHIQ/Nuj0RHw4VzU92dTtpf6AR0x9ere-ogXMgCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_2029.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-BkcskpLFqXs/Wbi4ekyBb7I/AAAAAAAAHIQ/Nuj0RHw4VzU92dTtpf6AR0x9ere-ogXMgCLcBGAs/s320/IMG_2029.JPG" width="320" /></a><br />
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Mom was having one of her quilt retreats at her house and that tidbit of information jogged my memory that her sewing machine dealer/repairman had also once had a harness shop. When I stopped at his sewing machine shop he informed me he had not kept any of his leather tools when he sold the business. I showed him the pieces of leather and he smiled. "This I can do," he said as he fished in his tool box for the appropriate tools.<br />
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All the pieces sat on my living room floor waiting. But there were tomatoes to turn into sauce, peppers picked and ready to be sliced along with carrots for canning, market day, butcher day, a dead-in-the-water diesel runabout that needed the alternator removed to be fixed or replaced...<br />
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Finally, I sat down with my tools and schematic. It went back together easily and when I went to place the drive band, a piece of cotton string, on the wheel, I realized it had been chewed in a few places by one of my four-legged furry monsters. Not to be defeated, I pulled a strand of bright red yarn from my stash and fashioned a figure-8 drive band for the wheel. It was working.<br />
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This project has humbled me time and time again with the patience and practice required to do something as basic as turning fiber into yarn, something we, as a modern society takes for granted each time we put on a piece of clothing. It's not as simple as it looks so the next step is practicing with commercial yarn to get the feel of drawing it on to the spindle.<br />
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Meanwhile, there are four bags of roving awaiting spinning, five more fleeces needing to be skirted, washed, dried and carded, six more bags of alpaca wool in my second cousin's barn needing to be picked up and processed and several more pasture maggots to shear.<br />
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My Sheep2Socks journey continues...Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7474320504282291685.post-72617126355349933772017-08-18T13:57:00.006-07:002017-08-21T09:41:59.012-07:00Sheep2SocksIt's been a long time since I've posted as I gave up blogging over the last few years for several reasons, the foremost being I've been farming my heart out and prefer the long end of a pitchfork to the short end of a keyboard. I have also been focusing my time on several more writing projects. Since there are only so many hours in a day, the blog seemed a bit frivolous considering how many of my blog posts were showing up, sometimes word for word, in other people's content and books with little or no citation. Yeah, that kind of sucked.....<br />
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But I've started a new chapter and wanted a place to document my progress; proof an old bitch can learn new tricks.<br />
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Anyone who knows me has watched as I've pulled about every penny from livestock--goats rented out for brush clearing or for camp, that end up in the curry pot, their livers as dog treats, their hides as djembe drums, their bones as artwork and garden markers. But now I have entered a world in which I swore I would never venture...SHEEP! I found myself looking after several wooly pasture maggots in need of shearing and could not resist the temptation calling from my grandmother's chintz picnic basket full of her knitting needles and notions.<br />
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Each morning when the big Tunis ram greets me at the gate to nose in my pockets for treats I sink my fingers to the knuckles in his thick wool amazed by its elasticity and heft. He stands unfazed each winter, snow gathering with ragged cracks like the mud flats of Death Valley.<br />
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A bag of his wool from three years ago sits in the barn collecting rat turds. Last year the shearer kept his fleece. This year I was determined to make myself a pair of socks from start to finish. And so I began my journey in June when the shearer showed up.<br />
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Granted, I know how to shear, but I'm not very good at it and the ram outweighs me--two factors that led me to to hand it over to a pro. However, when culling a few wild ones later in the summer, I swiped their fleeces and sent them to the butcher naked, clipping them both by hand using <a href="https://www.premier1supplies.com/p/red-shank-hand-shear" target="_blank">a pair of hand shears</a>. Years ago when I was first learning to shear I watched a video of an elderly Navajo couple in their mid 80's meticulously clipping the sheep from which the yarns in their intricately hand-woven rugs were made. It was actually quite relaxing once I got the ewe's feet tied together and she quit trying to kick the snot out of me. I queued up an old Eagles playlist and began my task. Both sheep took less than an hour to shear with both fleeces coming off in a single piece.<br />
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Despite the lunatic behavior during lambing season that earned them a sausage wagon candidacy, one of the ewes laid her head on my thigh and calmly gazed as if in meditation while I relieved her of three pounds of thick wool while sweat poured down my back. There's an irony to working with wool on the hottest days of the year in order to be warm on the coldest days of the year. Just as most people are far removed from how their food is produced, we are equally ignorant of the textiles from which clothes are made, be it cotton, silk, wool, leather and even synthetics.<br />
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Being new to all this even with the cadre of fiber livestock friends I've amassed over the years, the Internet was my bible. Mistakes and failures would be a given so I took on the responsibility of finding them myself.<br />
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The first step was to skirt the fleece which means to clean all the detritus from the wool. Not having a skirting table, I opted for the foot stool of my porch chair and began picking away. I used to make fun of those little slinkies and canvas coats the show people used to keep their animals clean. No more. Picking shit, grass and seeds out of raw wool is a tedious task that never seems to be completed. Each pass regurgitates more bits when you swore that section was clean. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17061.Coraline" target="_blank">Neil Gaiman read Coraline</a> in its entirety while I picked both fleeces. <br />
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Next step: to wash the wool. Here is where the plus side of having many extra water tubs came in handy. The bonus: the tubs got scrubbed clean. I went for the method that I found the easiest--setting the water baths of Dawn Dish Soap out in the hot sun for a few days. I rinsed by setting up an equal tank of clean water next to the bath water so the temperature would be the same when the fleeces were transfered to the rinse water as several sites said that if the water temperatures were different I would end up with a giant ball of felt. The fleeces were washed and rinsed over a period of a week and set out to dry in bulb crates on the front porch. Hopefully, the cats would not be assholes and pee in them.<br />
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Sharing my new adventures on social media has been for the win. My fiber-loving friends squeed in excitement at my endeavors. "How are you going to card your wool?" asked one friend. When I admitted to have yet obtained the hand carders I was planning to use she graciously offered me the use of her <a href="http://brotherdrumcarder.com/" target="_blank">drum carder</a>. Once again my ignorance showed as I offered to bring my wool over to her house to card one afternoon. "You can take it home with you. I won't need it until the end of August," was her reply. It's a gorgeous piece of equipment and once I got it home I understood her offer to lend it to me. Carding is a time-consuming process. In an effort to gauge how much time I invested in this step, I began listening to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2666" target="_blank">Roberto Bolano's epic novel 2666</a> as an audio book as I worked turning the raw washed wool into roving, which is what you call wool that has been combed so all the fibers go in the same direction. The novel is 38 hours long. The wool from the two sheep was completed at hour 36.<br />
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When I took my roving, to <a href="http://bethesda.centralfarmmarkets.com/" target="_blank">market</a> with me the following Sunday to show <a href="http://www.kiparoofarm.com/" target="_blank">Annie, the yarn vendor</a>, she asked if the drum carder had a motor. "That's ok, you've only got a few fleeces to do, but a motorized one makes it soooo much easier." Her next question was how I was going to spin the roving into yarn. "I have a pair of drop spindles," I told her. Without missing so much as a heartbeat she offered to lend me one of her unused wheels. SCORE!<br />
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A few weeks later I drove down to her farm studio to pick up the wheel. Stepping into her old farm house with several rooms of yarn, fiber, knitted pieces, hand-made soaps, patterns and assorted equipment all displayed in antique farm items like nest boxes and Hoosiers, I could feel myself being sucked into a vortex similar to my mother's quilting where one could never have enough fabric or gadgets. There was a felted cape dripping ringlets of raw pearlescent <a href="http://www.thespinningloft.com/sheep-o-pedia/border-leicester/" target="_blank">Border Leicester</a> wool that sent me to eBay to purchase felting tools as soon as I got home. I was in absolute awe of the scope of Annie's talent. And then she opened to door to her work room.... There were multiple gadgets that spun like contraptions straight out of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.<br />
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There was the dying shed with pots full of dark liquid awaiting the boxes of white and gray skeins stacked everywhere. "I should be dying all this week, but this weather!" exclaimed Annie who said that she had to hang freshly dyed yarn throughout her house to get it to dry. Into another shed we went, full of feed bags stacked neatly at attention with the tops open like gaping baby birds. "This is all my wool I have yet to send to the mill," she said. There must have been a hundred bags.<br />
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We went to yet another barn--the Bull Barn--that had a pipe cage as if to contain Lucifer himself. Given that a few weeks ago my USDA processor slaughtered a Black Angus bull about the size of a VW van, the cinder block barn seemed appropriate. There in the corner past all the holiday displays in storage were a pair of spinning wheels. The first she grabbed was the quintessential spinning wheel complete with fancy lathed pieces supporting a wheel with more lathed spokes. "Oh no, I don't think this one is all here," she said as she reached for another wheel, much different than anything I had ever seen. It had a solid wheel set between what I could only describe as a cross between Old Adobe Mission and the Danica House furniture store in Santa Barbara. "This one is all here," she said handing the the flyer and bobbin (two new words from the fiber lexicon) my way.<br />
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We made our way back to her front porch where she sat up her own wheel after putting together the what I found out was a <a href="http://www.clemes.com/spinningwheels.html" target="_blank">Clemes & Clemes Modern</a> made in Pinole, California just north of San Fransisco. They've been making wheels since 1970 and this one was probably one of their first. Next, I was schooled on the components, how it fits together, is adjusted and works overall. Similar to my mentality of carding, I thought it would be something I just sat down and did. How humbled I soon became. "Just practice treadling," Annie advised, "It takes some practice to get the rhythm." I just wanted to make the wheel go in the same direction without vacillating in the other. "When you get the wheel cleaned up and oiled, it will work smoother." So she sent me on my way with a wheel, practice roving, a skein of purple Star Night, a set of needles for knitting in the round and a pattern for a Mighty Manly Hat, basically a stocking hat with ribbing--very basic which was something I could handle.<br />
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When I arrived home I began to clean the wheel. There were places where the veneer was peeling off which could not be sanded down so I removed the wheel to strip off the veneer and sand the underlying wood which was quite beautiful. From there it was a slippery slope and soon the entire machine had been broken down into its most basic parts. New leather was needed for the piece that attached the treadle to the pitman. (<a href="http://www.clemes.com/modern%20wheel%20assembly%20instructions.pdf" target="_blank">I only know the names of the parts thanks to the online manual and schematic</a>) I could sacrifice an unused pair of reins for that. Wood cleaner, sandpaper, steel wool, 3 in 1 oil, and lots of elbow grease. Half of the pieces are cleaned, the rusty parts in a bag for my next trip to the hardware store for brass replacements. That's where I am at this point.<br />
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What I have learned from several of my friends who sell on a commercial level is they utilize small, professional mills which have sprung up in the wake of small flock fiber production over the last twenty years. When I first texted a picture of a soaking fleece to one of my fellow livestock gal pals, she responded with "Send it to a mill! I don't do any of that shit anymore." I know she shears all of her own animals--sheep, goats, alpaca, llama--and she dyes and knits, but it is the tedious hand labor of skirting, washing, carding and spinning she outsources. I look at it like livestock for meat. It's great to birth, raise, slaughter, butcher and cook my own animals, but after a while even I get to a point where I offload some of the work on to someone equally if not better equipped to do the job. But the first time, I have to be able to say I've personally completed each and every step it takes to get from sheep to socks.<br />
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So here I go......Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7474320504282291685.post-86754648869114834022014-01-28T09:41:00.001-08:002014-01-28T09:41:44.529-08:00Frozen Farmer, Frozen Food<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-wxTRUjRskXk/UufGWe34VEI/AAAAAAAAEPE/b73Rnjw5KJ0/s1600/IMG_7093%5B1%5D.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-wxTRUjRskXk/UufGWe34VEI/AAAAAAAAEPE/b73Rnjw5KJ0/s1600/IMG_7093%5B1%5D.png" height="320" width="213" /></a>It's official--the redneck refrigerator (i.e. front porch) has now turned into a redneck deep freeze. I figured this out last night when I went to gather a bucket of blemished fruit brought back from Sunday's market only to find a box of fruit-shaped rocks. The apples and pears were hard as baseballs. I took the box into my kitchen to thaw out. The pigs would just have to wait until morning. <br />
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I haven't posted in a few months because, well....there's no pasture right now, but that doesn't mean that there aren't farmers out there filling your plates. This time of year is when those of us who attend winter markets go into overdrive on customer education.<br />
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<i><b>"How come you don't have any fresh chicken?"</b></i> one customer asked, turning her nose up at a frozen bird.<br />
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The answer is meat birds simply do not grow in winter temperatures. They are bred to have minimal feather for plucking and there is no green pasture or bugs & grubs to support the rich diet they need. If I were to raise meat birds in this weather, they would need to go inside and eat twice as much. Plus, processing birds takes water...lots of water and to be quite honest, I do not want to be outside in three degree weather with wet hands. It just doesn't work that way.<br />
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<i><b>"The yolks of the eggs aren't as orange as they used to be." </b></i><br />
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Again, access to green pastures makes all the difference in an egg. While farmers can continue to feed organic, non-GMO grains, supplement with alfalfa hay and artificially add a few hours of light to the hen house to maintain egg production through the winter months as the birds require 16 hours of light in order to continue laying, getting those brilliant yolks just isn't going to happen again until spring.<br />
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<i><b>"Wow! I bet you're cold standing out here for four hours." </b></i><br />
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Yes, but customers also have to realize that if when we aren't at our winter markets, we're back at the farm continuing with the chores associated with raising the food we're continuing to bring to market each week. Most vendors have stock-piled their goods in cold storage, but they still need to be sorted, packed and brought to market<i><b>. </b></i>Those with greenhouses must still contend with Mother Nature by either adding layers of row covers over the greens for more insulation or using some sort of heating method. Meat producers must care daily for their livestock. Everything must be tended. <br />
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After these last few weeks at the outdoor weekly market I attend on Sunday, I can honestly say how much I appreciate my customers who not only show up and purchase food, but go out of their way to offer a little respite from the weather with a cup of hot coffee or cocoa. One even brought a pair of disposable mini pocket hand-warmers. A warm farmer is a happy farmer and will continue to feed you. <br />
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<i><b>So what's it like to farm during a Polar Vortex season?</b></i><br />
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Pretty f&%#ing miserable, especially for those farmers whose lives seem to be one big emergency after another. But for those who understand that there is no such thing as bad weather, only being poorly prepared, the worst we're going to get is cold feet, numb fingers and little grumpy. <br />
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When new & beginning farmers show up here at the farm wanting to pick my brain about their new endeavors, the issue I want to pound into their heads is WATER, WATER, WATER!!!<br />
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Dealing with water most of the year isn't problem, but when the temperatures drop to sub-freezing single and negative digits for days on end, water becomes a serious issue that can be detrimental to not just the health of the animal, but to the farmers as well.<br />
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Dehydrated animals are stressed animals weakening their immune systems and making them more susceptible to illness. Two of the smartest things I did here at the farm was to insist on installing the absolute best outdoor non-freezing stand-pipe hydrant at a depth deeper than normally required in order to ensure that even in the most brutal winter temperatures, it would not freeze. At the same time the ditch was open for the installation of the water pipes, I invested in having electric cables installed with outdoor outlets within a few feet of the water source. Now, I know that most people think that water an electricity don't mix, but on a livestock farm that experiences freezing temperatures, it's the only way to go.<br />
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Why?<br />
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Because it's much easier to drop a stock tank heater in the water, plug it in and keep the tank filled than it is to be swinging a 15-pound sledge breaking up solid ten-inch blocks of ice, lugging five-gallon buckets as the water sloshes out to soak your insulated coveralls freezing them to your legs and having your gloves freeze to the hoses as you try to drain them before the water freezes inside of them effectively rendering them useless until the weather warms up or you lug them inside to soak them in your bathtub in order to thaw them out so you can use them.<br />
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If you don't need a big stock tank full of water for larger animals or flocks, Tractor Supply and just about every other farm supply store worth their salt sells heated buckets. Word to the wise...don't walk into these stores when the temperatures dip below zero and think you're going to waltz out with one or any other device used to prevent livestock water from freezing. <br />
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The next critical piece of the puzzle for farming in frigid temperatures is feeding and bedding properly. Sub-zero nights mean that its time to invest in extra bedding. While those nice big bales of wood shavings are easy to handle and smell nice, they don't do squat for keeping animals warm. The best choice is clean, dry straw.<br />
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I am amazed at how many people don't understand the difference between hay and straw. Straw is just what it sounds like...you know, the hollow tubes you get with a drink? Well, straw for bedding is made from the dried stalks of harvested grains, such as oats, rye, wheat, barley and even rice. Animals may nibble at it, find errant heads of grain, but for the most part they will not eat it unless they are extremely hungry, meaning they haven't been given enough hay.<br />
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-u1UcMp8rTl4/UufGjpcLSlI/AAAAAAAAEPM/TFSX9OmZErA/s1600/IMG_7092%5B1%5D.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-u1UcMp8rTl4/UufGjpcLSlI/AAAAAAAAEPM/TFSX9OmZErA/s1600/IMG_7092%5B1%5D.jpg" height="239" width="320" /></a>Hay is harvested pasture. It is what is fed to the animals during the winter. There are three distinct types of hay--grass, herbaceous plants and legumes. Different types of hay provide different types of energy. For example, alfalfa is high in protein and calcium. It is a very dense, high-energy fodder (farmerspeak for harvested and stored forage) as compared to grass hays, such as timothy, brome and orchard grass. <br />
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Nothing frustrates me more than to see farmers who know darn well that inclement weather is on the way waiting until the last minute and then guilt-tripping their hay dealer into an emergency delivery. Similarly, hay auctions are a popular way for farmers in this area to obtain fodder, however, in single-digit temperatures, many hay farmers will take their sub-standard hay to auction knowing darn well that those who show up are most likely desperate and will pay any price for something to feed their animals which are now eating twice as much just to stay warm. <br />
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It also helps to understand the basic biology of livestock during an Arctic blast in order to keep them healthy. While it may be tempting to bump up an animal's energy with grain, the truth is ruminants, such as cows, goats and sheep will stay much warmer and well-conditioned by being fed a quality hay. Think of their stomachs as big fermentation vats. I've watched as grass-based farmers have succumbed to the ignorance to thinking adding a little grain to their grass-fed beeves' diet won't hurt, but the sad truth is that grain changes the pH in the animals gut decreasing functionality of the rumen and ultimately setting the animal back in production and overall health.<br />
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-RajxmomkAPo/UufGxA-OncI/AAAAAAAAEPU/2AGRgv0uAp8/s1600/IMG_7090%5B1%5D.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-RajxmomkAPo/UufGxA-OncI/AAAAAAAAEPU/2AGRgv0uAp8/s1600/IMG_7090%5B1%5D.jpg" height="239" width="320" /></a>On the other hand, horses, poultry and swine will benefit from the added calories of extra grains and sugars during extreme temperatures. In order to ensure that these species are getting enough moisture even when they have access to fresh unfrozen water, I like to soak their feed in warm water. This morning, the piggies got an added bonus as I turned their grains into a porridge with the whey off a batch of ricotta I had made earlier. I also feed them several pounds of damaged fruit given to me by a local orchard each week after market. <br />
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While the veal calves continue to feast upon their daily rations of warmed milk, it bears saying that it only takes one time of not bringing the empty 'mommy bucket' in from the cold and finding the teats frozen solid from milk from the last feeding to not do that again. They will violently beat the bucket against the fence sloshing the milk out all over themselves (and the farmer) making the most gawd-awful bellowing because they are hungry. <br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-a-texjw9-qQ/UufHsF4UoEI/AAAAAAAAEP0/J72F8KHLN70/s1600/IMG_6976%5B1%5D.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-a-texjw9-qQ/UufHsF4UoEI/AAAAAAAAEP0/J72F8KHLN70/s1600/IMG_6976%5B1%5D.jpg" height="239" width="320" /></a>All livestock aside, one of the most important things a farmer can do in this weather is be properly dressed. Wool is your best friend along with Polarfleece, Thinsulate, silk and cotton. Learn to layer for the cold. Invest in good gear. Years ago I had a fellow farmer make an offhanded remark about my "expensive taste" for winter clothing as I was well-outfitted in Patagonia products. Yes, their stuff may be expensive, but the winter coat, fleece vests, pullovers, turtlenecks and headgear I have owned for over <i>twenty years</i>. Do the math! I also had to disclose that I used to live in Ventura County, home to the Great Pacific Ironworks and corporate headquarters of Patagonia where I was always near the front of the line for their annual parking lot clearance sales. Only this year has my classic Sychilla Shelled jacket begun to show its age, but with some mending I'm sure it will continue to serve me for several more years before being retired.<br />
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Similarly, all wool is not created equal. That hundred dollar cashmere sweater from LL Bean will last ten years or more and be worth every penny compared to a ten dollar wool blend clearance rack special. Can't afford to shell out for new gear? There's plenty for sale on eBay for a fraction of the cost. A few key items will last for years as they are only used during the coldest of days. <br />
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But the tell-tale sign that it is <i>really</i> cold outside is when Megs the Merciless gives up on nabbing mice in the barn for the comfort of flannel sheets, the down comforter and Mom's hand-stitched quilt.<br />
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<!-- Blogger automated replacement: "https://images-blogger-opensocial.googleusercontent.com/gadgets/proxy?url=http%3A%2F%2F1.bp.blogspot.com%2F-wxTRUjRskXk%2FUufGWe34VEI%2FAAAAAAAAEPE%2Fb73Rnjw5KJ0%2Fs1600%2FIMG_7093%255B1%255D.png&container=blogger&gadget=a&rewriteMime=image%2F*" with "https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-wxTRUjRskXk/UufGWe34VEI/AAAAAAAAEPE/b73Rnjw5KJ0/s1600/IMG_7093%5B1%5D.png" -->Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7474320504282291685.post-78901464731295694782013-11-27T17:37:00.003-08:002015-11-21T05:51:40.447-08:00The Secret To Groovy Gravy At Thanksgiving<div style="text-align: right;">
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Pasture to plate, farm to table, nose to tail, and let's not forget my favorite--heads & feet--when it comes to <br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-uxX5pvylN5k/UqUyq1srFII/AAAAAAAAEFo/rpE6Qvx27TM/s1600/turkeystock.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-uxX5pvylN5k/UqUyq1srFII/AAAAAAAAEFo/rpE6Qvx27TM/s320/turkeystock.jpg" width="183" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b><i>How does your turkey stock stand up?</i></b></td></tr>
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poultry, it's time once again to take a good, hard look at not only how we vote with our food dollars, but how we reduce waste by extracting as much nutrients as possible from the animals that have given their lives to sustain us. Today, more people are making the switch from inhumanely, industrial-raised, antibiotic and chemical laden to locally, pasture-raised with non-GMO birds that have not been mutilated, trucked hundreds (if not thousands) of miles and have met with the most gruesome of end only be to dunked in toilet bowl cleaner, embalming fluid and acid to reduce the super bugs harbored in their inflamed digestive and respiratory tracts.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-IPNYeuEDI9k/UpaU4-TgGeI/AAAAAAAAEE0/iTur45Ym5zY/s1600/IMG_6738.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-IPNYeuEDI9k/UpaU4-TgGeI/AAAAAAAAEE0/iTur45Ym5zY/s320/IMG_6738.jpg" width="239" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b><i>Rich stock from heads & feet makes the BEST gravy</i></b></td></tr>
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Almost twenty years ago, I began raising heritage turkeys in the foothills of the Ojai Valley where they feasted on stone fruits, citrus and avocados that fell from the trees in the orchard I lived. I only raised about two dozen, enough for myself, neighbors, friends and co-workers. Bourbon Reds were my favorites, but no matter what I did they never developed the larger breasts that everyone associated with their holiday meal. But they were tasty!<br />
<br />
Butchering day was always balmy, usually in the high 60's, low 70's. We'd set out two pots of scalding water on the Camp Chef Cooker so that when one got foul and cool a fresh one was ready. A bottle (or two) of great wine, good music and my helper was always sent home with the bird of their choice for their own holiday meal.<br />
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"What you do wit da feet?" my Thai co-worker asked when I put up the sign for turkey delivery at the software company where I was working at the time.<br />
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"Dog treats," I responded.<br />
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"No, no, no...I want them, all of them," she responded in earnest. And so when delivery day arrived, so did a bag of forty severed bird legs.<br />
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On the following Monday I returned to the office to find a fifty dollar bill on my desk with a note of thanks. While that had been the average price for a whole bird, I was a bit taken back by the amount for....well, what I had considered the scraps.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-8K_FKYFT1iI/UpaUmBkBhwI/AAAAAAAAEEg/NesOQaMaLRc/s1600/IMG_6735.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="239" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-8K_FKYFT1iI/UpaUmBkBhwI/AAAAAAAAEEg/NesOQaMaLRc/s320/IMG_6735.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i><b>All clean & ready to simmer.</b></i></td></tr>
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Upon trying to return the money to my co-worker, she insisted while tearing up. "That was the best time my family had since leaving Thailand. We hid them into movies and ate. Just like home. Feet and heads, best parts."<br />
<br />
"Heads?" I questioned. <br />
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"Oh yeah, make best soup, very good!" she responded excitedly. Seeing as her husband owned one of the best Thai restaurants in town, I could hardly disagree. <br />
<br />
As the years rolled by and I purchased a farm and raised more turkeys, my curiosity got the better of me. At first, I started making stock from the feet. The first time I did it I realized that I failed to properly clean the feet as I shared pictures with my Thai friend.<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-AiIot6-vMz8/UpaT8WmTeLI/AAAAAAAAEDg/ct9OJtrCT1Y/s1600/IMG_6726.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="239" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-AiIot6-vMz8/UpaT8WmTeLI/AAAAAAAAEDg/ct9OJtrCT1Y/s320/IMG_6726.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b><i>Just like taking off a glove. </i></b></td></tr>
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"Why you no clean feet first? You put them in pot dirty," she admonished me, "You peel dem first, take off toenails." I felt like a fool, but lesson learned. <br />
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And so as the years went by, I began to clean the feet and include them along with the rest of the giblets. If customers didn't want them, they could simply toss them out or feed them to their dog. But for some reason, the mention of heads just stuck in my mind.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-HllecKAJj7g/UpaT-KR9KLI/AAAAAAAAEDo/BYto9_eF_lw/s1600/IMG_6727.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-HllecKAJj7g/UpaT-KR9KLI/AAAAAAAAEDo/BYto9_eF_lw/s320/IMG_6727.jpg" width="239" /></a>Fast forward a few years to the advent of the Paleo/Primal movement and the maturing of the sustainability movement. The more I learned about the nutritional benefits of the parts that normally get tossed out, the more I began to experiment. Bone broth became standard fare in my home not just for its culinary attributes but as a health elixir.<br />
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As I became more deeply in tune with the animals I was raising, the mindfulness that they were giving up their lives, the choice to limit what I wasted, I toyed with the idea of those heads again and asked my processor to save the heads along with my hearts, livers, gizzards, necks and feet. They came back in a bag, but were fed to the dogs as treats instead. I felt like a failure.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-coAJUtkJk_k/UpaUBv8ph7I/AAAAAAAAEDw/fSv6TDK4b1Q/s1600/IMG_6725.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="239" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-coAJUtkJk_k/UpaUBv8ph7I/AAAAAAAAEDw/fSv6TDK4b1Q/s320/IMG_6725.jpg" width="320" /></a>But when I started using a new processor this season for my poultry, he asked if I wanted to keep the heads as well as the feet. I said, "yes" and then I began cooking them down for stock in my crock pot. <br />
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Wow. Wow...effing, wow! It was one thing to eat the feet, but the combs, the wattles, the snoods! What incredible stock I made throughout the season and here I was at Thanksgiving wanting to simmer down those big, fat heads along with the feet this year, but there was only one problem....I didn't raise any turkeys.<br />
<br />
Yep....I'd opted for raising a dozen batches of broilers this year instead of my little T. rexes as I like to call them. There's only so much Hoop Coop space and pasture to go around. Either I could do broilers or I could do turkeys, but I couldn't do both.<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-FzCuMJk2d2I/UpaUS02PI8I/AAAAAAAAEEA/mKByTW_pM4c/s1600/IMG_6729.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="239" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-FzCuMJk2d2I/UpaUS02PI8I/AAAAAAAAEEA/mKByTW_pM4c/s320/IMG_6729.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i><b>Popping off the outer nail. </b></i></td></tr>
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Given that the local Amish and Mennonites have gotten into the turkey act, I figured I'd let their numerous brood take care of the labor instead of me. Plus, at all my metropolitan markets there were plenty of people raising turkeys to the point I didn't feel as if I'd be letting down any of my customers. Instead, they got a steady stream of fresh broilers throughout the market season. Worked for me.<br />
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Although I had procured my bird from a fellow farmer, I'd failed to asked for the feet and heads so I contacted my processor whom I knew was dispatching my organic feed dealer's holiday birds. Yes, they did not want their feet and heads. Yes, I could have them. Score! <br />
<br />
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-2ZrhxZ-V7yk/UpaUQH3ojmI/AAAAAAAAED4/EKo0x6SOE0w/s1600/IMG_6728.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-2ZrhxZ-V7yk/UpaUQH3ojmI/AAAAAAAAED4/EKo0x6SOE0w/s320/IMG_6728.jpg" width="239" /></a>But when I picked up my goodies, I realized that neither the heads nor feet had been prepared for simmering. This is one thing that many producers fail to inform their customers about...how to ready heads & feat for making the BEST stock they will ever have. <br />
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Heads....while they may be devoid of feathers, one must still give them a good scrubbing to remove all the external dermis. Additionally, the outer beak and chitinous membrane in the nostrils is also easily removed after scalding.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-nBAR_j5pSI0/UpaUjFnnvYI/AAAAAAAAEEU/UwCY_WsaX4k/s1600/IMG_6732.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-nBAR_j5pSI0/UpaUjFnnvYI/AAAAAAAAEEU/UwCY_WsaX4k/s320/IMG_6732.jpg" width="239" /></a>Feet.....turkeys are, indeed, little T. rexes. Their feet are scaled just like reptiles. Prior to cooking, one must remove the outer scales and the toe nails. It's practically like taking off a glove. If the toe nails don't come off as easy as you would like, simply use a regular ol' dinner knife to pop them off from the nail bed which will yield the most awesome gelatin for your stock. Sound gross? Wait until you make the gravy and don't need any flour to thicken it to a silky consistency.<br />
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I know this may be too much for the everyday consumer, but for those of you who are really concerned about sustainability, animal welfare and most importantly, your own health, when you purchase a turkey (or chickens) from your favorite local farmer, next time make sure to ask for the heads & feet!<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b><i>The scales from cleaned feet. </i></b></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b><i>The bones from a batch of broth. </i></b></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-X3c2bHe2QcY/UpaU3iPZz4I/AAAAAAAAEEo/r-q0UtnG9QI/s1600/IMG_6741.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="239" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-X3c2bHe2QcY/UpaU3iPZz4I/AAAAAAAAEEo/r-q0UtnG9QI/s320/IMG_6741.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b><i>Filtering the broth. </i></b></td></tr>
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<i>For all the people who have called or asked me how to make the best Thanksgiving gravy ever, here is my recipe. I like to make a double batch (ie. a full quart) so there are enough leftovers for my favorite post-Thankgiving leftover delight of Waffles & Gravy. </i><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><b>Sandra's Groovy Gravy Recipe</b></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">2 cups Turkey Broth</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">1/4 cup pan scrapings (optional, if you want a smoother gravy) </span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">1/2 cup of either white wine or cider (pear cider makes an out-of-the-ballpark gravy)</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">1 tablespoon arrowroot powder</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">Salt & Pepper</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;">In a sauce pan, bring the broth and scrapings to a simmer. Thoroughly mix the arrowroot powder with the wine/cider and then whisk into the simmering broth. Stir until gravy reaches desired consistency. Season to taste.</span>Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7474320504282291685.post-27992228931120125312013-11-19T09:05:00.001-08:002013-11-19T09:05:08.911-08:00Veal Chop with Pears & Brussel Sprouts<div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-UqfGcYg9YNw/UouVaoH_8-I/AAAAAAAAEDM/XouRrvB5xlQ/s1600/veal%2526brusselsprouts.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="223" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-UqfGcYg9YNw/UouVaoH_8-I/AAAAAAAAEDM/XouRrvB5xlQ/s320/veal%2526brusselsprouts.JPG" width="320" /></a>My favorite time of year at farmers market is when the fresh brussel sprouts begin to arrive. Sometimes they're still attached to the stalk with that wonderful cabbage-like tuft on top {TIP: don't toss it out, it's delicious and some farmers even harvest them to sell separately} or already cut off and sold by the pint or quart ready to be tossed into a pan. Really want to have fun with them? Add them to a batch of fermenting veggies. Additionally, fall also brings about the harvest of the veal calves and the arrival of pears, apples, quinces and freshly-pressed ciders. </div>
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This dish is my go-to meal throughout the fall months when I need something quick and easy. <span class="textstyle1">For anyone who laments, "It's just me," that's no excuse not to eat healthy and locally produced foods from your farmers market. This meal took about five minutes to prepare and ten minutes to cook and costs about the same that one would pay for a half-decent sandwich at a deli. </span></div>
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<span class="textstyle1"><b>Veal Chop with Pear & Brussel Sprouts</b><br />
</span><span class="textstyle4"><i> </i></span></div>
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<span class="textstyle4"><i>Ingredients: </i><br />
</span><span class="textstyle5">1 Painted Hand Farm Veal Chop (rib or loin)<br />
1 tablespoons butter<br />
1 small shallot, minced<br />
1 fresh pear, peeled & cubed</span></div>
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<span class="textstyle5">1 cup fresh brussel sprouts, cut in half<br />
2 tablespoons fresh cider<br />
Salt & Pepper<br />
</span><span class="textstyle4"> </span></div>
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<span class="textstyle4"><i>Instructions:</i><br />
</span><span class="textstyle5">In a skillet, brown one side of seasoned chop using half of the of butter (about five minutes). Turn chop and add shallot brussel sprouts and pear with remaining butter. Saute three minutes, add cider, cover pan and simmer for 3-5 more minutes.
For variations, try using leeks instead of shallots, apple instead of pear and Calvados or
white wine instead of apple cider. Cranberries & orange juice are
also a delicious combination to dress up your chops. </span></div>
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<span class="textstyle5">Enjoy! </span></div>
<br />Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7474320504282291685.post-2963985373168161642013-11-15T06:41:00.002-08:002013-11-15T06:41:28.245-08:00A Delicious & Easy Fall Dinner<div style="font-family: Calibri,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;">
This is one of my favorite fall meals because it is quick, easy and all the ingredients are readily available this time of year at the farmers market. Most of all, I enjoy experimenting with all the different types of wonder artisan and farmstead cheeses and charcuterie. Or try switching out the spinach for something a little tangier like fall mustard greens. Or give your squash an Asian flair with toasted sesame oil and ginger. Any way you choose, humanely-raised rose veal cutlets make a quick and delicious meal.</div>
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-SyCiltK1Ty8/UoYxJt9QHII/AAAAAAAAEC4/B-Yd8-0OHME/s1600/veal_scallopini_pumpkin.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-SyCiltK1Ty8/UoYxJt9QHII/AAAAAAAAEC4/B-Yd8-0OHME/s320/veal_scallopini_pumpkin.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Stuffed Veal Cutlets with Roasted Winter Squash</b> </span></div>
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Prep time - 30 minutes </div>
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Serves: <span>2</span></div>
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<br /><strong>Ingredients</strong></div>
<ul>
<li>2 veal <span>cutlets</span></li>
<li>1 small winter squash, such as butternut or acorn, peeled, cut into 1.5 inches thick pieces </li>
<li>salt and freshly ground black pepper</li>
<li>1 tablespoon fresh rosemary</li>
<li>1 teaspoon maple syrup or honey </li>
<li>2 slices cured ham</li>
<li>8 spinach leaves, trimmed, washed, dried</li>
<li>2 ounces artisan cheese, sliced</li>
<li>2 tablespoons olive oil</li>
</ul>
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<div style="font-family: Calibri,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;">
<strong>Instructions</strong></div>
<ol>
<li style="font-family: Calibri,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;">Preheat oven to 400 °F.</li>
<li style="font-family: Calibri,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;">Toss squash with one tablespoon olive oil, salt, pepper, maple syrup and rosemary.</li>
<li style="font-family: Calibri,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;">Line a baking tray with non-stick baking paper.</li>
<li style="font-family: Calibri,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;">Arrange the squash on prepared tray. Bake on top shelf of preheated oven for 20 minutes or until golden brown and tender.</li>
<li style="font-family: Calibri,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;">Meanwhile, place a piece of veal on a clean work surface.</li>
<li style="font-family: Calibri,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;">Top with a slice of cured ham, four spinach leaves and a slice of cheese.</li>
<li style="font-family: Calibri,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;">Fold over to enclose filling and secure with a toothpick. Repeat with the remaining veal, ham, spinach and cheese.</li>
<li style="font-family: Calibri,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;">Heat the oil in a large non-stick frying pan over medium high heat.</li>
<li style="font-family: Calibri,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;">Add veal and cook for 2-3 minutes each side or until brown. Transfer to a baking tray and cover with foil.</li>
<li style="font-family: Calibri,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;">Bake in oven for a further 5 minutes or until hot. Remove from oven.</li>
<li><span style="font-family: Calibri,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;">Place veal on serving plates and serve with winter squash</span>.</li>
</ol>
Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7474320504282291685.post-35230745644165837242013-11-06T10:54:00.001-08:002013-11-12T12:13:57.657-08:00PART FIVE: VEAL--Getting It On The Plates<b><i>This is the fifth and final installment of a five-part of posts regarding veal production
for small-scale farms and why educated eaters dedicated to local foods
and sustainable agriculture should be eating veal as well as beef.</i></b><br />
<br />
<b>SALES & MARKETING</b>
<br />
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-_twU78qevn0/UnqOsSHDXHI/AAAAAAAAEB4/H_wD7uQs4I8/s1600/4152010a.JPG" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="115" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-_twU78qevn0/UnqOsSHDXHI/AAAAAAAAEB4/H_wD7uQs4I8/s200/4152010a.JPG" width="200" /></a><br />
The two questions I most often encounter are<br />
<ol>
<li>How do you figure out how to price the veal?</li>
<li>How and who do you market to?</li>
</ol>
Let's address question #1 first.<br />
<br />
<i><b>Determining Price</b></i><br />
One of the best workshops I ever attended at the <a href="https://www.pasafarming.org/" target="_blank">Pennsylvania Association for Sustainable Agriculture's</a> annual <a href="https://www.pasafarming.org/events/conference" target="_blank">Farming for the Future conference</a> was given by Mike and Chick Debach, owners and operators of <a href="http://www.leonameatplant.com/" target="_blank">Leona Meat Plant</a>. <i><b> </b></i> In their presentation, they broke down the numbers associated with processing animals adding into the formulas those things I had previously never considered such as shrink (the amount of moisture a carcass loses when it hangs), cut-out (fat, connective tissue, bones) and transportation. Previously, I only worked with the cost of production, live weights and hanging (hot) weights. And then there was the <i><b>BIG</b></i> expense I also overlooked, especially as I entered the world of farmers markets---marketing.<br />
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<br />
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The first step is to know the production cost of the live
animal and the live weight. This will give you the cost per pound to produce. For example:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
</div>
<br />
<ol><ol>
<li>Purchased Calf $50</li>
<li>Milk replacer $150</li>
<li>Feed $25 </li>
</ol>
</ol>
If the calf is raised to 300 pounds, the formula to determine the production cost would be:<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>Total Production Cost divided by Live Weight</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>(50+150+25)/300 = $0.75 per pound Live Weight</b></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
The
next step is to determine the percentage of live versus hanging weight. Over the years, I have found that calves in the 300-pound range typically have a 50-55% range depending on their body condition. You must also consider that there can as much as 15 pounds of matter in
the digestive tract if the animal has been fed within 12 hours prior to slaughter. For this example, we'll assign a value of 160 pounds for a Hanging Weight. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<b>Hanging Weight divided by the Live Weight X 100</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<b>165/300 = 55% yield</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
</div>
To determine the cost per pound for the Hanging Weight:<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>Total Production Cost divided by Hanging Weight = Cost per pound Hanging Weight</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>(50+150+25)/165 = $1.36 Hanging Weight</b></div>
<br />
Most folks who typically sell by the carcass stop at these numbers and then just add the butchering costs on to the bill, but if you are going to market individually wrapped cuts via farmers markets, CSA or buyers club, it's well worth continuing with the math to get a better idea of total production costs.<br />
<br />
I have patronized abattoirs who charge a flat fee for calves up to 300 pounds and ones who have a set kill fee with a cost per pound for cut, package and labeling. Similarly, I've had processors who provided a custom label for me once I had paid the set-up fee (around $100) and ones who have required me to procure my own labels (around $300 per 10,000)<br />
<br />
For this example, I am going to assign a set processing fee of $110 per calf with labeling included which is typical to what I currently pay for processing. One of the significant processing costs that tends to be overlooked is transportation. If you are traveling a significant number of miles to and from the processor (remember, you make TWO round trips--one to drop off the animals and one to pick up the finished product), it helps to include the transportation cost <i>per animal</i> in this part of the equation. I know that delivering live animals costs approximately $25 in fuel and to pick up finished product, $15. If I take three calves at a time, my transportation costs per calf are approximately $13. That would bring the Processing Costs to $123 per calf. <br />
<br />
To acquire the cost of processing:<b> </b><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>Hanging Weight divided by Processing Costs</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>165/123 = $1.34 per pound for processing</b></div>
<br />
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">Now you have a better understanding of the true cost per pound of finished product. </span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>Cost per pound Hanging Weight plus Cost per pound Processing</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>$1.36 + $1.34 = $2.70 per pound </b></div>
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>
<br />
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But wait, we can't stop there, especially if you are going to go to farmers markets. This number is a lot trickier to come by unless you've got a season of markets under your belt and have an idea of your total sales versus your total market costs which include market application fees, vendor fees, liability insurance (this is different than your farm or homeowners and required by most markets), transportation, health department licensing fees for each jurisdiction in which you sell that requires them, etc. In my experience over the years, I've found these costs will add as much as 35% on to the cost of getting a product in the hands of a customer. That means</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<b>$2.70 * .35 = 0.95 </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<b> $3.65 per pound wholesale cost per pound</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
That might still sound inexpensive at this point, but we've not yet factored in the most important part of the equation....<b>PROFIT</b>. Yes, farmers have to profit or we'd all be out of business and everyone would starve (or eat very poorly). Just as in typical retail, mark-up is 100% bringing the minimum cost per pound of product to <b>$7.29 per pound average for the entire carcass. </b></div>
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While some cuts are more expensive than others, the first few times (and occasionally as time goes by) I inventory every single salable piece from a calf and determine what the average cost per pound for that specific animal amounts to. If I'm not hitting my numbers, it's time to examine my prices on all cuts. </div>
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<b> </b></div>
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While there is an art to determining how to cut a carcass, there is also one for pricing products. After determining you average cost per pound, now it's time to bring individual cuts into alignment with the open market. Premium cuts, such as tenderloin, scallopine, cutlets, loin & rib chops as well as specialty items like ossobuco, are going to command a premium price while stew meat and ground are going to be at the lower end. </div>
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<br /></div>
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I highly suggest also doing local reconnaissance by visiting other markets--bother farmers markets and retail locations--to gauge prices. The two biggest mistakes you risk by pricing your products too low are:</div>
<ol>
<li>Losing profits from not charging what the current market may bear. </li>
<li>Pissing off fellow vendors who are more experienced and knowledgeable by undercutting them. </li>
</ol>
Although many have been led to believe that prices direct from the farmer should be less expensive than at a supermarket or retail store, keep in mind that a product such as humanely-raised veal, rose veal, meadow veal or naturally raised milk-fed veal (whatever you're going to brand your product to describe your farming practices) <i>is a premium product</i>. It is NOT the commercial, pasty pale cardboard that passes for veal.<br />
<br />
The notion that your product should be <i>cheaper</i> than what's in the grocery store is entirely incorrect. I had my eyes opened to what the market price would bear when I went to the upscale grocery store less than a mile from one of my metropolitan markets and found scallopine priced <i>twice</i> as much as mine. Judging from the size of their rib chops, the marbling and the color of the meat, I could tell the calves had been crated or chained, fed predominantly grain, had no access to grass, were anemic and probably weighed close to 500 pounds when they were harvested--certainly <i>not</i> a premium product. What a wake-up call. How was I to compete?<br />
<br />
And this is where the second part of the equation comes in.....<i>marketing. </i><br />
<br />
<i><b>Setting Your Product Apart From the Others</b></i><br />
The difference between marketing and advertising was once explained to me in simple terms. <i>Advertising</i><b> </b>is the methods through which you tell potential customers you have a product for sale. They are going to buy it because they need it. <i>Marketing</i><b> </b>is telling the customer why they should buy your product. <br />
<br />
Thanks to the animals rights campaigns against industrial veal during the 1980's, veal has been vilified as an ugly product from which anyone with half a conscious steer clear. Veal is a product that you can not take to a public market, put up a sign advertising and stand back waiting for sales. People will walk by and sneer, they will make openly rude comments to you, they will complain to the market manager, they will threaten to picket your stand, your market, your farm. That is why for anyone interested in raising and direct-marketing veal it is <i>critical</i> for you to learn how to market your products, to tell your story of why your product is different, is better.<br />
<br />
The foundation of my marketing has always been to have an open door policy at my farm. Customers are welcome to visit to see firsthand how their meat is raised, not just with veal, but with all types of livestock, poultry and produce. 100 % transparency without a hint of hesitation has swayed many potential customers on the fence toward a purchase.<br />
<br />
Next, tell your story with <i>lots</i> of pictures. There are images of veal calves in pasture on the banner displayed at market, on the farm's website, on Facebook, on Twitter and in the farm's monthly newsletter. I show customers where my calves come from, how they are raised, what they eat and ultimately, where they are processed. But it doesn't stop there.<br />
<br />
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-weight: bold;">ROSE VEAL</span><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-style: italic; font-weight: bold;">: UNDERSTANDING THE DIFFERENCE</span></span></div>
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><br />
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<br /></div>
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-style: italic;"> </span><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-style: italic; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: underline;">Painted Hand Rose + versus Veal </span><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-style: italic;"> </span><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-style: italic; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: underline;">Commercial White Veal -</span><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-style: italic; text-decoration: underline;"></span></span></div>
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS"; font-style: italic;"> </span><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">+ </span><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">Stays with cow after birth </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">- Taken away immediately</span></span></div>
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"> </span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">+</span></span> Naturally nursed with colostrum </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">-</span></span> Force fed antibiotics & electrolytes</span></span></div>
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"> </span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">+</span></span> Transported directly from local </span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">family dairies to Painted Hand Farm. </span></span> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">-</span></span> Trucked hundreds of miles, often </span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">through large auction barns.</span></span></div>
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"></span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">+</span></span> Fed all non-medicated whole milk products </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">-</span></span> Fed only medicated powder milk which is often soy and plasma based</span></span>
</div>
<span style="font-size: small;"></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"> </span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">+</span></span> Fed with nipples </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">-</span></span> Fed in buckets</span></span></div>
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"> </span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">+</span></span> Never injected with hormones </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">-</span></span> Synthetic estrogen implants used illegally </span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">to promote rapid growth. </span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">+</span></span> No antibiotics. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">-</span></span> Prophylactic use of antibiotics. </span></span></div>
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"> </span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">+</span></span> Raised outside in small groups </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">-</span></span> Crowded inside with hundreds of </span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">other calves in individual crates.</span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">+</span></span> No mutilation. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">-</span></span> Ear-tagged or notched </span></span></div>
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"> </span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">+</span></span> Lots of grass & sunshine </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">-</span></span> A life of concrete & darkness</span></span></div>
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"> </span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">+</span></span> Processed at a family-operated </span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">local USDA facility. </span></span> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">-</span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";"> Trucked thousands of miles to a large scale processor.</span></span></div>
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">I believe in 100% transparency for our food system. </span></span></div>
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-family: "Comic Sans MS";">Feel free to visit our farm any time and see for yourself. </span></span></div>
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<span lang="en-US" style="language: en-US;">-------------------------------------------------------------</span></div>
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<span lang="en-US" style="language: en-US;"><i><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">This is a sign I post at all farmers markets.</span></span></i></span>
</div>
<br />
<br />
Most folks haven't grown up eating veal, let alone cooking it. Instructions, recipes, ideas have always been an important part of my marketing plan in addition to eduction. Recipes get posted to my website, blog and Facebook with pictures included. Printed recipes are always available at market.<br />
<br />
Customers want facts about their food. We've become a nation of label readers. Share scientific nutritional information with your customers, especially in comparison with other meats.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.paintedhandfarm.com/files/beefnutro.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://www.paintedhandfarm.com/files/beefnutro.jpg" width="224" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b><i>Beef Nutritional Facts</i></b></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
For instance, these are Nutrition Facts of Beef versus Veal. Customers can see that veal is lower in calories and fat compared to beef. <br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.paintedhandfarm.com/files/vealnutroinfo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://www.paintedhandfarm.com/files/vealnutroinfo.jpg" width="235" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b><i>Veal Nutritional Facts</i></b></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
In some situations, depending on where you are located and what the local health department regulations are, sampling your veal products is a great idea. When I attended an indoor market and had access to electricity and a sink I would cook veal sausages in an electric skillet for customers to taste. But at outdoor markets and with new regulations, the licensing and health code requirements became so restrictive I chose to no longer sample meat products.<br />
<br />
The key to marketing a niche product such as veal is for the producer to be knowledgeable enough about their own products that the information can be easily and quickly shared with potential customers, especially those who make disparaging comments. Here are some of my most frequent exchanges. <br />
<br />
<i><b>Customer: </b></i>How can you be so cruel to those baby cows, keeping them in boxes in the dark and feeding them all those antibiotics and hormones. <br />
<i><b>Producer: </b></i>My calves are hand-raised in large paddocks and on pasture. They are free to move about their entire life and receive no chemicals or drugs. Hormones are illegal to use in veal calves and wouldn't make much of a difference if they were used. Plus, the milk replacer I feed contains no soy or plasma. My calves are never chained or mutilated. They live as natural a life as possible until they are harvested. I am the farmer and you're welcome to come out to the farm and see for yourself anytime. <br />
<br />
<br />
<i><b>Customer: </b></i>I can't eat veal. It's a baby and I don't eat babies. <br />
<i><b>Producer: </b></i>Essentially all animals you are eating are technically "babies". Meat chickens are harvested at 6-8 weeks, pigs at 4-6 months, lamb and goat at less than a year and even beef which don't reach maturity until they 2 1/2 to 3 years old. Beef producers need to get their animals to weight prior to 30 months or their processing is $80-100 more because the USDA requires the spinal column to be completely removed because of potential mad cow disease. My calves may be young, but they still weigh as much as 400 pounds. I am the farmer and I don't want to handle big animals. <br />
<br />
<i><b>Customer: </b></i>I'll eat organic, grass-fed beef, but I won't eat veal. It's not humane. <br />
<i><b>Producer: </b></i>Do you consume dairy products like milk, butter and ice cream? If so,
you're contributing to the commercial veal industry as cows have to have
babies in order to produce milk. The reality for male offspring of dairy cows, especially for smaller breeds such as Jerseys and Guernseys, is they are sent to auction or killed at birth because they are not economically viable to be raised for beef. They can be trucked dozens, if not hundreds of miles only days after birth and many often die. Sometimes the farmer ends up losing money after paying a hauler and the auction barn commission when the market for calves is down. I source all my calves within five miles of my farm from small dairy farms run by local families--some are even Certified Organic. My farmers give the calves a good start on mother's milk for 3-5 days before I pick them up. Plus, I always pay the farmer a fair price for the calves regardless of what they're going for on the open market. They are started in pairs on bottles for the first month so I can ensure they are getting enough nourishment, then out on to pasture in groups of four to eight where they can run. The truth is at a certain point dairy calves' growth rates stall and it takes a lot of input to get them over the hump to where they'd make a decent beef animal. In terms of resources, such as feed, water, space and fuel, naturally-raised veal calves are much more sustainable than beef.<br />
<br />
<i><b>Customer: </b></i>That's not real veal because it's not pale in color. <br />
<i><b>Producer: </b></i>According to the USDA, this animal has been classified as veal. It is pinker in color because this animal had access to grass for most of its life and it was healthy. Veal that is extremely pale in color is because the animal was anemic and was most likely crated or chained its entire life. The idea that the paler in color the better the veal was a marketing campaign by the Beef Checkoff program when veal production in the U.S. became vertically integrated and industrialized. Pale veal has little flavor and a mushy consistency. That's why its often breaded and covered in sauce. One of my loin chops is like eating a little T-bone. It tastes just fine by itself. If you don't believe me or like them, I'll return your money. <br />
<br />
In these conversations, I've not only assuaged the customer's concerns, but go a step further
to educate them about my farming practices versus industrial practices. And no one has ever asked for their money back.<br />
<br />
But unfortunately, not all exchanges end positively in a sale. I've tried for years to get a trendy local food coop to carry my veal, but their answer is always the same, "We're worried it would upset our members." I have offered to write an educational article for their newsletter as well as their website and hand out samples with a educational display in their store, but they still declined. Yet as I peruse the store on a regular basis, I see products from farms with less-than-stellar agricultural, environmental and social practices. It is that stigma that I hope to diminish through sharing my experiences with raising and selling veal.<br />
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-h3hvQ69ESiQ/UnqNk3VONUI/AAAAAAAAEBs/CN1wU4qB82A/s1600/mitch.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="232" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-h3hvQ69ESiQ/UnqNk3VONUI/AAAAAAAAEBs/CN1wU4qB82A/s320/mitch.jpg" width="320" /></a><br />
<i><b>Who are the customers and where do you sell?</b></i><br />
Over the years I've sold my veal through a variety of outlets in a myriad of cuts--whole carcasses, by the half, off the farm, through CSAs and buyers clubs, to individuals, upscale butcher shops and restaurants, but by far, my most successful avenue has been through direct sales at farmers markets. While the majority of buyers tend to be middle to upper income educated people who have traveled internationally, many of my customers also include many immigrants for whom veal was a staple of their diet in their homeland and they all say the same thing, "You raise <i>real</i> veal," as they are often appalled at the quality and price of products found in grocery stores and specialty meat markets.<br />
<br />
Early in my veal rearing venture, I'd imagined that restaurants would make up the bulk of my business, but that was prior to the popularity of nose-to-tail establishments and practically all the chefs only wanted the choice cuts in quantities I didn't have the resources to provide.<br />
<br />
For instance, the first thing most chefs ask for when I tell them I raise veal are the sweet breads, which are a fatty gland (thymus) found in the throat of a young animal. Recently, I had three calves processed and ended up with a <i>half pound</i> of sweet breads. Considering a trendy joint can go through twenty pounds of sweet breads a week, that would equate to processing <i>one hundred twenty</i> (120) calves each week just to meet the demand. Similarly, kidneys, liver and tongue are frequently requested items--all each in very limited quantities per animal.Chances are if you see these items as standard fare on a menu, they are coming from a not-so-nice place.<br />
<br />
Another popular items chefs want are the bones. Any restaurant worth their salt understands the depth and clarity veal broth and demi glaze brings to fine dining.<br />
<br />
"I go through fifty pounds of veal bones a week," said the chef of a local establishment when I was picking his brain at a party. Quickly I did the math in my head. Three hundred pound calf yields twenty to twenty five pounds of bones if I part it into cuts and thirty to thirty five if I turn all the meat into sausages, ground and boneless cuts. Later I would learn that places such as the Greenbrier go through as much a four hundred pounds of veal bones <i>every week</i>. This was definitely <i>not</i> my market. <br />
<br />
Similarly, I have had chefs want to 'cherry-pick' the cuts and then demand a wholesale price. When I explain that the only way they are going to get wholesale price is by taking a whole carcass, they've tended to balk. While this is not true for all establishments, many want term of 30 to 60 days and sadly, I still have outstanding invoices from a number of now-defunct restaurants who wanted to only source local and sustainably-raised ingredients. <br />
<br />
As CSAs and Buyers Clubs gain in popularity, they too, should be considered an option. However, as veal is not a staple item on American family menus, it tends to be pushed into the "specialty" category with lamb, goat and rabbit as opposed to beef, pork and chicken.Consider partnering with an existing produce CSA to offer products on a monthly basis. Also gaining steam are local "food hubs" where producers drop off product to be picked up by multiple purchasers. <br />
<br />
Regardless of which audience you choose to market your veal, your job is not just to produce a phenomenal product, but to also educate your customers about the benefits of purchasing your product. For me, that means championing:<br />
<ul>
<li>Humane</li>
<li>Pasture-raised</li>
<li>No antibiotics or hormones</li>
<li>Environmentally sound and sustainable</li>
<li>Small carbon footprint</li>
<li>Healthier</li>
<li>Locally produced and processed</li>
</ul>
As the popularity of local and sustainable foods increases, customers are taking pride in the fact they are choosing grass-based and artisan foods, but tend to shy away from the meats which have the potential to make the biggest impacts in animal welfare, farm viability and the environment.<br />
<br />
When I'm in an in-your-face mood, I like to tell people that if you are drinking organic/raw/local milk and eating locally farmstead/artisan cheeses or ice cream, then you should also be consuming the veal that is produced by these dairy farmers. Just as consumers have moved away from industrially produced mainstream dairy and meat products in lieu of ethically and sustainably produced foods, the same should hold true for the consumption of veal.<br />
<br />
In my experience, the farmers who truly care the most for their animals are more than happy to establish a relationship with a new/beginning/small scale farmer who wants to humanely produce veal. Repeatedly, I've been told that sending calves to auction is one of the most distressing parts of being a diary farmer, but in their all-to-busy lives, raising and marketing calves for veal is something there just isn't time for. Worse, for some dairy farmers who sell their fluid milk to a cooperative, their contract stipulates that they cannot raise veal for sale using the milk for which the coop has agreed to purchase.<br />
<br />
Highlights of this installment....<br />
<br />
<ol>
<li>Factors and formulas for pricing your product. </li>
<li>Tips and ideas for marketing veal in a positive spin. </li>
<li>Determining your market. </li>
</ol>
As someone who has worked in both the food and farming industries, I see a huge opportunity for both sustainably-minded farmers and consumers to participate in an equitable and sustainable paradigm by choosing to raise and eat veal.<i><b> </b> </i><br />
<br />
<a href="http://pasture2plate.blogspot.com/2013/07/part-one-veal-time-to-change-attitudes.html" target="_blank">PART ONE to this series can be found at this link. </a><br />
<a href="http://pasture2plate.blogspot.com/2013/07/part-two-veal-getting-started.html" target="_blank">PART TWO of this series can be found at this link.</a><br />
<a href="http://pasture2plate.blogspot.com/2013/08/part-three-veal-let-fun-begin.html" target="_blank">PART THREE of this series can be found at this link.</a><br />
<a href="http://pasture2plate.blogspot.com/2013/09/part-four-veal-most-difficult-part-of.html" target="_blank">PART FOUR of this series can be found at this link. </a><br />
<br />Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7474320504282291685.post-61353557363818223552013-10-17T13:58:00.002-07:002013-10-17T14:08:43.478-07:00Bone Broth--Delicious, Nutritious, Healing & Sustainable<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ry8eC-CQvXU/Uic9-Wiqp8I/AAAAAAAAD70/bXe07l6cAOQ/s320/IMG_6049.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="239" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ry8eC-CQvXU/Uic9-Wiqp8I/AAAAAAAAD70/bXe07l6cAOQ/s320/IMG_6049.jpg" width="320" /></a>A few weeks ago, I visited local farming friends and mentors, Jonas & Judi Stoltzfus who own <a href="https://www.localharvest.org/jujo-acres-farm-M5099" target="_blank">JuJo Acres </a>over in Perry County where they've been raising Certified Organic, Animal Welfare Approved, 100% grass-fed Limousin beef since 1972. As soon as I got out of my car, the aroma hit me like a wave. <span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;"></span></span></span></span>Something delicious was cooking and I secretly hoped that was lunch.<br />
<br />
"Come here. I've got something to show you," Jonas said excitedly as he greeted me. Walking down behind their farmhouse we approached a huge bubbling stock pot. I don't mean the kind you can jars in or even deep fry turkeys in, I mean a HUGE stockpot--probably 40-50 gallons in size--and it was full of beef bones simmering away.<br />
<br />
<i><b><span style="font-size: large;">Healing</span></b></i><br />
Jonas is a firm believer that good bone broth from grass-fed animals (not just beef) is not only nutritious and delicious, it's also healing. As a personal testament to his belief, four years ago I suffered a knee injury when I was violently kicked, hyper-extending my leg completely backwards. While I was fortunate enough not to suffer and breaks or tears, the tissue damage and instability had me petrified that I would endure joint problems for the rest of my life.<br />
<br />
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Fortunately, the injury happened in the early fall, when my bone supply is always at an all-time high. Squirreling away plenty for myself, each week I made a huge pot of my own broth, eating it in soups and stews as well as drinking it like tea. Veal bones, beef bones, pork bones, goat bones, lamb bones, turkey & chicken feet--each week a different type of broth simmered away in my slow cooker.<br />
<br />
I stayed off my leg for nearly a month, thanks to friends helping out with farm chores. Gradually, I added in walking daily. I lost weight. I wore a brace. I cut out inflammatory foods, such as grains, dairy and processed sugar and I kept consuming bone broth--as much as quart--daily. <br />
<br />
Six months later without any surgery or medication, I hiked to the top of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Mountain_%28Pennsylvania%29" target="_blank">Blue Mountain</a> atop the tunnels of the Pennsylvania Turnpike. It was slow going and coming down was actually harder than going up, but I made it without any pain during or after.<br />
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<br />
A year later when I returned to see the orthopedist who told me initially that I would eventually need surgery, they were shocked to see that no scar tissue had formed. "If I didn't know how old you were, I'd say I was looking at the knee of a woman 15 years younger," I was told and considered myself healed.<br />
<br />
The analogy I like to use when talking about food and our bodies is think about your car....if you put crappy fuel and oil into the engine, it's not going to run very well or for an extended period of time without significant problems. It's really that simple.<br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><i><b>Nutritious</b></i></span><br />
<a href="http://learnmuscle.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/bodyfortresswhey-223x300.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://learnmuscle.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/bodyfortresswhey-223x300.png" width="148" /></a><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">Sure, there are plenty of vitamins, supplements, pills, potions, lotions and </span></span>elixirs all claiming to enhance our performance and keep us healthy. And you know what? They are all <i>expensive.</i> On top of that, you can not verify the <i>quality</i> of ingredients used in their production.<br />
<br />
A few years ago, I was asked to write a guest post on a Paleo/Primal blog that catered to people interested in fitness training after I made a comment about whey powder from a farmers perspective. (<a href="http://www.charmcitykettlebells.com/dietary-nutritional-planning/a-farmer-weighs-in-on-whey/" target="_blank">You can read it here.</a>) I was <i>amazed</i> at the responses I received from people I'd never met before thanking me for getting them off their powdered protein drinks. "I can't believe how much money I wasted on that stuff before discovering bone broth" and "Wow, I can't believe how much better I feel" were two of the most common statements.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.paintedhandfarm.com/files/chickenstock.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="166" src="http://www.paintedhandfarm.com/files/chickenstock.jpg" width="200" /></a>Consider this, a bag of bones, depending on the size and type, will cost anywhere between $5-25 dollars and yield 1-3 gallons of bone broth while a 24 ounce tub of organic, gluten-free protein powder will set you back $45. Coenzyme Q10 (CoQ10), a fat-soluble antioxidant is $30 for a 120 capsules. Cellular supplement capsules with organic gelatin for younger looking skin will empty your wallet $48 for a 60-day supply. <br />
<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">
<a href="http://politicalfruit.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/7-126_nourishing_trad_400.jpg?w=300&h=238" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://politicalfruit.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/7-126_nourishing_trad_400.jpg?w=300&h=238" width="158" /></a>"According to <a href="http://www.blogger.com/null" shape="rect">Sally Fallon's cookbook, </a><span style="color: maroon;"><i><a href="http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?e=001N9H1xtgN57mn2B4n0sdfgNsDm-ESLtfAqrrY0pI6SpYlsCYMDNwovmWwEIgFPHcIrYf-iPWyStgyDGDvmTF1cNbgnKI7cMZtGBUBTnmeMSlC3Op9Kz7Ep0h9FUXX9kahT6ZFJwITSO9F8ws113IBiGfPnDPYWqpUOVE6VTdTd3mDk_7UdBPMRXWNQ-kELGYf2NygYw-lKZu59HMkSigQxQ==" shape="rect" style="color: maroon; text-decoration: underline;" target="_blank">Nourishing Traditions </a></i></span>which has become the tome for the <a href="http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?e=001N9H1xtgN57mn2B4n0sdfgNsDm-ESLtfAqrrY0pI6SpYlsCYMDNwovmWwEIgFPHcIrYf-iPWyStjKq0bhGT1QZ1GBhRCXnteLN0az7lESNhM=" shape="rect" style="color: maroon; text-decoration: underline;" target="_blank">Weston A. Price Foundation</a>, there are numerous health benefits to <a href="http://www.blogger.com/null" shape="rect">natural gelatin alone</a> include:</div>
the<br />
<ul>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Hair, nail & skin health</li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Joint recovery and maintenance</li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Aids digestion</li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Dietary collagen</li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Helps build muscle </li>
</ul>
Composed
primarily of the amino acids glycine and proline (which many people
don't consume in adequate amounts from the Standard American Diet),
gelatin is found in the bones, fibrous tissues and organs of animals. But here's the
kicker....these amino acids are needed not only for proper skin, hair
and nail health, but for optimal immune function and weight regulation! Considering Americans spend over $50 <i>billion</i> dollars a year on weight loss products, who would consider a bag of bones in a pot with some water could make your butt smaller?<br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><i><b>Delicious</b></i></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">Anyone who knows me understands that for me, it's all about quality. I can't say it enough, <i><b>Life is too short to eat bad food</b></i>. Nothing makes the difference between mediocre and out-of-this-world food than a rich base of good stock made from meaty bones, especially ones with lots of natural gelatin like joints, ribs, feet, heads and especially the bones of young animals such as veal, lamb and kid goats. Unlike commercial broths and stocks, there's silkiness imparted by home made broths than can't even begin to compare. And nothing beats the aroma! </span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">But the question that always comes up when I talk about making bone broth and stock is "<i>How do store it</i>?" You can:</span></span><br />
<ul><a href="http://www.paintedhandfarm.com/files/stock.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="178" src="http://www.paintedhandfarm.com/files/stock.jpg" width="200" /></a>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">Freeze it. I like to use 1 quart freezer bag. (Hint: lay them flat on a tray to freeze first before storing. They will stack neatly. Also, freeze in ice cube trays and then store in bags. Works great when you just need a few tablespoons of liquid for cooking.) </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">Can it. Don't have room in your freezer? Don't like using plastic? Processing in glass jars means no energy needed for storage. </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">Use it. During the winter, I like to always keep a slow cooker (Crock Pot) going with bone broth. Or store it in a glass jar in the refrigerator for up to a week. </span></span></li>
</ul>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">There are so many recipes and ways to use a good bone broth as a base--stews, soups, bisque, pho. It's also a great liquid for braising larger cuts of meat. </span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">And if you <i>really</i> want to be decadent, first, roast the nice marrow bones and then scoop out the luscious goodness, spread it on little points of sourdough toasts or just eat it plain if you're eschewing grains & gluten. Marrow is food of the Gods. Then you may make stock out of the leftover bones. </span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i><b>Sustainable</b></i></span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">As a livestock producer, I spend most of my time raising animals for food. Outside feeding, cleaning, birthing, raising and taking to the processor in all sorts of weather, nothing irks me more than having to waste a single part of the animals which I've so lovingly cared for in order to feed others. <i>Nothing</i> goes to waste.</span></span></span></span><br />
<br />
<a href="https://scontent-b-lga.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-frc3/1378817_10151924824843307_567073656_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="239" src="https://scontent-b-lga.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-frc3/1378817_10151924824843307_567073656_n.jpg" width="320" /></a><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">In my recent <a href="http://campaign.r20.constantcontact.com/render?llr=klbbhgeab&v=001V1Z8JVJHjI5dWjXWw4LfLmWX8K87Z5eRnooZk_zrjR9ez04YR8WFhhHWvK4dQSiyS9IxQ_NBLDctuJOVndBv63-Pu4a7jztR1B4qwfUvcX4f-ysG-Xg7e4xJNSh_MXc6LScT5iwPPOX0F79xZ82Nj1wBZLskXB787mXJPwhYWkSL7Df2mmhySPuZqmhnC9f5NlysT3EDaOOrZYotiPHtkpkvu4cQhftNLvGY9XQb3nXcqapmiwTn8Ql9NzLl-BVRsuSv86CyBv_sSKglQ6pVA2ZO0QbZ9l1rZnyw0sEPc9KF5dL3CiHs8TXYEQTcVgfWkWOPbK4UbvBODp1RcBHJVncL7JfIZitd3WvcvpsAdEdUhgPZ7bARMBHNNcnK0rI986qL5WggXgo44M1SzM7MpJjrsqTPgHEqNZYXSLxcj0z7q48dX-zQfn3jxiqXfh8QXX04raYan3U%3D&id=preview" target="_blank">Painted Hand Farm Newsletter</a>, I wrote about using poultry heads and feed for stock after receiving a barrage of negative comments when and image was posted to my Facebook page of a slow cooker full of the offending objects. Despite the <i>trendiness</i> of sustainability, farm-to-table and nose-to-tail eating, acceptance of using as much of the animal as possible for food is still far from hitting the mark. </span></span></span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">And I say this because myself, as well as every other livestock producer I know, ends up with a freezer full of bones, feet & heads originally destined to our customers for broth and stock, but we often use them ourselves, feed them to our animals, give them away or throw them out. What we want to be doing is selling them to our customers. That's why we're in this business. It takes money to raise, process and bring products to market--even the bones! Many producers rely on selling their bones and offal to offset the ever-increasing costs of processing. As regulations become more stringent, energy and labor costs rise along with that of equipment and packaging, our butchers pass those costs on to us. We need to sell <i>every</i> piece of the animal possible if we're going to remain in business. When customers demand cuts such as tenderloins, New York strips, kabob and stew meat, etc., we're faced with significant cut-out weights. That's why those cuts are often so expensive. </span></span></span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">This is not the first time I've written about bones on this blog. You can read about my adventures in bone broth <a href="http://pasture2plate.blogspot.com/2011/01/waste-nothing.html" target="_blank">HERE</a> (Waste Nothing), <a href="http://pasture2plate.blogspot.com/2013/09/one-last-hurrah.html" target="_blank">HERE</a> (One Last Hurrah) and <a href="http://pasture2plate.blogspot.com/2013/01/dem-bones.html" target="_blank"> HERE</a> (Dem Bones) which also includes my basic recipe for bone stock. </span></span></span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">Ready to give bone stock a try? See me (or any of your favorite farmers market meat vendors) at your local market & CSA and ask them about their bones. As always, you can find recipes at <a href="http://www.paintedhandfarm.com/Recipes.html" target="_blank">HERE</a> or at the Painted Hand Farm stand at market. </span></span></span></span>Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7474320504282291685.post-57820490626079524612013-09-28T11:47:00.001-07:002013-09-28T11:49:18.939-07:00One Last Hurrah for a Laying Hen<a href="http://www.paintedhandfarm.com/files/IMG_5995.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="239" src="http://www.paintedhandfarm.com/files/IMG_5995.jpg" width="320" /></a>There's a chill in the air signaling the changing of seasons. There's also lots of feathers in the barnyard--the telltale sign of the seasonal moult of laying hens. During this time, egg production decreases significantly as all of the bird's energy goes into growing new feathers.This is also the time hens should be on their best behavior here at the farm. If you're moulting and a constant escapee, you get a one-way ticket to the processor and ultimately, the stew pot.<br />
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So it's no surprise this seasonal product--<i>the fatty stewing hen</i>--is starting to show up at farmers market along with their younger, premium brethren--the tender, young broiler. <br />
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Don't understand the difference? Think of dairy cows versus beef cattle. One is designed to push their energy into milk production, or in the case of the laying hen, egg production. The other, of course, has been bred to lay down as much meat as possible in the shortest amount of time with the least input (feed).<br />
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Just like cattle, there are also "dual-purpose breeds", many that fall into the "heritage" category. However, as producers who rely primarily on animal production for income, many of us have learned that we need to balance market price with affordable production.<br />
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Would I like to raise all heritage breeds, which tend to be more colorful and unique? Absolutely! Can I afford a production time twice as long to produce the same amount of meat? No way. The truth is a good farmer worth their salt can feed a utility breed, like the Cornish Giant, a non-GMO feed and raise them outside on pasture making them just as tender, juicy and tasty as their Old World counterparts.<br />
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Similarly, as much as I would love to let my old ladies live out their natural lives here in peace on the farm, the reality is that there needs to be a return on my investment and that boils down to eggs or meat.<br />
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And just what does one do with a fatty stewing hen?<br />
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Here are a number of recipes for you to try as their flavor is unparalleled when it comes to making stock for soup. Fair warning however, their meat is best when shredded, diced or ground.<br />
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<b><span style="font-size: large;">Schmaltz (aka Jewish Penicillin) </span></b><br />
<i>This is rendered chicken fat used in place of butter, lard, tallow, etc. in cooking. Hint: use it to make the crust for Chicken Pot Pie. </i><br />
<br />
<a href="https://encrypted-tbn3.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTkzpkezj8hgFqjLpKqnzwO3nB9XSLdfd3kojPdA2OV346WmuJb" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://encrypted-tbn3.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTkzpkezj8hgFqjLpKqnzwO3nB9XSLdfd3kojPdA2OV346WmuJb" width="115" /></a><br />
<b>Ingredients:</b><br />
1 fatty stewing hen<br />
<br />
<b>Directions: </b><br />
Remove all fat and skin from carcass. Blot dry with paper towels. Cut into small pieces about the size of a dime using scissors. Place in an uncovered skillet and heat on medium low for 15-20 minutes until liquid fat pools in the bottom of the pan. Remove from heat and strain liquid fat using a mesh strainer into a glass container. <b> </b><br />
<br />
At this point, if you want to make <i>gribenes</i>, the equivalent to cracklins when it comes to pork, add the cooked fat bits back into the pan with a thinly sliced onion and cook until crispy, but not burned. <br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Chicken Corn Soup </span></b><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>This is a Pennsylvania Dutch staple in late summer.</i></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i><a href="http://images.media-allrecipes.com/userphotos/250x250/00/85/07/850738.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://images.media-allrecipes.com/userphotos/250x250/00/85/07/850738.jpg" width="200" /></a></i></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-weight: bold; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">Ingredients: </span></span></span></div>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">
</span></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination: none;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">1 whole chicken</span></span></span></div>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">
</span></span>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination: none;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">1 medium onion, chopped</span></span></span></div>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination: none;">
<span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">1 cup celery, chopped (note: I like to substitute chard stems)</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination: none;">
<span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">6 ears fresh corn, kernels cut off cob</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination: none;">
<span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">4 hard boiled eggs, chopped</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination: none;">
<span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">8-10 threads saffron</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination: none;">
<span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">1/2 cup fresh parsley, minced</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination: none;">
<span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">Salt & Pepper</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination: none;">
<br /></div>
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<span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-weight: bold; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">Directions:</span><span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;"></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination: none;">
<span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">Cover chicken in stock pot with water and bring to a simmer for 2 hours. Remove chicken and pick all meat from bones. Sauté onion, celery and corn until onion is translucent. Add to stock along with picked meat and saffron. Simmer for 20 minutes. Season to taste. Add hard boiled egg and parsley a few minutes prior to serving. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination: none;">
<span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-weight: bold; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">NOTE: </span><span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">Some variations include adding noodles or rivels (pea-sized dumplings made from flour and egg and then dropped into the simmering soup.)</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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</span><span style="font-size: large;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-weight: bold;">Chicken Pot Pie</span></span></div>
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<span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;"><span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-weight: bold; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">Ingredients: </span></span></div>
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<span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">1 medium onion, chopped<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span> </span></div>
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<span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">1/2 cup celery, chopped </span></div>
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<span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">1 cup peas or lima beans</span></div>
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<span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">2 tablespoons flour<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span> </span></div>
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<span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">1/4 cup chicken stock</span></div>
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<span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">1 tablespoon minced herbs<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Salt & Pepper</span></div>
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<span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">Crust or Noodles</span></div>
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<span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-weight: bold; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">Directions:</span><span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;"></span></div>
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<span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">Cover chicken in stock pot with water and bring to a simmer for 2 hours. Remove chicken and pick all meat from bones. Sauté onion, celery, peas and carrot until onion is translucent. Add meat, stock, flour and herbs. Season to taste and simmer until thickened. </span></div>
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<span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">To make traditionally Pennsylvania Dutch Pot Pie, add the liquid stock and large flat egg noodles, simmering until noodles are cooked. </span></div>
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<span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">For a crusted pie, add chicken and vegetable mixture to crust and top with either another crust or breadcrumbs, cheese and butter. Cook at 350 degrees until bubbly and crust is golden brown. </span><span lang="en-US" style="language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;"></span></div>
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</i></span></span>Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7474320504282291685.post-2035749793818157972013-09-25T11:46:00.000-07:002013-11-12T12:10:06.381-08:00PART FOUR: VEAL--The most difficult part of the process<b><i>This is the fourth of a five-part of posts regarding veal production
for small-scale farms and why educated eaters dedicated to local foods
and sustainable agriculture should be eating veal as well as beef.</i></b><br />
<br />
<b>HARVEST, PROCESSING & PACKAGING</b><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-burEyU3JMak/Uhdd_n8BoxI/AAAAAAAAD00/ugcSmHoP4xY/s1600/IMG_5658.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><br /></a>
<br />
<br />
I want to make this clear from the start--I <i><b>DO NOT</b></i> kill, slaughter, butcher or murder my calves...they are <i><b>harvested.</b></i> Just like other farmers, I'm raising a crop destined to provide sustenance for human consumers.<br />
<br />
Routinely, I am faced with someone staring at me with their sad, puppy-dog eyes and whining, "But how can you kill your babies?" And while to date I've avoided the urge to reach out, grab them by the throat and punch them in the face, I have instead, over time, developed a response that has led to the highlight of my veal venture--selling scallopine to a pair of militant vegetarian animal rights activists complete with placards of ugly, industrial veal barns ready to picket my stand at an outdoor farmers market in Washington, DC. <br />
<br />
First, let's get this straight. Just about <i>all</i> animals raised for human consumption today--industrial, organic, sustainable, feedlotted, pasture-raised and otherwise--are young animals who have not reached sexual maturity. In other words...babies. Meat chickens are 8 weeks, lambs and goats under a year, 6-7 months for pigs and beef producers like to keep their animals under 30 months so they do not have to spend the extra money at the processor to remove the spine prior to butchering due to new Mad Cow preventative measures. Very little in the food chain today isn't a young animal.<br />
<br />
As discussed in <a href="http://pasture2plate.blogspot.com/2013/07/part-two-veal-getting-started.html" target="_blank">Part Two</a> of this series, dairy breeds are not conducive to putting on enough muscle fast enough to warrant a feasible return as a beef animal. These are the most likely candidates for veal. However, there are many smaller family cow-calf beef operations now leaving their cull heifers on the cows until weaning to produce premium veal instead of pulling the calf at birth and shipping to action for a fraction of what they'll ultimately reap from a finished product.<br />
<br />
<i><b>When to Harvest</b></i><br />
This is where art meets experience. For me, the artistry is in cooking--what's the best size for a rib chop, loin chop and how does that translate into live weight and body condition? What cuts don't sell...ever? What sells out first?<br />
<br />
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-LzmiAZ3SDMg/UkMrv57HXKI/AAAAAAAAD_M/oDvmGjxLQuQ/s1600/IMG_3359.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="239" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-LzmiAZ3SDMg/UkMrv57HXKI/AAAAAAAAD_M/oDvmGjxLQuQ/s320/IMG_3359.jpg" width="320" /></a>Then there is the first time a customer returns your product with a valid complaint.<br />
<br />
"These loin chops I paid $30 for last week have more bone than meat on them."<br />
<br />
And there you are caught like a deer in the headlights out of ignorance. It happened to me....once. I removed every package of loin chops left in my inventory and ate them myself. The customer was right; what sorry little medallions of meat, barely a morsel, there were on the bones. After coming to farming via professional cooking, I was truly embarrassed by what I had sold my customers.<br />
<br />
The next time I dropped animals at the processor, I confronted the butcher about the chops.<br />
<br />
"Hey, I just cut what you tell me to cut," he replied.<br />
<br />
"Well, I'm not here when you're cutting up my animals and from now on, I don't want you cutting anything that you wouldn't serve to a guest at your house. Turn it into a roast or grind it and pack the bones," I requested.<br />
<br />
"Yes, ma'am," and with that I never received another complaint from a customer about the quality of a cut.<br />
<br />
To further increase my knowledge about my products, one winter I took three calves of varying sizes, breeds and weights to a custom butcher for private sale. He agreed to allow me to work with him while he processed the carcasses from the kill floor to the packaging.<br />
<br />
From this experience, I learned things I would have never considered such as informing the processor <i>before the animal is harvested</i> that you want to have the tongue and sweetbreads (thymus gland that runs along the esophagus and trachea and the pancreas). Don't just list them as a request on the cuts sheet as it is often only ready when the carcass is ready to cut. By then, these items will have been long gone as they are not routinely cut by small-scale processors.<br />
<br />
With holding feed for twelve hours prior to processing makes a <i><b>huge</b></i> difference in the cleanliness of the whole deal. A full rumen is a most frightful and nasty thing to contend with during processing. That's one of the reasons most processors ask for animals to be delivered to their holding facility the night prior. <br />
<br />
Scallopine is best when cut with the fiber direction by hand from a single muscle instead of the whole boneless rear thigh cut on a slicing machine when partially frozen. Here's the difference in the kitchen--one gets the crap pounded out of it with a hammer before it's tender enough to cut with the fork, the other doesn't. <br />
<br />
Many processors are also farmers at one point or another and can teach you a thing or two about the health of your animals as they are harvested.<br />
<br />
Livestock (not just calves) that don't have proper access to minerals are much tougher to bleed out and skin. That you have a sub-clinical issue with pneumonia. That your livestock has a heavy parasite load and what kind--Barber Pole worms in the stomach, liver flukes, lung worms, lice and ringworm. Don't just blindly drop off your animals at the processor, pick them up and pay your bill without a quick conversation as to anything notable. Ultimately, developing a relationship with your processor will help you to deliver a first-class product pleasing everyone involved in the process from the pasture to the plate.<br />
<br />
Invariably, the question gets asked, "How <i>old</i> are your calves when they are harvested?" This is a timely answer because veal can be harvested at number of ages depending on the conditions. Primarily, I choose to harvest by <i>weight.</i> In the colder months, calves do not grow much so they may live a few months more than their counterparts on whole milk, spring flush or browsing with goats. Holsteins are born one third of the way to finished weight for me as I choose not to raise animals much past 300 pounds.<br />
<br />
<br />
However, there are other farmers/ranchers who will take their veal calves as high as 700 pounds prior to processing, which, if left on the mother for a full season will easily reach that weight being only milk and grass-fed.<br />
<br />
The commercial guys have told me that I'm not raising <i>real</i> veal since I allow my animals to move around, wean them from milk, let them eat grass and let them get<i> so big</i>. But the truth is veal has traditionally been the young male offspring of the dairy calves that are harvested at the end of the grazing season prior to when farmers had to start feeding their herd stored forage. Some might be several months old while others were only a few months old. The whole idea is to harvest non-essential animals that have been fed by the grace only by Mother Nature, a cash crop with little to no inputs.<br />
<br />
That means for some farmers, the limiting factor is pasture and forage. When the field go dormant, the calves get harvested, period. <br />
<br />
Once, I took a bred heifer just over a year old who was already showing signs of chronic mastitis to the processor for a neighboring farmer along with my own animals saving them the trip for a single animal. When the meat was returned to them it had been graded by the inspector as veal and labeled as such prompting quite a tirade on the subject. <br />
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And some days, there are those gangly little souls who, no matter how much milk or lush pasture you give them, just never seem to thrive. Speaking from experience, I prefer to harvest them underweight and strictly for sausage which guarantees a solid price. You'll know who these little guys are.<br />
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Osv2x9ilXic/UkMrbaZtkHI/AAAAAAAAD-s/b2XKUPgMzyo/s1600/CIMG0002.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"></a><br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-LzmiAZ3SDMg/UkMrv57HXKI/AAAAAAAAD_M/oDvmGjxLQuQ/s1600/IMG_3359.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><br /></a></div>
<i><b>Choosing a Processor</b></i><br />
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Osv2x9ilXic/UkMrbaZtkHI/AAAAAAAAD-s/b2XKUPgMzyo/s1600/CIMG0002.JPG" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Osv2x9ilXic/UkMrbaZtkHI/AAAAAAAAD-s/b2XKUPgMzyo/s320/CIMG0002.JPG" width="320" /></a>Farmer and author Forest Pritchard tells the tale of his first processor in his first book, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Gaining-Ground-Farmers-Markets-Saving/dp/0762787252" target="_blank"><b><i>Gaining Ground</i></b></a>, which had me on my feet screaming, "I'm not the only one!" Like him, I suffered through processors who failed to return all the meat from my animals, who mis-labeled product, who didn't package well and who made fun of what I had chosen to do with my livestock. <br />
<br />
The first processor returned meat what was at least four different identifiable animals so he was cut off after the first try. Similarly, the second processor barely made it past the unloading of my calves when young man charged with unloading stock immediately went after my already confused and afraid calves with an electric cattle prod.<br />
<br />
Grabbing the gadget from his hands and waving it in his direction I bellowed, "Don't you <i><b>ever</b></i> use this on my animals or I guarantee I will use it on you!" I then grabbed an empty 5 gallon bucket and rattled it enough to get the calves' attention as they were still cowering in the front of the stock trailer.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-_1WMjGu7QiE/UkMrbsLBzMI/AAAAAAAAD-w/BnZ-pHtFwH4/s1600/CIMG0005.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-_1WMjGu7QiE/UkMrbsLBzMI/AAAAAAAAD-w/BnZ-pHtFwH4/s320/CIMG0005.JPG" width="320" /></a>"That bucket is empty," said the young man who had be relieved of his hot stick.<br />
<br />
"They're just bull calves. They don't know any better." I replied as the pair followed me out of the trailer, up the ramp and on to the kill floor holding pen as we were the first to arrive that morning.<br />
<br />
Given how the day started, I should have taken it as a sign and left them on the trailer, returning home to find another processor. The calves were slated to be sold by the half to three different customers and I was keeping the fourth half so I could cook my way through a calf to better understand the cuts and enjoy the fruits of my own labor. In making arrangements with the processor, they assured me that each piece would be labeled.<br />
<br />
"Would you like to have your meat vacuum-sealed?"<br />
<br />
"Yes, please."<br />
<br />
The only problem was he failed to tell me that when meat was vacuum-sealed, it could not be stamped with the ink stamp names identifying each cut. Worse, both calves were randomly packed in liquor boxes leaving me no idea what a quarter of each animal was.<br />
<br />
"Well, you can just divide all the packages up by four," the man replied when I asked how I was going to identify all the little frozen pink blobs.<br />
<br />
"What was their hanging weights?"<br />
<br />
"Oh, they weighed about 150, maybe 160 pounds each...somewhere in there."<br />
<br />
"I'm charging by the pound, like beef, and I needed to know the hanging weights. I had it written on the directions and told that to the man who helped me unload." Maybe I shouldn't have threatened him with the hot stick.<br />
<br />
"Oh well, next time we'll get the weights."<br />
<br />
There wouldn't be a next time for him.<br />
<br />
Finally, I asked a local dairy farmer who sold veal at farmers markets along with their farmstead cheese where they got their calves processed and was turned on to a processor who were like a dream come true--reliable, professional, clean and could follow directions almost too well. <i><b><br /></b></i><br />
<br />
Little did I realize until reading his book, that Forest was responsible for urging Mennonite family who has run their USDA plant for over 50 years into doing market cuts and packaging that I, as well as many mid-Atlantic livestock producers, now rely upon. <br />
<br />
If you are going to be<br />
<ul>
<li>Selling at farmers markets</li>
<li>Crossing state lines</li>
<li>Selling individual retail cuts from your farm store</li>
<li>Selling to a restaurant, grocery store or butcher shop</li>
<li>Create any value-added product such as sausage </li>
</ul>
you <i><b>MUST</b></i> process under a USDA-approved inspection facility. I've come across a lot of people with the rise of the local foods movement who cut corners processing at custom facilities or doing it themselves. For private sales of whole animals, farmer to consumer, this is fine, but it is imperative to understand the state and federal regulations if you want to sell animals under any of the above conditions.<br />
<br />
The first step in choosing a processor is to find one that is able and willing to process your calves. Forget the phone book, ignore the Internet--use word-of-mouth, first-hand recommendations from other farmers. This is the most reliable way of engaging the services of a processor.<br />
<br />
Then next step is to visit the processor. Make an appointment to speak with them at a convenient time. Don't just show up and expect their time and attention, especially on receiving and kill days when their attentions are demanded elsewhere.<br />
<br />
Questions to ask:<br />
<ul>
<li>What day are calves dispatched?</li>
<li>Do you require stock to be delivered the day prior?</li>
<li>Do you have a minimum/maximum number of animals?</li>
<li>Do you provide labels or must the producer? </li>
<li>If the producer must provide labels, what are the specifications?</li>
<li>Do you vacuum-seal?</li>
<li>What is your lead time? (meaning, if I call you today, how long before I can get an appointment)</li>
<li>Do you offer value-added products? (patties, sausage, etc.)</li>
<li>Do you flash freeze on shallow carts or just pack meat into boxes and place in freezer? </li>
<li>Ask for a services list with the prices of each service. </li>
</ul>
In addition to the services and price list, it's good to ask for a cut sheet as well. For example, when I chose only from my first processor's cut sheet, I did not get the highly coveted osso buco cuts which are lovely cross-sections of the shanks and <i>the</i> first items to sell out at market.<br />
<br />
So let's take a closer look at the different types of cuts and packaging.<br />
<br />
<i><b>The Final Product</b></i><br />
Recently, I spoke to a dairy farmers in New York who is just beginning to market their veal.<br />
<br />
"One of the challenges we're having is getting our customers to understand the cut sheet because it's not like a beef," was their comment that got me thinking about my experiences with raising, harvesting and selling veal retail.<br />
<br />
If there is one piece of advice taken from this installment, I want it to be that <i>YOU</i>, as the producer, should be making the final judgement call on when and how to process your animals...not the customer. They should only be given that right when they are standing next to a live animal and have run their hands over its flesh to verify that is the size they want.<br />
<br />
Over the years, I have had many goat customers who have chosen their own animals, but never for veal. This is one product in which customers are quite happy to trust the producer's judgement. <br />
<br />
Here is a list of my cuts for premium calf cuts I have sold over the years and their popularity.<br />
<ul>
<li>Rib Chops & Loin Chops - good seller</li>
<li>Cubes/Stew - great seller</li>
<li>Scallopine - great seller</li>
<li>Ground - great seller</li>
<li>Patties - good seller</li>
<li>Sausages - great seller</li>
<li>Osso Buco - can never have enough</li>
<li> Ribs - weak seller</li>
<li>Shoulder Roast - mediocre seller</li>
<li>Sirloin - mediocre seller</li>
<li>Organs - great seller</li>
<li>Boneless Loin - good seller</li>
<li>Whole Loin Rack - mediocre seller</li>
<li>Bone-in Rib Roasts - mediocre seller</li>
<li>Breast/Brisket - weak seller</li>
<li>Bones - great seller</li>
<li>Whole Head - good seller</li>
</ul>
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-bthV782ilLU/UkMrxzabVYI/AAAAAAAAD_U/xsHx-IZlBw8/s1600/IMG_3141.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="239" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-bthV782ilLU/UkMrxzabVYI/AAAAAAAAD_U/xsHx-IZlBw8/s320/IMG_3141.jpg" width="320" /></a>Yes, you'll notice the head and the bones on that list. These two items are <i>extremely coveted</i> by chefs and foodies. Recently, a senior editor at Bon Apetit listed her favorite meal of the year as being ravioli stuffed with calf brain and within a week of the magazine's publication I had at least a dozen requests for my heads.<br />
<i><b></b></i><br />
<br />
Note: in order for the head to be returned to the customer, for either USDA or custom, the animal must not be dispatched with a bullet or captive bolt. Another good question for your processor.<br />
<br />
And bones! Don't forget to package and label the bones. Unless you have a
standing order from a chef, ask for 3-5 pound bags as that is what most
home cooks can handle at a time. If they want more, they'll buy more.
Good veal bones make the most incredible, silky, gelatinous stock. <br />
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But what about those less-than-premium calves? While it's easy to turn an entire animal into burgers and sausages, there's no need to grind certain cuts that are perfectly fine and would command a better price per pound than burgers or sausages--mainly the Osso Buco and boneless loin. Similarly, be certain to have all the bones packaged and labeled for sale. <br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/--cUk-QCB8WI/UkMrpwjmdiI/AAAAAAAAD_E/QX5lLw1nv00/s1600/CIMG0007.JPG" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/--cUk-QCB8WI/UkMrpwjmdiI/AAAAAAAAD_E/QX5lLw1nv00/s320/CIMG0007.JPG" width="320" /></a>In the list above, you'll notice a few "value-added" items. Some of you may not have heard this term before. It's part of the lexicon meaning to change from it's raw form to create another product with increased value. For me, sausage and patties top the list. Fair warning though, these items require an added expense to produce and this must be reflected in the final products' pricing.<i><b></b></i><br />
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For instance, my processor charges $0.10 for each patty made and as much as a dollar per pound for sausage depending on the flavor and type of casing.<br />
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For producers with access to a licensed kitchen, other value-added items might include:<br />
<ul>
<li>Demi glase - a rich stock based sauce which is a staple in fine cooking</li>
<li>Stock</li>
<li>Ravioli</li>
<li>Stew</li>
</ul>
While going to farmers markets or selling retail via buyers clubs is not for everyone, with the right marketing veal can also be sold whole, by the side or in primal cuts. It is best to simply wrap these in sheets of food-grade plastic and deliver fresh.<br />
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While growing up, I remember my family splitting a side of beef with their friends and everyone getting together wrapping meat in waxed paper and taping shut with freezer tape. In this day and age, there should be no reason that a processor would ever wrap meat in paper destined to be frozen and sold for retail.<br />
<br />
But just because a processor owns a commercial vacuum sealer doesn't mean they know how to use one properly. Vacuum-sealed product can last up to <i>two years</i> in a deep freeze without any ill effects to the meat. Bone-in cuts are particularly difficult to seal. If you notice that your packages of chops tend to not maintain their vacuum, ask that they be bagged in another plastic bag prior to the final seal. Some processors will even use small patches of mesh to cover parts of bones for a better seal.<br />
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Scallopine should be packaged in flat sheets, not all rolled up into a ball.<br />
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Before having a large run of patties done out the ground, ask if they are frozen in patty form before sealing. If not, ask this to be done or don't make patties. Nothing is more visually unappealing than patties squished beyond belief when sealed. Some processors also do this for sausage links as well.<br />
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In the end, it's not just producing a healthy, harvestable animal that is key to raising veal for sale, but to present that animal after harvest in a way that is pleasing to be cooked and eaten.<br />
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Highlights of this segment....<br />
<br />
<ol>
<li>Learning when to harvest calves. </li>
<li>How to choose a processor. </li>
<li>Determining cuts of meat. </li>
<li>Packaging professionally. </li>
</ol>
Stay tuned for the final installment of this series when we'll wrap up with sales & marketing. If you've missed any of the series, the previous installments can be found here: <br />
<br />
<br />
<a href="http://pasture2plate.blogspot.com/2013/07/part-one-veal-time-to-change-attitudes.html" target="_blank">PART ONE to this series can be found at this link. </a><br />
<a href="http://pasture2plate.blogspot.com/2013/07/part-two-veal-getting-started.html" target="_blank">PART TWO of this series can be found at this link.</a><br />
<a href="http://pasture2plate.blogspot.com/2013/08/part-three-veal-let-fun-begin.html" target="_blank">PART THREE of this series can be found at this link.</a><br />
<a href="http://pasture2plate.blogspot.com/2013/11/part-five-veal-getting-it-on-plates.html" target="_blank">PART FIVE of this series can be found at this link. </a><br />
<br />Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7474320504282291685.post-47088637727566314262013-08-29T09:19:00.002-07:002013-08-30T03:43:41.581-07:00What the Heck is a Primal Cut?<a href="http://naturoad.com.au/image/Goat%20Primal%20Cuts.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="262" src="http://naturoad.com.au/image/Goat%20Primal%20Cuts.jpg" width="320" /></a>Primal cuts are the big chunks that make for easier handling of whole carcasses after the animals has been slaughtered and hung. Well known and understood in the realms of professional food service, chefs, butchers and meat counters, primals are not as popular or well-understood by most consumers because they are not readily available. <br />
<br />
But as the farm-to-table, sustainable, localvore, humane, organic, pastured livestock movement gets a foot-hold, home meat purchasers are going to start seeing a lot more of these types of cuts previously only known to the world of professional meat. Let me explain.....<br />
<br />
<a href="https://sphotos-a-lga.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/543405_10151973624415312_99069874_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://sphotos-a-lga.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/543405_10151973624415312_99069874_n.jpg" width="239" /></a>First, in raising livestock the reality is that not all animals are going to produce the premium cuts that so many customers are accustomed to thanks to industrial agriculture. Many breeds of meat animals have been bred to put on as much muscle as possible in a short amount of time with minimal inputs. Often, this means grain-fed. Think of those plump, well-marbled lamb chops with their tasty medallions of loin the size of a lid on a Mason jar. And it seems that all the leg-of-lamb recipes on the Food Network or any other popular media outlet begin with 5-8 pound piece of meat.<br />
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But in using lambs as an example in comparison to goats, it's apples and oranges--or should I say caprines and ovines. First, there are two distinctly different body types for goats--dairy and meat--similar to cattle. One has been bred to put as much energy as possible into milk production resulting in a thinner, leaner framed animal. Animals bred to produce meat have heavier, well-muscled bodies and once the skin comes off, this difference becomes even more evident.<br />
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I've always been amazed by people who think that there is a hard and fast line between production animals and their ultimate destination--milk animals are not used for meat, meat animals are never milked and the two are never bred to each other. But many milk producers (especially in the goat world) breed their females to meat-style males in order to produce more marketable male offspring.<br />
<br />
However, in doing so, the phenotype of these offspring don't always exhibit strong meat-type traits and thus must be harvested at a smaller weight in order to produce a marketable (and profitable) product. To allow young male goats with more dairy characteristics to grow larger would require more inputs and time, but still may result in larger bones with minimal muscling and no one wants more bone than meat on their dinner plate. Instead, these animals are harvested at a younger age while still plump from the fattier diet that includes their mothers' rich milk with bones proportional to their meat ratio.<br />
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Again the question is raised, "Why primal cuts?" This time it boils down to economics. As red meat sold at farmers markets, it MUST be processed under USDA inspection. You'll notice not just the blue stamp on the meat, but the little round circle on the label with the processing facility's identification number. Most USDA processors charge a flat fee for killing, cleaning, hanging, cutting and packaging a small ruminant (goat, lamb or veal). The smaller the animal equals the larger cost per pound for processing. When smaller animals such as milk-fed kid and lamb (usually 50 pounds and less live weight) are processed, it makes more economical sense to cut into primals otherwise the cost per pound would have to be significantly more. And I can guarantee that no one wants to pay a premium price for a pathetic cut of meat. (yes, this is the voice of experience)<br />
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Part of being a good farmer and direct marketer is knowing when to harvest an animal that is going to satisfy both the customer and the seller.<br />
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This is why the latest batch of goats to be harvested have been cut as primals. They were milk-fed kid goats from dairy/meat crosses that just weren't going to yield well at the minimum size required for individual cuts. As my customers know, one of the big reasons I raise meat is due to my former life in the professional food realm. I want to produce delicious and organically raised meats, most of which I have found difficult to obtain due to our industrialized food system. That includes naturally-browsed goat meat, milk-fed kid, humanely-raised rose veal and pastured poultry.<br />
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<i><b>So, what are the primal cuts available and how can they be used?</b></i><br />
Basically, an entire goat is cut into six large pieces--three from each side. Here they are with an explanation of what they normally would be broken down into on a larger carcass and tips for how you can either break them down yourself or cook them whole. <br />
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<b>Forequarter</b>--this is comprised of the whole shoulder, foreshank, neck and breast. Lots of great connective tissue, too, that makes for rich stews and curries. The various cuts can be separated at the joints using a only sharp knife. Individual cuts can be roasted, braised or grilled. As there is much less fat on goats than on lamb, beef, pork or chicken, if you smoke goat it is best to wrap in foil so it does not dry out. This primal cut is the heaviest, typically weighing 4-5 pounds. <br />
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<b>Rack</b>--this is what I consider the best of the best. Cuts from this primal include rib chops, loin chops or without the bone, the entire loin can be fileted off the bone--a real luxury! There are also ribs and belly. One of my all-time favorite things to do with this cut is put it meat side up on a large baking sheet, sprinkle with a mixture of bread crumbs, fresh herbs (especially rosemary), olive oil, a flavorful hard, dry grated cheese (<i>don't you dare use fake Parmesan out of a cardboard can</i>), fresh black pepper and large grain sea salt and bake for 20-30 minutes in an oven preheated to 450 degrees. You can do this on an outdoor grill or even better, in a wood-fired oven. Fair warning, if you want to cut your own chops, you are going to need a saw or a heavy cleaver. This primal cut is the smallest, typically weighing 2 3/4 to 3 1/4 pounds.<br />
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<b>Leg</b>--the entire rear leg is comprised of the chump, leg and shank. While most people like to roast up one of these bad boys on a rotisserie, just as easy and delicious is cutting the meat off the bone in large cubes and making kabobs. Similar to the rack, the leg can also be roasted until the internal temperature at the thickest part of the leg reads 150-155 degrees F with a meat thermometer. This primal cut typically weights 3 1/2 to 4 1/4 pounds. <br />
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And if you're still left wondering how on earth to cook goat meat, I would suggest <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Goat-Meat-Cheese-Bruce-Weinstein/dp/1584799056" target="_blank">Bruce Weinstein's book, GOAT: Meat, Milk, Ch</a>eese which as many wonderful recipes, including my favorite Goat Chops with Blackberries. <br />
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<br />Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7474320504282291685.post-80308337063361964862013-08-23T06:19:00.000-07:002013-11-12T12:38:15.272-08:00PART THREE: VEAL--Let The Fun Begin<b><i>This is the third of a five-part of posts regarding veal production
for small-scale farms and why educated eaters dedicated to local foods
and sustainable agriculture should be eating veal as well as beef.</i></b><br />
<br />
<b>HANDLING, CARE & FEEDING </b><br />
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-burEyU3JMak/Uhdd_n8BoxI/AAAAAAAAD00/ugcSmHoP4xY/s1600/IMG_5658.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-burEyU3JMak/Uhdd_n8BoxI/AAAAAAAAD00/ugcSmHoP4xY/s200/IMG_5658.jpg" width="149" /></a>Now that your calves are safe and sound at your facility from their initial transport from the dairy where they were born, it's time to really understand what it is to handle animals with the mentality of an infant yet the size of a large Labrador Retriever or Great Dane because that's how big they'll be when they're less than a week old. Being born is a tiresome business and just like all other newborns, calves want to do three things for the first few weeks of life: eat, eliminate and sleep.<br />
<br />
One thing I've said yet folks often fail to comprehend is just because a calf may weight a hundred pounds when they hit the ground, they are more delicate than a kitten. Think about that. I've watched as momma cats have drug their kittens from nest to nest shortly after giving birth with little adverse affects, yet when humans go hauling calves from one place to another--sometimes even on the same farm--the result is a failure to thrive. Calves that are stressed, especially those who have been moved away from their mothers in less than 72 hours after birth, often suffer from a number of maladies, the three big ones being pneumonia, <span class="st">Coccidiosis and E. coli. </span><span class="st"></span><br />
<br />
<span class="st">Several of my suppliers have been more than willing to provide me with the bull calves at a week old as they detest the local sale barns where they have often seen calves still wet from birth in the auction ring. Many of them even pen cows and calves together allowing the calf to nurse naturally prior to putting the cow back into the parlor and just keeping the precious immune-building colostrum (first milk) that is critical for the health of newborns. </span><br />
<span class="st"><br /></span>
<span class="st">To minimize stress, for the first week minimize handling. The only time I handle calves during week one is when they are fed. That's not to say I don't check on them often, but when I'm not feeding them, it's an unobtrusive look in to make sure they aren't laying flat out on their side or have gotten their head stuck in a water bucket or some sort of other mischief. </span><br />
<br />
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-xx_LjFieR4w/Uhda3za835I/AAAAAAAAD0Q/aVCSQYWcShc/s1600/IMG_5577.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="239" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-xx_LjFieR4w/Uhda3za835I/AAAAAAAAD0Q/aVCSQYWcShc/s320/IMG_5577.jpg" width="320" /></a><span class="st">Feeding always begins with individual bottles. <b>NEVER FEED A CALF WITH A BUCKET</b>. Calves mouths (and all mammals who suckle) are designed to use a nipple. Would you try to feed a newborn child out of a cup when it is only days old? This is the </span><span class="st">most unnatural thing for a calf and it will not consume enough milk to thrive. By using individual bottles, you can be certain how much a calf is consuming. Look for copious saliva production when your calf uses a nipple. This is a sign of healthy and will aid with digestion of the milk. When calves feed from buckets they do not salivate. Bottles are also the easiest way to delivery remedies if within the first few days, a calf begins to scour (diarrhea). About 90% of the time, scours can be alleviated by adding 1-2 raw eggs and either 8 ounces of cultured whole milk yogurt, cultured buttermilk or raw milk to the bottle if you are using a milk replacer formula. </span><span class="st"></span><br />
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<span class="st">There is another reason I choose to use bottles for the first 2-4 weeks--the calves will become extremely tame and follow your wiggling fingers making them much easier to lead as they grow larger. Calves will willingly jump on to a stock trailer at the sight of a bottle or mommy bucket which has multiple advantages--low stress for the animals and safer for the farmer. Because of this practice, I have been loading my calves by myself for years now when it's time to harvest them. There is no need for expensive chutes, electric prods or brute force. A word of caution, however. This type of devotion can also result in safety issues when in open pasture with larger calves. For calves who have been started by holding their head between my legs in order to get them to take a bottle--this is particularly needed for calves allowed to suckle from their damn instead of going straight on to the bottle right after birth at the dairy--calves will nudge from behind out of habit. If the calf is large enough, you will end up on your rear end as it runs between your legs looking for a bottle. </span><br />
<span class="st"><br /></span>
<span class="st">A note about milk replacer formula--there are many options out there on the market, some are medicated. Medicated feed can include antibiotics to reduce issues with E. coli and/or medication to prevent Coccidia (protozoan parasite). Similarly, less expensive formulas are based upon soy and include blood plasma to boost protein content. From my experience using many different brands and formulations of milk replacer, I've found that investing in a quality product up front will give you a quality product upon harvest. I do not use milk replacer formulas that contain either soy products, plasma or medication. </span><br />
<span class="st">While I do not agree with some of the advice given in this publication, it does a good job at explaining all the ingredients in commercial milk replacer formulas. </span><br />
<span class="st"><a href="http://www.aphis.usda.gov/animal_health/nahms/dairy/downloads/bamn/BAMN08_GuideMilkRepl.pdf">http://www.aphis.usda.gov/animal_health/nahms/dairy/downloads/bamn/BAMN08_GuideMilkRepl.pdf</a></span><br />
<span class="st"><br /></span>
<span class="st">Once you have decided on a type and brand of formula, <b>DO NOT SWITCH</b>. This is a sure way to upset your calves' digestive systems and set them back in gaining weight. My rule of thumb is to <i>always</i> keep at least one unopened bag of replacer on hand when feeding calves. That way I am certain not to run out and make a mad dash for the feed store only to find out they, too, are out. </span><br />
<span class="st"><br /></span>
<span class="st">When choosing a formula, don't just look at the ingredients to make your decision, but read the mixing directions as well. Some formulas only call for 8 ounces of powder per quart while others require 10, even 12 ounces to make quart. That fifty pound bag may sound like a deal compared to other brands, but in the long run will end up costing more. </span><br />
<span class="st"><br /></span>
<span class="st">There has been much debate and experimentation on how much and how often to feed calves. I start out feeding two quarts a day--morning and evening for the first week and then adding a full mid-day bottle for larger breeds the second week. This is where paying attention to your livestock is critical. Will they drink a full bottle at mid-day? Are they enthusiastic about their evening meal? Are they showing signs of scouring? By the third week or fourth week, I try to have them up to four bottles a day (2 gallons). While this type of feeding schedule can wreak havoc with your social life, it's well worth the effort until the calves are transferred to mommy buckets and dialed back to two 1-gallon feedings per day. </span><br />
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-fHFsiz1afhE/Uhdal6eR8xI/AAAAAAAADzs/1bkzQohTaAU/s1600/IMG_5573.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="239" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-fHFsiz1afhE/Uhdal6eR8xI/AAAAAAAADzs/1bkzQohTaAU/s320/IMG_5573.jpg" width="320" /></a><span class="st"><br /></span>
<span class="st">I've mentioned this contraption called a "mommy bucket". What is it? Basically, it's a bucket with two nipples </span><span class="st">attached to it. Some folks use 5-gallon buckets, others prefer flat-backed square buckets. I have access to lots of 3-gallon buckets so I use them. They cost about fifteen bucks each to make. While you may be able to find bucket teat units at your local supply store, I purchase ALL of my mommy bucket supplies from <a href="http://www.premier1supplies.com/" target="_blank">Premier One Supplies</a>.(the exception for this being the bucket and hardware for hanging the bucket on the fence) Advice to the wise---ALWAYS keep extra teats and extra rubber gaskets on hand and spend the extra $3.50 for a teat unit wrench. Tractor Supply and many of the local suppliers carry a brand of teat that is black. While these work in a pinch, they will not last an entire season. Teats are less than $2 each so like the straw for bedding, start with fresh when starting a new batch of calves. Mommy buckets will get dirty and should be cleaned regularly, but after their use with batch of calves, I remove the teat unit from the bucket and thoroughly sanitize them cleaning out any goo that has collected inside. At the same time, I replace the teats and if needed, the gaskets. </span><br />
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-G0zDWRB6wcs/UhdalsMl0rI/AAAAAAAADzo/m6mpuHHwHyI/s1600/IMG_5574.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="239" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-G0zDWRB6wcs/UhdalsMl0rI/AAAAAAAADzo/m6mpuHHwHyI/s320/IMG_5574.jpg" width="320" /></a><span class="st"><br /></span>
<span class="st">There are three main areas where calves are kept here at Painted Hand Farm--the barn, the paddocks and then the pastures. </span><br />
<span class="st"><br /></span>
<span class="st">Upon arrival, calves are housed in large stalls 16'x16' well-bedded with straw. They have access to fresh, clean water at all times. Larger calves, such as Holsteins or Brown Swiss are kept two or three to a stall, but the smaller breeds such as Jersey and Jersey crosses can have four. Personally, I like to keep it to two as that is what is easiest for one person to feed without getting mugged. </span><br />
<span class="st"><br /></span>
<span class="st">After they've spent their first week here at the farm, I begin letting them out of the barn into a large paddock area in the morning after their first feeding and then bringing them in later in the afternoon for their second feeding. This allows the calves access to fresh grass and to interact with the others who will ultimately become their pasture mates. One of my favorite things about raising calves (other than Osso Buco and sweetbreads) is watching them run for the very first time. Be prepared for a few face plants into the ground and fence during this time as they learn to use their legs. </span><br />
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<span class="st"><br /></span>
<span class="st">Another reason I prefer keeping calves in the barn is the smaller space makes it easier for bottle feeding and to eventually train to suckling from a "mommy bucket". Once they have successfully mastered the mommy buckets, calves are moved to outdoor paddocks constructed of woven wire as at this point they are not ready for high tensile electric wire, which they will run right through. A terrified calf that has been shocked is no joy to catch. </span><span class="st"></span><br />
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<span class="st">One note of housekeeping advice here--when calves leave the barn for good, clean out ALL of the bedding and spray down the area with a bleach solution. I use a 1-gallon garden sprayer with a 1:10 dilution. Similarly, thoroughly clean and sanitize all buckets and bottles used by those particular calves before starting the next batch of calves. And when bedding the animals, make sure <b>NOT TO USE MOLD OR DUSTY STRAW.</b> These few simple steps of cleanliness will ensure a better chance of raising healthy, vigorous calves (or any animals, for that matter.)</span><br />
<span class="st"><br /></span>
<span class="st">In the outdoor paddocks (the smallest being 60'x60'), no more than six calves are housed together at a time. In many mob-feeding operations, at this stage of the game they routinely house up to two dozen calves together, however, I've found that even when calves are of similar size and age in groups of more than six someone still gets out-competed for food and will fail to thrive. Since this series of articles is aimed at people getting started with veal calves, I'm going to stick to my advice of only housing six at a time together when they are in the 1-2 month/100-200 pound stage. </span><br />
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<span class="st">At this stage, the calves are hardy critters and can withstand all seasons as long as they have access to clean, fresh water and shelter with dry bedding. Again, do not use dusty or moldy straw. In the winter months, I will also bed with grass hay mixed with alfalfa to give the calves something on which to nibble. At no time do I ever use saw dust. It's expensive, messy and causes respiratory issues. </span><br />
<br />
<span class="st"> This is also the stage where if you choose to feed grain, you can start offering it to the calves. I've had a love-hate relationship with grain over the years. It's always a fine balance between getting an animal to market weight in the requisite amount of time. Jersey and Jersey crosses are difficult to get to market weight in less than six month on just milk and grass. If you have the time and the grass, that's great. Go for it. You'll be blessed with delicious meat, especially if calves have access the milk the entire time. However, if you are using milk replacer, this is not feasible to feed out a calf entirely on milk. At this point, there are two choices--good, quality alfalfa and/or 16% protein calf feed. </span><br />
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-O7nOF80jZ4Q/UhdaorBQZWI/AAAAAAAADz4/wVU8HFnzfTk/s1600/IMG_5569.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="239" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-O7nOF80jZ4Q/UhdaorBQZWI/AAAAAAAADz4/wVU8HFnzfTk/s320/IMG_5569.jpg" width="320" /></a><br />
<span class="st">In the paddock, calves are pretty much on autopilot--eat, sleep, pee, poop & play. Being in woven or welded wire, there's little chance of escape and they are large enough that a bout of scours isn't going to kill them in a few hours. That doesn't mean, however, that they can be ignored. Just as important as what is going in the front end, you want to keep an eye on what is coming out the back end. By now the calves will be nibbling at the grass and their stools should be firming up to look more like cow patties. But if a calf is squirting watery diarrhea, it's time to take a good look and figure out what's going on. </span><br />
<span class="st"><br /></span>
<span class="st">Scours can be caused by a variety of agents--protozoans (Coccidia, Cryptosporidia), bacteria (E. coli) and virus (Roto or Corona virus). Knowing the symptoms of each is critical for understanding how to treat the calf. Viruses need to run their course and the only thing to do is isolate the calf and provide enough fluids to prevent dehydration. A Coccidia infection will result in a brilliant yellow diarrhea with a more gelatinous texture and streaks of blood. Coccidia is present naturally, just like E. coli, and is a malady caused by stress, a depressed immune system and poor management (sanitation & crowding). </span><br />
<br />
<span class="st">Stress, stress, stress, scours, scours, scours....now you know why I say calves are more delicate than kittens. They are not meant to be taken from momma, trucked to auction, trucked to a barn where they are crowded with lots of other calves and fed unnaturally in a bucket with soy and blood-based slop loaded with harsh chemicals to prevent them from getting sick--minimal transport, minimal crowding, minimal problems, maximum return. </span><br />
<br />
<a href="https://fbcdn-sphotos-c-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-frc1/412633_3813632068707_639070258_o.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://fbcdn-sphotos-c-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-frc1/412633_3813632068707_639070258_o.jpg" width="240" /></a><span class="st">The final stage of grow is off to the pasture. For farmers just getting started or who have minimal land, life in a large paddock with access to grass and good hay works just fine. Here at Painted Hand Farm we are set up for rotational grazing and browsing with a series of pastures, paddocks and alley ways. Larger calves (150-200 pounds) are put into pasture with well-bedded shelters and fresh water. Mommy buckets are hung on the gates while milk is still being fed. </span><br />
<br />
<span class="st">Keep in mind that while they are still mentally babies, they are now getting big enough to hurt you even though they are not being malicious--they're just being calves. I do not castrate my bull calves as I believe an open wound only sets up opportunity for infection and it causes needless stress on the animals as they will be harvested before they reach breeding age. That does not mean, however, they won't exhibit behaviors such as mounting each other as a form of play. They're young males doing what young males do and again, these are words of caution from experience. When bull calves surpass 200 pounds, when you are in open pasture with them, carry a stick, do not run from calves chasing you, do not turn your back on them. Their hooves are sharp. Wear shoes with closed toes, preferably boots. Crocs don't count as shoes even though they're easy to clean when a calf craps on your feet. You will be slobbered on, sucked on , chewed on, peed on, crapped on, kicked and even knocked down a time or two before you get the hang of handling calves. </span><br />
<br />
<span class="st">Raising calves for veal can be a rewarding and profitable venture for new and beginning farmers as long as you use common sense. As the adage goes--you are what you eat <i>eats</i>. I am a firm believer that when people eat sick animals, they too become sick. Calves that are raised in an industrial environment aren't the ones ending up at farmers markets, fine dining establishments and boutique butcher shops--they're the ones ground into breaded patties and served smothered in sauce for less than $10 a plate. Calves raised in clean and humane environments that are well-fed are in demand by discerning and educated consumers who understand the value and increasingly, customers are also becoming aware of the carbon footprint associated with raising beef as opposed to that of harvesting animals at a younger age. </span><br />
<span class="st"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="st">Take aways for this installment......<br />
</span><br />
<ol>
<li>Calves <i><b>MUST HAVE</b></i> had a good start with colostrum in order to live and thrive. </li>
<li>Use a non-medicated quality milk replacer.</li>
<li>Started calves on individual bottles to ensure their milk intake.</li>
<li>How to build a 'mommy bucket'. </li>
<li>Causes and cures for scours. </li>
</ol>
<span class="st">So if you are a new or beginning farmer in an area were you have access to dairy bull calves consider raising veal.</span><br />
<br />
In the next installment of this series, I'll be talking about harvesting, processing and packaging. Stay tuned.....<br />
<br />
Follow Sandra throughout the rest of the series at these links:
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="http://pasture2plate.blogspot.com/2013/07/part-one-veal-time-to-change-attitudes.html" target="_blank">PART ONE of this series can be found at this link. </a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="http://pasture2plate.blogspot.com/2013/07/part-two-veal-getting-started.html" target="_blank">PART TWO of this series can be found at this link.</a></div>
<a href="http://pasture2plate.blogspot.com/2013/09/part-four-veal-most-difficult-part-of.html" target="_blank">PART FOUR of this series can be found at this link.</a><br />
<a href="http://pasture2plate.blogspot.com/2013/11/part-five-veal-getting-it-on-plates.html" target="_blank">PART FIVE of this series can be found at this link. </a>Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7474320504282291685.post-51564535803815471492013-07-30T06:00:00.000-07:002013-11-06T11:47:07.904-08:00PART TWO: VEAL--Getting Started <b><i>This is the second of a five-part of posts regarding veal production
for small-scale farms and why educated eaters dedicated to local foods
and sustainable agriculture should be eating veal as well as beef.</i></b><br />
<br />
Let's face it, just like any other business, getting starting with farming involves capital expenditures. Fortunately, today there are more programs and paradigms designed to fund first-time farmers who aren't following in their family footsteps and inheriting a functioning farm or even fallow land.<br />
<br />
Land is expensive. Equipment and infrastructure is costly, including when purchased as used. Even if you have access to both, the time and labor required to start any agricultural-based venture can take <i>years</i> to develop herds, pastures and soil fertility.<br />
<br />
For small-scale ventures, I've found that the investment needed to start raising veal calves is quite similar to that of pastured poultry. As with poultry, prior to the arrival of the livestock there must be some type of infrastructure in place. Let's start there.<br />
<br />
<b>Facilities & Equipment</b><br />
With the advocacy of leasing land, the minimal infrastructure required makes veal production ideal for anyone not wanting to make expensive capital investments on land they do not own. Whether or not you own your land will most likely determine the type of fencing installed. I just want to preface this section with the advice that regardless of the type of fencing system you use, this is not an area in which you want to skimp, go cheap or used (if you can help it) or do a half-assed job. Good fencing, regardless of permanent or temporary will be your biggest return on investment.<br />
<br />
Here at Painted Hand Farm, my fencing runs the gauntlet from fortified <a href="http://www.grainger.com/Grainger/Hardware-Cloth-4LVE5?Pid=search" target="_blank">quarter-inch hardware cloth</a>, <a href="http://www.tractorsupply.com/en/store/searchterm/hog%20panels" target="_blank">pre-fabricated feedlot panels</a>, <a href="http://www.redbrand.com/Products/HorseFence/SafeGuard.aspx" target="_blank">Red Brand SafeGuard</a>, <a href="http://www.kencove.com/fence/82_High+Tensile+Fence_resource.php" target="_blank">six-wire high tensile</a>, <a href="http://www.premier1supplies.com/c/fencing/electric_netting/" target="_blank">portable electrified netting</a> and <a href="http://www.premier1supplies.com/c/fencing/posts/" target="_blank">portable step-in fiberglass posts</a> for <a href="http://www.premier1supplies.com/c/fencing/conductors-tape-rope-twine-_wire/" target="_blank">IntelliRope hotwire</a>. I have had calves in all kinds enclosures depending on their age and the area in which I want them kept. I would suggest using common sense when choosing fencing. Younger calves should be in stronger, non-electrified enclosures and as they get older can be moved into more flexible configurations.<br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-jt2pFDhVF-g/UnqZ2dFZrOI/AAAAAAAAECU/JRKyq39CCk4/s1600/CIMG0013.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-jt2pFDhVF-g/UnqZ2dFZrOI/AAAAAAAAECU/JRKyq39CCk4/s320/CIMG0013.JPG" width="320" /></a>Prior to raising veal, I had been developing a commercial meat goat herd and it didn't take long to realize that calves aren't much bigger than full grown meat goats, thus, they were able to also utilize the same inexpensive, portable three-sided huts I had previously built for the goat herd.</div>
<br />
My huts are 3'x4'x8' each. Set up in pairs facing each other with a standard sheet of plywood covered with rubber roofing or some other water-impermeable material, these huts have the capacity to shelter up to six calves at a time quite comfortably until they reach approximately 300-350 pounds. <br />
<br />
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-hVYTjvy1nxM/UnqcgjVy-6I/AAAAAAAAECg/tiEVRa__eB8/s1600/CIMG0021.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-hVYTjvy1nxM/UnqcgjVy-6I/AAAAAAAAECg/tiEVRa__eB8/s320/CIMG0021.JPG" width="320" /></a>The first set of three sided huts built here were made out of a shipping crate for a network attached storage device and the aluminum sides of an above-ground swimming pool, which, ironically has the appearance of wood. They are still in use and good repair after twelve years. I have also built lighter versions from a wood frame and metal roofing. While more expensive, the total cost of a pair of huts (approximately $250) is still considerably less than the price of a single calf hutch (approximately $400 new). I have also seen wonderful shelters made from straw bales and wooden pallets. <br />
<br />
My point on housing is it does not have to be anything expensive or permanent in order to be effective.<br />
<br />
Veal calves can be reared on a fraction of pasture compared to beef which requires several acres per animal to reach a harvestable weight. Calves gain most of their nutrition from milk and are smaller animals, thus require less forage. I've found that running calves with goats in browse areas works especially well as the calves learn to browse the high-protein forbs from their caprine counter parts thus providing them with richer nutrition leading to better growth rates.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-z1TwkLgbnzc/Ud7rNSKAd6I/AAAAAAAADsQ/ty1aiFml0-k/s1600/calfskm.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="181" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-z1TwkLgbnzc/Ud7rNSKAd6I/AAAAAAAADsQ/ty1aiFml0-k/s200/calfskm.jpg" width="200" /></a>If you do have access to several acres, you may want to consider using nurse cows as opposed to feeding milk replacer. This is when multiple calves are grafted to a single milk cow, however, this often requires investment into a head gate and will be covered more in my next post covering feeding.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-jvWbjl91sos/UfbRrgLdaJI/AAAAAAAADxA/DD18Rp3OZQ8/s1600/IMG_0794.MOV" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-jvWbjl91sos/UfbRrgLdaJI/AAAAAAAADxA/DD18Rp3OZQ8/s320/IMG_0794.MOV" width="180" /></a>For me, feeding the calves is the funnest part. You know the adage that boys don't really grow up, they just buy bigger toys? Well, in my case this girl just got dollies that drank out of bigger bottles! <br />
<br />
While bottle feeding is fun and works great for the first few weeks, my favorite contraption is a mommy bucket. They are inexpensive to make with simple supplies from <a href="http://www.premier1supplies.com/" target="_blank">Premier One Supplies</a>. Most importantly, they allow you to feed larger calves more than two quarts at a time safely from the opposite side of the fence.<br />
<br />
<b>Breed Types & Acquisition</b><br />
When I first began raising veal calves unexpectedly, I started out with pure bred Jersey calves because they were free. The dairy farmer had to pay to have them taken away so I was actually saving her money. But years later when they were no longer available to me, I switched to Holsteins. Although I had to pay for the calves, I found that their larger size meant they made it to market weight faster or yielded more given the same inputs over the same amount of time it took to get a Jersey calf to harvest weight.<br />
<br />
I am very fortunate living in a dairy-rich area and have been able to cultivate relationships with several dairy farmers who will offer me first crack at their bull calves prior to sending them to the local livestock auctions. One thing I want to make perfectly clear to anyone interested in raising calves for veal and that is <span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: red;"><i><b>NEVER BUY CALVES AT A PUBLIC LIVESTOCK AUCTION!! </b></i></span></span><br />
<br />
Despite their size, calves are more delicate than kittens when it comes to being moved around so soon after birth. I've seen a momma cat drag her babies to a new spot every day for a week running after giving birth with no ill effects to the kittens, yet calves picked up by a hauler, tossed on a trailer with umpteen other calves from various farms, trucked for hours, run through a public sale barn and trucked with yet another set of animals to another location often suffer from both digestive and respiratory distress requiring the administration of harsh chemicals and antibiotics to prevent mortality. There is also no guarantee that the calf you are purchasing has received colostrum--the mother's first milk--that is necessary to ensure adequate antibodies for the calf to thrive. <br />
<br />
When I had to start purchasing my calves, I did my homework. First, I checked out the freely available market reports from the <a href="http://www.ams.usda.gov/AMSv1.0/ams.fetchTemplateData.do?template=TemplateP&page=Cattle" target="_blank">USDA's website listing the going rate for veal calves</a> at the local auctions. This number can vary widely throughout the year especially when the big packing houses are gobbling up everything for their feedlots after a significant draw down on the national beef herd due to feedstock supplies affected by weather. At one point, Holstein bull calves were bringing $200 a head compared to the $50-75 average.<br />
<br />
Since calves are a minor revenue stream for dairy farmers and can take up a significant amount of resources compared to their value for farmers who must transport them to the sales barns themselves, ask a dairy farmer to figure out the average price paid for his bull calves in the previous year and then set a price accordingly. That way the farmer is guaranteed the same price each time without the wild fluctuations of the open market and you can better budget for the acquisition of calves. Several of my suppliers are Certified Organic dairies operated by Old Order Amish who must pay someone to haul their bull calves to auction since they don't drive vehicles. Add on top of that the sale barn commission and the costs associated with just getting the animal to sale can exceed its purchase price in a bad market cycle, thus leaving the dairy farmer with a bill. <br />
<br />
Also, many dairy farms who milk purebred Holsteins tend to freshen their heifers to Jersey bulls so the smaller calf is an easy birth for the young cows. These cross-bred animals are a hit-or-miss kind of prospect at the local sale barn so offering a standard price to the farmer is an incentive for them to sell all of these bull calves (and sometimes the heifers) to you for a predetermined price. <br />
<br />
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-iXWpusmlZyw/UfbR1lw56YI/AAAAAAAADwo/qbiQ6qm3vFw/s1600/IMG_1841.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-iXWpusmlZyw/UfbR1lw56YI/AAAAAAAADwo/qbiQ6qm3vFw/s320/IMG_1841.jpg" width="239" /></a>When a dairy farmer calls me about a bull calf, he knows he knows that I will pick up the calf free of charge and he'll be paid an expected (and fair) price for the animal on the spot. In return, I ask that the calf receive at least four to six feedings (2-3 days) of colostrum before I take possession. It's been a win-win situation.<br />
<br />
This leads us to our final topic of this segment--<b>transportation</b>. <br />
<br />
Often I hear from new and beginning farmers that they can't afford a truck and trailer to get started with larger livestock. There have been many a small ruminant stuffed into a dog crate and transported in minivans, yet folks are a bit cautious about hauling livestock unrestrained unless they are in a separate compartment such as the back of an enclosed truck or a trailer. While I am extremely fortunate to own a truck and trailer, a few years ago when a call came in to pick up a pair of organic Holstein calves I found my rig inaccessible due to extremely wet and icy conditions. However, my trusty all-wheel-drive Subaru wagon was ready to go!<br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-MvkC9-JxXXo/ToKGMTqSEeI/AAAAAAAACvU/Xvrq92IzqWw/s1600/IMG_0728.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="239" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-MvkC9-JxXXo/ToKGMTqSEeI/AAAAAAAACvU/Xvrq92IzqWw/s320/IMG_0728.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
Since then I have seen calves hauled in minivans, retired police cruisers (specifically the Ford Interceptor) with the rear seat removed, SUV's and yes....other Subaru wagons which will easily hold four calves. One calf even arrived here at the farm in the back of a Mercedes wagon secured in a gunnysack with his head sticking out!<br />
<br />
As for getting the calves to the processor, if you do not have a truck and trailer this is where paying a livestock hauler will have to suffice. Right now the going rate is about a dollar a mile per load round trip. While this is not economical for a single animal, consider if your processor is 20 miles away and you have four animals to process, that translates into $10 per head...much more cost effective than spending thousands of dollars on your own rig, especially when you are first getting started.<br />
<br />
So what have we covered today....<br />
<ol>
<li>You don't need a large, expensive barn in which to house calves. </li>
<li>You don't need a lot of pasture on which to raise calves. </li>
<li>You don't need large, specialized feeders. </li>
<li>You don't need a fancy truck and trailer to get started. </li>
<li>Never, ever buy calves from public auctions or sale barns. </li>
</ol>
In the next installment of this series, I'll be covering handling, care & feeding. Stay tuned.....<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<a href="http://pasture2plate.blogspot.com/2013/07/part-one-veal-time-to-change-attitudes.html" target="_blank">PART ONE to this series can be found at this link. </a><br />
<a href="http://pasture2plate.blogspot.com/2013/08/part-three-veal-let-fun-begin.html" target="_blank">PART THREE of this series can be found at this link.</a><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="http://pasture2plate.blogspot.com/2013/09/part-four-veal-most-difficult-part-of.html" target="_blank">PART FOUR of this series can be found at this link. </a></div>
<a href="http://pasture2plate.blogspot.com/2013/11/part-five-veal-getting-it-on-plates.html" target="_blank">PART FIVE of this series can be found at this link. </a>Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7474320504282291685.post-11748338672658142462013-07-29T11:09:00.000-07:002013-07-30T14:57:52.896-07:00How about those yolks, folks!Did anyone happen to catch NPR's story about Ari Shapiro's pale egg yolks while traveling in Africa recently? (<a href="http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2013/07/12/201501977/help-my-egg-yolks-are-freakishly-white" target="_blank">The Salt: Help! My Egg Yolks Are Freakishly White</a>)<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://media.npr.org/assets/img/2013/07/12/51375422_wide-6bb2044db566730b5027fb912d4aba37bf51f923-s40.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="179" src="http://media.npr.org/assets/img/2013/07/12/51375422_wide-6bb2044db566730b5027fb912d4aba37bf51f923-s40.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
The article had been sent to me by one of my egg customers asking me what I thought about the story as they know I'm a stickler for raising good eggs from laying hens living outdoors, scratching in the dirt, eating bugs and chemical-free plants along with non-GMO grains. Hang around me long enough and you'll hear (or read) <a href="http://pasture2plate.blogspot.com/2013/03/chickens-are-not-vegetarians.html" target="_blank">my rants about the bullsh!t industrial egg producers--especially the organic ones--print on their cartons that really ruffle my feathers, such as <i>cage-free, vegetarian feed</i> and<i> no hormones</i>. </a><br />
The manager of the lodge where Shapiro was staying offered the explanation as to why American eggs have brightly colored yolks was "because they're pumped full of hormones". I want to debunk this myth about chickens and hormones once and for all.<br />
<br />
First, hormone use in poultry is illegal. Yes, it's also illegal in veal calves, but industrial producers still use them. Why? Because they promote faster growth. However, this is not true for poultry. Feeding or injecting growth hormones into chickens will not make them grow faster or lay more eggs....period! And even if they did, the hormones would have to be injected into each bird. Shooting up a few hundred animals is a lot different than injecting tens of thousands of birds that reach harvest weight in weeks, not months. Heck, even the completely organic pastured broilers raised here at Painted Hand Farm are ready for harvest in sixty days. So hormones or steroids just aren't needed. <br />
<br />
Although I knew that the color of the yolk is entirely dependent upon the layers' feed, it never occurred to me that in other parts of the world commercial feed wouldn't include our traditionally abundant yellow corn that comprises the majority of industrial chicken feed here in the U.S. Over the years I've heard stories about Certified Organic CAFO egg producers adding dried marigold leaves to their rations to bump up the color or even small flock producers who house their birds in a barn dumping lawn clippings to add greens to their hens' diet for richer yolks, yet it would make perfect sense that chickens fed the African feedstock staples of sorghum<i> </i>and white maize would have paler yolks.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-AmNi7KfFlIo/Ufg2sW6OK8I/AAAAAAAADxQ/jqyVxkwW-Rk/s1600/IMG_5741%5B1%5D.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="239" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-AmNi7KfFlIo/Ufg2sW6OK8I/AAAAAAAADxQ/jqyVxkwW-Rk/s320/IMG_5741%5B1%5D.jpg" width="320" /></a>Ironically, in reading down through the comments on the article, a Peace Corps Volunteer in Tanzania elaborated on the difference between "kisasa", (meaning "modern" in
Kiswahili) pale-yolked eggs that are commercially available and the eggs that come from local villages where chickens merely scrounge around for food, which do indeed have bright yellow yolks.<br />
<br />
But the part that had me the most excited about this story was the veteran NPR radio journalist's comment, "I buy my eggs from my neighborhood farmers market, and the yolks are the color of a setting sun." I knew he was talking about<i> my eggs!</i><br />
<br />
So when he showed up at market this week, I was extra excited to hand over a dozen of my brown beauties to him knowing well that they had been appreciated and missed. This is the part of my job that make life as a farmer truly rewarding. <br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-CsfO12ciE2M/UfasLAvsT6I/AAAAAAAADwQ/IcQ5Awsj674/s1600/arishapiro.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="640" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-CsfO12ciE2M/UfasLAvsT6I/AAAAAAAADwQ/IcQ5Awsj674/s640/arishapiro.JPG" width="476" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b><i>Ari Shapiro and his egg farmer at the Bloomingdale Farmers Market in Washington, D.C.</i></b></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<br />Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7474320504282291685.post-47784506067751924442013-07-13T16:39:00.001-07:002013-07-18T09:09:10.619-07:00Crock-pot Curry<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-HHtmlS7pV_o/UeHgtX9Ud0I/AAAAAAAADtI/X9VWyr-Ssw4/s1600/curry.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="298" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-HHtmlS7pV_o/UeHgtX9Ud0I/AAAAAAAADtI/X9VWyr-Ssw4/s400/curry.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
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Although I have a passion for cooking great food, frequently my schedule of farming, going to markets and writing necessitates limiting my time in the kitchen. But that doesn't mean I can't still eat very, very well. For busy times, as well as those days were heating up the stove would be unbearable, I break out the Crock-pot.<br />
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-nhidvy26vpk/UeQXEa7SYXI/AAAAAAAADtg/BbLbiGyyARE/s1600/garners.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-nhidvy26vpk/UeQXEa7SYXI/AAAAAAAADtg/BbLbiGyyARE/s200/garners.jpg" width="149" /></a>As I have often told customers asking how to cook a certain piece of meat, many know my standard answer is to toss it in a slow cooker with vegetables and liquid of your choosing and walk away for the day. Many times I've gone home to a delicious (and healthy!) hot meal after a long day in the city ensuring others have access to organically and humanely pasture-raised meats.<br />
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So, what's on the menu at Painted Hand Farm this week?</div>
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<b><span style="font-size: large;">Sandra's Summer Crock-Pot Curry</span></b><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">1-2 pounds of meat or meaty bones (cuts work well, but bones give enough flavor yet keep the dish light)</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">6-8 cups diced summer vegetables (this week is garlic, onion, tomato, eggplant, zucchini and hot peppers)</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">1 can coconut milk</span></span><br />
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-t0xfSthxxag/UeQXL_-K_yI/AAAAAAAADto/vhAyQaEBAa0/s1600/vegies.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-t0xfSthxxag/UeQXL_-K_yI/AAAAAAAADto/vhAyQaEBAa0/s200/vegies.jpg" width="149" /></a><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">2 cups liquid (can be water, stock, wine, cider, juice) </span></span><b><span style="font-size: large;"> </span></b><br />
1-2 tablespoons curry paste (red or green)<br />
1/2 cup minced fresh herbs (I like either basil or cilantro)<br />
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Layer meat first, herbs next and then vegetables on top. Add liquids and curry paste. I like to shake my curry paste in a jar with some of the liquid to disperse it evenly before pouring over everything. Cover & cook!<br />
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It's easy. It's delicious. It's healthy. It won't heat up your kitchen and best of all, it will leave you plenty of time to enjoy summer. Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7474320504282291685.post-41475218223084012922013-07-11T10:47:00.003-07:002013-12-02T11:38:31.021-08:00PART ONE: VEAL--Time to change attitudes and misconceptions <b><i>This is the first in a series of posts regarding veal production for small-scale farms and why educated eaters dedicated to local foods and sustainable agriculture should be eating veal more than beef. </i></b><br />
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Inevitably, not a week goes by at market when someone openly remarks, "How can you be so cruel and eat those adorable babies!" Suppressing the desire to reach across the table and shake some sense into them, I counter.<br />
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"Do you each chicken? Harvested at six to eight weeks. Pork? Five to seven months. Lamb? Less than a year."<br />
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"Oh no, I don't eat meat. I'm a vegetarian."<br />
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Again, I respond, "Do you eat butter or yogurt or ice cream?" and if they answer yes, they're busted. I consider one of the biggest highlights of my market days to have been a pair of militant vegetarians who had openly threatened me online and then showed up to picket my stand at a popular DC market one Saturday morning. By the time I was done educating them, they actually purchased a piece of veal scallopine as their eschewing of meat stemmed from the egregious treatment of commercially-raised livestock.<br />
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Most folks know that I raise veal because I live in the heart of dairy country and have incredible access to bull calves, which are indeed a by-product of the modern dairy industry. Some have even heard the story about how I fell in love with veal kidneys in green peppercorn sauce after a visit to <a href="http://bistrojeanty.com/">Bistro Jeanty in Napa Valley</a> years ago, but refused to commercially-raised veal. And I openly admit to not letting animals on the farm surpass three hundred pounds as that's about my limit for loading an obstinate pasture pal on the Sausage Wagon by myself.<br />
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But the real reason you should be consuming veal raised by local farmers, especially small dairies and creameries, is <b><i>sustainability</i></b>. <br />
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I've been raising cattle in one form or another since 1988 in both the west and the east. I know the amount of resources--land, water, infrastructure, fuel, time--it takes to make a profit with a beef cow, a dairy cow and a veal calf. And while some of my fondest memories are of pushing cattle through the morning mist in the walnut grove of the Flying H in the upper Ojai Valley, the truth is way more resources went into getting a steak on the table than what it takes to raise a calf to a harvestable weight.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Beef cattle grazing on hay fields in the upper Ojai Valley after they hay has been harvested. </i></td></tr>
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As more new and beginning farmers enter into livestock production, raising veal is a way to maximize profit (and reduce risk) on smaller acreages. Let's do some math....<br />
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Since cow-calf beef operations require large acreages in order to be self-sustaining, smaller diversified farms often purchase "stockers" or "feeder" which are basically well-started weaned calves weighing 700 pounds or less.Typically running $1.25 lb., a farmer has to lay out a significant investment up front to feed out a single animal to harvest weight which can take a year or longer, especially for purely grass-fed animals. Keep in mind that the farmer has little control of how that calf was reared until the point of when it was purchased. That means it could have been raised in a dry-lot, given antibiotics or hormones and fed grain for nearly half of its life.<br />
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In comparison, three day-old bull calves straight from the dairy often sell for less than a hundred dollars. Smaller-framed breeds, such as <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jersey_cattle">Jersey</a> and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guernsey_cattle">Guernsey</a>, go for as little as ten bucks at regional livestock auctions. My entry into the veal business began after a local Jersey dairy gave me their calves for free because the market was so depressed at the time it actually cost them money to dispose of their unwanted bull calves when they shipped them to auction after paying the hauler and the commission fees.<br />
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But here's the part most folks don't consider. By purchasing a very young animal, producer have much more control over the full production cycle of that animal meaning they can attest to the way it was raised from start to finish. This means that even calves purchased from conventional dairies can still be raised organically and humanely, meaning using non-medicated, milk-based formula or nurse cows and rearing the calves on pasture instead of chained or crated. <br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>In one season, this two-teated Jersey cow reared three calves who yielded approximately 1,100 live weight from only her milk and pasture. </i></td></tr>
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Let's talk about risk. For math's sake, let's assign the cost of a single feeder calf as $500 and that of a bull calf of $50. That's 1:10, meaning as a new and beginning farmer (who make mistakes that result in mortality, it's part of the learning curve) if your animal dies, you have 100% loss, but with calves, out of that same initial investment it is possible to have an 80% mortality rate (four out of five croak) and you may still not incur a total financial loss. <br />
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Another risk many consumers don't think about when choosing between a veal loin chop and a beef T-bone (same cut, by the way) is the physical risk to the farmer. As a woman farmer, I am extremely cognizant of how quickly larger animals can injure me. That's the last thing I want. A few years ago when making the switch from raising Jersey calves to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holstein_cattle">Holsteins</a> I was unprepared for the larger calves. Walking into a pen with individual bottles for three strapping black and white calves, I was instantly knocked to the ground and trampled into the mud by ravenous 'babies' that were double the weight of the little doe-eyed, buck-toothed Jersey boys at birth.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>That's a mini-Tbone (aka veal loin chop) that is perfect for feeding one person</i>.</td></tr>
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Along that same vein, by starting with calves within days of birth, a farmer can determine just how tame they want their livestock to be where as with stockers, many have been reared on the cow barely handled by humans and can be downright wild. This often means investing in some type of handling equipment, be it a set of swing gates or a specialized squeeze chute, especially if the animals were purchased intact (uncastrated). Veal are harvested long before the calves exhibit any aggressive male behavior, castrating and exposing the animals to additional stress and risk of infection is unnecessary and they are small enough to be restrained with the help of another person using a cotton rope. <br />
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Similarly, raising beef animals, even for a modest herd, can require dozens to hundreds of acres as compared to as little as an acre to sustainably raise veal for both personal consumption and market sales.<br />
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Why such a small acreage? Simple--smaller animals require less space and will consume less pasture, especially since milk or formula will constitute the majority of calories consumed during its lifetime.<br />
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And finally, calves are harvested long before beeves. This is particularly critical to new and beginning farmers as it is a product with a shorter production cycle, thus a quicker return upon investment. Just as the infamous <a href="http://www.polyfacefarms.com/">Joel Salatin of Polyface Farm</a> has preached poultry as the gateway livestock for beginning farmers, I highly suggest first timers with limited resources to start with calves before over-capitalizing with a beef operation, especially those with little or no experience handling larger livestock or with animal husbandry (breeding & birthing) skills for small ruminant production.<br />
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Throughout this series of posts, I'm going to chronicle what I have learned from raising, harvesting and direct marketing veal through farmers markets, restaurants and boutique butchers these last eight years. I'll be covering:<br />
<ul>
<li>Breed types, acquisition, transportation, equipment and facilities</li>
<li>Handling, Care & Feeding</li>
<li>Harvest, Processing & Packaging</li>
<li>Sales & Marketing</li>
</ul>
As the local foods and sustainable agriculture movement continues to grow, it is my hope to see more consumers and producers taking advantage of this much maligned meat. <br />
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Follow Sandra throughout the rest of the series at these links:<br />
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<a href="http://pasture2plate.blogspot.com/2013/07/part-two-veal-getting-started.html" target="_blank">PART TWO of this series can be found at this link.</a></div>
<a href="http://pasture2plate.blogspot.com/2013/08/part-three-veal-let-fun-begin.html" target="_blank">PART THREE of this series can be found at this link.</a> <br />
<a href="http://pasture2plate.blogspot.com/2013/09/part-four-veal-most-difficult-part-of.html" target="_blank">PART FOUR of this series can be found at this link.</a><br />
<a href="http://pasture2plate.blogspot.com/2013/11/part-five-veal-getting-it-on-plates.html" target="_blank">PART FIVE of this series can be found at this link. </a><br />
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Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7474320504282291685.post-485418814625168202013-07-06T19:04:00.000-07:002013-07-08T06:22:34.340-07:00Traditional Delights from the Ottoman EmpireMove over Huevos Rancheros, you've just been replaced as my new favorite with the spicy egg & tomato concoction--Shakshouka, which is a traditional northern African dish popular in Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia as well as Israel. Introduced to me by one of my regular egg customers in the city, I quickly realized that the staples needed for this spicy amalgamation of garlic, onion, peppers, tomatoes and spices are just coming into season at the local markets, I couldn't help but pass along this recipe to everyone. Best of all, it's an extremely healthy meal, especially for all you Paleo/Primal eaters! {<i>hint: make a double or triple batch and then just spoon out a few scoopfuls each time you want to cook up a few eggs</i>)<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Yes, one of my friends actually sent me a postcard from there. </i></td></tr>
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<span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 26.0pt; font-weight: bold; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">Shakshouka</span></div>
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<span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-style: italic; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">Tunisian breakfast dish of eggs poached in a rich, spicy tomato sauce </span><span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; font-style: italic; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span lang="en-US" style="language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">3 tablespoons olive oil <span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>1 small onion, sliced</span></address>
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<span lang="en-US" style="language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">2 teaspoon ground cumin<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>1/2 teaspoon ground coriander</span></address>
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<span lang="en-US" style="language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">1/4 teaspoon harissa or cayenne<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>1/4 teaspoon turmeric powder </span></address>
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<span lang="en-US" style="language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">Salt & ground black pepper<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>6 eggs</span><span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; font-weight: bold; language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;"></span></address>
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<span lang="en-US" style="language: en-US; mso-ansi-language: en-US;">In a large frying pan or saucepan, fry the onions, garlic and peppers in olive oil until they become glossy and soft, about 10 minutes on medium-high heat. Add the spices and stir, cooking for about two minutes to release the oils. Add the tomatoes and simmer for about an hour, or until the onions and peppers are very soft (your patience will be rewarded). Add a splash of water here and there to make sure the sauce doesn’t burn. Crack in the eggs and let them simmer for about five minutes, or until the whites have set. Alternatively (making it menemen), dribble in whisked eggs and cook until set. Serve with warm flatbread and a sprinkle of parsley. </span><span lang="en-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; language: en-US;"></span></div>
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At the suggestion of my customer, I began by charring both the peppers and tomatoes using my gas burners to remove the skin and lend a roasted flavor. This can also easily be done on the grill. </div>
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Delicious and easy to make with a few simple ingredients from your local farmers market or your garden.</div>
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The next step is to add artichoke hearts, potato and fava beans and top with a good feta. And of course, adding in any of Painted Hand Farm's sausages (or any others from your local farmers market) would fare well with this recipe. </div>
<br />Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7474320504282291685.post-52479204451538800032013-06-18T09:50:00.001-07:002013-06-18T09:56:14.979-07:00An Ethical Omnivore<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b> Breakfast: Guinea fowl eggs with lambs quarters, pig weed, onion and chicken hearts</b><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;">What is it that makes my breakfast this morning so 'ethical'? </span></div>
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<i><span style="font-size: small;">Let's start with the eggs...</span></i></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">I use Guinea Fowl on my farm to control the pest population. No Frontline for the cats & dogs because thanks to these feathered dinosaurs who voraciously hunt down bugs and eat them so there is no need to poison my pets. However, because of their free-roaming nature, they tend to lay there eggs in places I may not find them immediately, therefore, I rarely sell Guinea eggs unless I know exactly when they've been laid. Coming across a nest of these conical little beauties is, indeed, a treat as their yolks tend to be large and extra-rich as compared to a chicken's egg due to the fact Guineas forage up to 90% of their diet as opposed to a chicken's 40%. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">When I find an errant nest, I place the eggs in a bowl of water. Those that float get tossed out, but if they stay firmly on the bottom, they'll become breakfast. By the way, this test works on all types of eggs. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><i>The heart of a good meal....</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">What else? Heart! Raising animals from conception to customer, after all these years I've learned there is precious little that ever gets wasted. But there are a few key items that seem to languish in the freezer (or are such delicacies), I tend to keep them for myself. One of these are chicken hearts. Out of a fifty bird batch, I may end up with a pound of hearts. I've cooked them all sorts of ways, but my favorite is to simply fry them all up at once in their own fat with just a little black pepper and then cut up a few at a time and saute them along with greens and onions or garlic for a quick breakfast. They are also quite good on bamboo skewers and grilled until crispy. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><i>Eat those weeds!</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">Let me tell you, there are plenty of weeds in my garden. But what is a weed? As a meat goat producer, <b>I LOVE weeds</b>! Why? They are extremely high in nutrients and weed-fed goats grow faster & taste better. After attending a <a href="http://www.sonnewald.org/events_weed_walk.html">Weed Walk with the renown Grace Lefever of Sonnewald Natural Foods</a>, my mind will forever be changed about what I see as a weed versus what I see as food, not just for myself but for my animals. <i> </i> </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><i> </i></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">While I may not chow down on poison ivy (which weighs in at 26% protein and is high in vitamin C) like my goats do, this morning's breakfast straight from the rows between my planted crops is <a href="http://fort-greene.thelocal.nytimes.com/2009/06/10/urban-forager-sheepish-about-lambsquarters/">Lambs Quarters</a> and <a href="http://www.ediblemanhattan.com/departments/urban-forager/a-tale-of-two-pigweeds/">Pig Weed</a>. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">Eating weeds is much preferred to spending money on expensive herbicides anyway. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">By the way, being an 'ethical omnivore' is also cost-effective. Even shopping at the trendiest of farmers markets for these ingredients still puts this breakfast at less than a $1.50 as long as you pick your own weeds and you'll stand in line longer at Starbucks than it took to cook it. </span></div>
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Sandra Kay Millerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02818864134465526818noreply@blogger.com0