FARM MEAT!!!!!
Last night I went to a homeschool meeting. The speaker used to be a VP at Gateway, but was now a SAHM and living on a farm. She used to live right around the corner from Z's basketball home court (in a very fancy house). She told us about grass-fed beef, free-range chickens and free-range pigs. They raise their own meat. They even have dairy cows and drink only raw milk. She told us all about the horrible things that industrial farmers do to their animals (and thus the food they produce). Her chickens, eggs, beef and pork do not taste like anything you buy in the store. Her eggs are $3 a dozen (which is cheaper than free-range eggs in the grocery store around here). If I had the money, if we didn't have to drive to Kenosha, WI, to get the meat, and if I had room, I might be tempted to go hog wild (excuse the expression). Do you think I have room in my little freezer?
Thankfully, my freezer will feed us for several weeks. Maybe my next load of food should come from their farm. Not likely, but it is a nice thought.
posted by Adminswife @ 9:27 PM
4 Comments:
It's an interesting dilemma. Dan and I have been learning about this topic a lot lately. We've watched Food, Inc., Food Matters, and read articles online. I think the next time we buy a 1/4 cow, we'll buy grain fed, and we have switched over to free range eggs. I think though we need to buy local of those items too. I'm beginning to be less and less comfortsble with what the grocery store is providing. I don't know where that meat is coming from, and I'm finiding that the mass producers of meat can hide so many things.
Money is always an issue though. So I'm trying to move over slowly and with the items that I think will have the greatest impact. Raw milk NOT being one of them. I do realize that you lose some nutrients when milk is pasturized, but I'm a bigger believer of not spreading disease and finding those nutrients elsewhere. Feel free to argue differently!
Her thing about raw milk was the process of pasturization and homogenized milk. I forget all she said, but the basic idea was they take everything out of the milk and then put stuff back in. The cows are fed corn (which they can't digest) and it rots in their stomachs. So the meat and the milk we get is from slowly dying cows. I haven't checked her information, I just listened to it that one night. Farmers cannot sell raw milk. You have to have "cow-shares" in order to get it. You'll have to check that out if you want to know more. I can't be bothered right now because I can't do a thing about it.
This stuff is really interesting! I find it neat that you got to hear a presentation on it from a woman who has been on both sides of the fence. I only know a little on this topic from watching Food, Inc, but I am starting to realize how little we do know about our food and what is being put in it, and that raises a lot of questions for me. It really makes me wonder about thing like cancer and how the things being injected into our food may be affecting our future health. We know so little! Erin has read some into cow-share and raw milk, you could ask her what she thinks on that topic.
love,
Betsey
This whole topic gets me all riled! I agree with all of you wholeheartedly...except I'm somewhat undecided on the raw milk issue. I sure wish I could trust the cleanliness of my local dairy farmer and just drink my milk raw! For now, whole milk is an adjustment our family has made as well as free-range eggs. We may be able to join a CSA up here, which basically gets you a box of garden-fresh veggies from a local farmer once a week. How fun!
I understand about the $ and space. What a dilemma!
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