From the Bronx to the Barn City chick trades subways for cattle
From the Bronx to the Barn City chick trades subways for cattle
From the Bronx to the Barn City chick trades subways for cattle
Twitter Link
BRONXTOBARN.COM
Tune in, Saturday, 8:30AM, Jan. 28. Ear tags = food safety. Really??
Hope you'll join us for this live Deep Roots Radio interview about some regulations that may increase the cost (and/or decrease the availability) of your locally grown grass-fed steak, hamburger, lamb chop, pork roast and pastured chicken.
Judith McGeary, Executive Director of the Farm and Ranch Freedom Alliance, will describe puzzling disconnects between how food is grown, some US regs, and the healthful foods you demand.
Listen in!
When: Saturday, 8:30-9AM, Central Time
Where: WPCA Radio, 95.7FM and
on the Internet at www.wpcaradio.org
Why: Because food lovers and farmers want to know what may help - or hinder -
the ability to produce, process and market sustainably-raised foods by
smaller-scale farmers
Hope you'll tune in.
Sylvia
Judith McGeary, Executive Director of the Farm and Ranch Freedom Alliance, will describe puzzling disconnects between how food is grown, some US regs, and the healthful foods you demand.
Listen in!
When: Saturday, 8:30-9AM, Central Time
Where: WPCA Radio, 95.7FM and
on the Internet at www.wpcaradio.org
Why: Because food lovers and farmers want to know what may help - or hinder -
the ability to produce, process and market sustainably-raised foods by
smaller-scale farmers
Hope you'll tune in.
Sylvia
Podcast: NY's Fleisher's Grass-fed & Organic Meats, sustainable butchers and good-food evangelists
Jan. 25, 2012 Young butchers bring old world to growing market for sustainable meats
Jessica Applestone is up front about the big vision she shares with her husband Joshua Fleisher. "We want to change the world." The dramatic shift they're looking for is all about the quality of meats they want to see available in New York, and everywhere else in the US.
An interesting goal from a former vegan chef and a mostly-vegetarian writer.
Jessica and Joshua own and operate Fleisher's Grass-fed & Organic Meats, a butcher shop that's gotten the attention and loyalty of top-notch restaurants, local families and national media. I mean, we're talking NY Times, Saveur and Gourmet magazines, the Martha Stewart Show, USA Today, and lots more. Why? Because the young couple went against the grain while riding a rapidly rising market demand for food you could trust. In 2004, they opened a butcher shop based on old-fashioned meat-cutting skills, even though they were repeatedly warned that the old-world approach just couldn't succeed in an age of industrial farming, big-box chillers filled with plastic-wrapped meats, and busy families accustomed to microwaved meals.
The skeptics were wrong. Seven years later, Fleisher's shops in both Kingston, NY (Hudson Valley), and Brooklyn, NY are thriving for two large reasons: because they provide high-quality, locally-sourced beef, lamb, pork and poultry raised and slaughtered using only sustainable practices; and, because they help their customers learn how to select cuts that will work well for their families.
Now, their story and lessons are available in their book, The Butcher's Guide to Well-Raised Meat: How to Buy, Cut and Cook Great Beef, Lamb, Pork, Poultry and More. I hadn't expected the book to be a page-turner, but their story is so well written and illustrated that I let my cup of coffee get cold. Some of it's really funny. And the charts do a great job of explaining just where the different cuts of meat come from and how best to cook them.
In this Deep Roots Radio interview, Jessica talks about why they revived Joshua's great-grandfather's butchery (the original Fleisher's), their steep learning curve, and the growing demand for grass-fed and organically produced meats.
Enjoy.
Sylvia
Jessica Applestone, Fleisher's Grass-fed & Organic Meats
Jessica Applestone is up front about the big vision she shares with her husband Joshua Fleisher. "We want to change the world." The dramatic shift they're looking for is all about the quality of meats they want to see available in New York, and everywhere else in the US.
An interesting goal from a former vegan chef and a mostly-vegetarian writer.
Jessica and Joshua own and operate Fleisher's Grass-fed & Organic Meats, a butcher shop that's gotten the attention and loyalty of top-notch restaurants, local families and national media. I mean, we're talking NY Times, Saveur and Gourmet magazines, the Martha Stewart Show, USA Today, and lots more. Why? Because the young couple went against the grain while riding a rapidly rising market demand for food you could trust. In 2004, they opened a butcher shop based on old-fashioned meat-cutting skills, even though they were repeatedly warned that the old-world approach just couldn't succeed in an age of industrial farming, big-box chillers filled with plastic-wrapped meats, and busy families accustomed to microwaved meals.
The skeptics were wrong. Seven years later, Fleisher's shops in both Kingston, NY (Hudson Valley), and Brooklyn, NY are thriving for two large reasons: because they provide high-quality, locally-sourced beef, lamb, pork and poultry raised and slaughtered using only sustainable practices; and, because they help their customers learn how to select cuts that will work well for their families.
Now, their story and lessons are available in their book, The Butcher's Guide to Well-Raised Meat: How to Buy, Cut and Cook Great Beef, Lamb, Pork, Poultry and More. I hadn't expected the book to be a page-turner, but their story is so well written and illustrated that I let my cup of coffee get cold. Some of it's really funny. And the charts do a great job of explaining just where the different cuts of meat come from and how best to cook them.
In this Deep Roots Radio interview, Jessica talks about why they revived Joshua's great-grandfather's butchery (the original Fleisher's), their steep learning curve, and the growing demand for grass-fed and organically produced meats.
Enjoy.
Sylvia
Jessica Applestone, Fleisher's Grass-fed & Organic Meats
Played: 3 | Download | Duration: 00:26:59
Wanna know what's in that can of soup? Send it to a lab.
Jan. 22, 2012 What's that food label not telling us?
Sometimes it's hard to know where to turn. I mean, we all try to do right by our families: we seek out healthful foods, we try our hand at a new recipe, we stay clear of transfats, we ban carbonated sodas from our shopping carts. We pay attention to news stories about the latest food research and try to make sense of it all. We read food labels and steer away from the high calorie and the high sodium. We're trying, for crying out loud!
But you know, you can read the ink off a label and still not know if the food's been irradiated or genetically modified. It's just not required. Now, if you don't care about these processes, great. But if you do, or if you want to at least have the option of making a choice, you'll have to contact the food processor directly for the information. And if they decide not to respond to your question, then what? Are you going to send your grocery cart out for lab tests?
If you'd like food labels to let you know if the food, or any ingredient in it, has been genetically modified, go to Just Label It! and learn more.
I believe we have a right to know, a right to choose. I'm asking the FDA to disclose this info on all food labels.
Sylvia
Tune in Saturday, Jan. 21, 8:30-9AM Central - Brooklyn's Fleisher's butcher shop
Set your web browser to WPCA Radio for tomorrow morning's Deep Roots Radio interview with Jessica Applestone, co-owner of Fleisher's Grass-fed and Organic Meats. With her husband, Joshua, the Applestone's have established a Brooklyn butcher shop that's a true link between sustainable farmers, New York restaurants and local consumers who demand great taste, high nutrition, environmental stewardship and humane animal husbandry.
Joshua was a vegetarian chef and Jessica an author when they decided to investigate the revitalization of Fleisher's several years ago. (Joshua's great-grandfather opened the original kosher shop in 1901.). Jessica will explain why they took this path and she'll describe how you and I can search out similar meats where we live.
Hope you'll join us!
Sylvia
Joshua was a vegetarian chef and Jessica an author when they decided to investigate the revitalization of Fleisher's several years ago. (Joshua's great-grandfather opened the original kosher shop in 1901.). Jessica will explain why they took this path and she'll describe how you and I can search out similar meats where we live.
Hope you'll join us!
Sylvia
Podcast: MN's Beth Dooley - cooking locally, seasonally, deliciously in icy north
January 16, 2012 Mid-winter: ground is frozen, snow's predicted. You can still eat locally, in season and deliciously. [see podcast below]
If you live in the Upper Midwest or the Northeast, it's hard to imagine eating locally-grown foods when trees shiver in frigid winds. Yet that's exactly what Beth Dooley's newest cookbook, The Northern Heartland Kitchen, helps us to do. Loaded with recipes, short profiles of local growers, and tips for pickling and preserving, the book celebrates the farmers, gardeners and home cooks of the northland.Cooking doesn't have to be complicated, says Beth in this Deep Roots Radio interview. Beth's approach is practical - she's a working mom - and liberating. She knows of what she speaks. Beth has covered the northern food scene for 25 years. She's the food critic for Minneapolis/St. Paul Magazine, and writes for the Taste section of the Minneapolis Star Tribune. A regular on KARE 11 television, she also teaches cooking classes at the University of MN Landscape Arboretum.
Enjoy,
Sylvia
Podcast: Gearld Fry on human health and recapturing grass-fed beef genetics
January 10, 2012 Not all bulls are created equal, and what that means to your hamburger
A farmer all his life, Gearld Fry has got to be one of the most gentlemanly-mannered, well-spoken men I've ever had the pleasure to meet. At 70+ years of age, he's also one of the most experienced and highly-principled ranchers and teachers we've got in the US. He owned and operated an artificial insemination consultancy for two decades, and now helps cattle graziers around the world through his business, Bovine Engineering. He is a guru when it comes to understanding what we need to do to raise healthful, delicious beef on grass - and grass alone.
Why grass? And why care? Because food lovers all across this country are rediscovering the benefits of livestock raised on fresh grasses and herbs:
- Food high in nutrition and flavor,
- Cattle that are pastured outdoors virtually all year round, and
- Opportunity for profitability (you can't farm long if you can't making a living)
What's the big deal? you ask. Can't all cows get big and strong if they chomp on green pastures all summer long? Not necessarily. For example, Gearld explains that if you wean a calf away from its mother too soon, the little guy's stomach won't develop fully and he'll never digest grass as effectively as he would have if he'd been left to nurse longer. In other words, it'll take more food (cost and time) for him to grow up.
Gearld, and others like him, know that it takes both breeding and good management (how you feed and care for your cattle) to produce tasty, healthful burgers, steaks and roasts. And lots of the best qualities in any herd - such as the tenderness of a steak - are determined by the bull!
What's amazing is that you can actually see and evaluate the bull's genetic makeup by close - and tutored - examination of height, weight, back and chest measurements, the quality of the hide and hair, conformation of the scrotum and testicles, and other outward signs.
Gearld says it best. I hope you enjoy this Deep Roots Radio conversation with him. Are you finding grass-fed beef where you live? What have you done to improve the quality of your grass-fed herd? Leave a comment. Let us know. I'd love to hear from you.
Sylvia
Played: 27 | Download | Duration: 00:29:10
Gearld Fry, Bovine Engineering
Have food crops really changed? I mean, really?
Jan. 8, 2012 It's not just in your head.
We get the news episodically
- Superbugs laugh in the face of pesticides that worked just a few years ago
- Despite initial assurances, genetically-engineered crops are cross-pollinating with neighboring non-GMO varieties
- Yet another incidence of burgers or chicken or green peppers tossed out by the ton because e.coli or salmonella are discovered within the foods
- Reports that tell us 70-80% of pharmaceuticals used in the US are used in agriculture - lots of it lacing livestock feed
Hey, I'm not making this up. There is data available from numbers of trustworthy sources. For example, The Pew Research Centers examine how the use of antibiotics in agriculture affects human health. And this interactive website, by the USDA's Economic Research Service, provides data, graphs and charts about America's food deserts - communities with no easy access to a grocery store.
I thought this short article from Mother Earth News might be of interest to any food lover or farmer. It refers to research that indicates declining nutritional value of some of our basic foods.
So it seems we need to be concerned about more than chemicals, genetic manipulation and massive spoilage. What do you think? How are you going to find the high-nutition foods your family needs?
Sylvia
Tune in Saturday, Dec 31, 8:30-9:00 a.m. live interview w/cookbook author Beth Dooley.
Streamed live on www.wpcaradio.org and at 95.7FM (in Amery, WI)
We northerners can eat locally, seasonally and deliciously!
Join me this Saturday, 8:30-9:00 a.m., Dec 31, for a live Deep Roots Radio interview with Twin Cities (Minnesota) journalist and author Beth Dooley. We'll be chatting about her new cookbook, The Northern Heartland Kitchen.
The book celebrates the region’s chefs, farmers, ranchers, gardeners and home cooks. It’s about eating with the seasonal rhythms.
- 200+ recipes organized by season
- Includes instructions for pickling and preserving
- Tips for growing your own food
- Tips for getting the most out of your CSA or farmers’ market
- Includes profiles of local farmers, butchers and chefs who use new technologies as well as heritage practices
About Beth Dooley
- A journalists who has covered the local food scene for over 25 years
- Restaurant critic for Mpls.St.Paul Magazine, writes for the Taste section of the Minneapolis Star Tribune, and appears regularly on KARE 11.
- Co-authored Savoring the Seasons of the Northern Heartland with Lucia Watson (2004)
- Teaches cooking classes at the University of Minnesota Landscape Arboretum.
- Lives in Minneapolis with husband and three sons
Hope you'll tune in!
Sylvia
A wet nose
Christmas Day 2011
It was about 35 degrees today - unusually warm for late December in north central Wisconsin. The cows had dedicated most of their afternoon to some serious lounging, their backs soaking up the sun. They looked content and totally unconcerned about everything. Would Italy or Greece collapse? Would North Korea tip one way or another? They couldn't care less. No wrinkles on their brows.
What did bring them to their feet, however, was the sound of my tractor chugging up a shallow rise. It was time to bring fresh bales of hay to their feeding area - and they knew it. They crowded around the little John Deere as I approached, and when I stepped off the tractor to open the 16-ft gate, they pressed close, curious. I'm one of the humans that brings fresh hay and occasional handfuls of sweet alfalfa pellets.
The sun was a half-hour above the tree line and the air was absolutely calm. My little herd stood around me. They looked pretty good, and I was, again, thankful for the recent spate of warm weather. These Buelingo beef cattle are very hardy, but a mild winter is a real boon for all pastured livestock, making it easier for the grass-fed animals to maintain good body condition.
I took a couple of steps towards them, moving slowly, using a quiet voice. I didn't want to spook them. Every once in a while I'd crouch low, bringing myself closer to their eye level. Three of the 20-month old calves - a steer and two heifers - cautiously inched to me. I lifted my left hand towards them and, one by one, they touched their broad, wet noses to my work glove.
A gift.
Wishing you and yours the very best of this blessed season.
Sylvia
Giving thanks
Nov. 24, 2011
It had been an atypically bright and warm Thanksgiving, but by 5 p.m. there was chill breeze blowing and the light was fading fast. Dave and I were playing beat-the-clock, trying to move hay from one field to another before dark. Given the boulders everywhere on our pastures, driving tractor at night was nothing I wanted to do. And wouldn't you know it, the tractor's engine was sputtering and losing power. Dave had replaced the fuel filter earlier in the day, but the little John Deere wasn't healed. What could it be?
Although the tractor was straining at about half-normal power, Dave managed to engage the front-end loader, manipulate a set of very heavy chains and eventually move a 1,200-lb round bale. The four little bulls were eager for the fodder. I could hear them snuffling through the dried grasses and alfalfa, munching. Good.
Job done, Dave flipped on the headlights for a slow return trip to the other side of the farm.
It's now after 11 p.m. The bulls and cows are fed, and despite lack of rain since July, Bull Brook continues to flow, if shallowly. The fences held another day. Dave and I are safe and sound. Our children called to wish us a good day. Several will be with us tomorrow for a belated family dinner.
So many big blessings, yet I know I barely acknowledge the scores of gifts I enjoy every day. I tend to take them for granted, to think that I'm entitled to that first flush of rose in the east, to safety on the highway, the warm sip of sweet tea, the glossy magazines I toss into the grocery cart, and the yawns that fill my lungs.
And so, I'm grateful for days like today, when I'm reminded that every good thing flows from Him -- the grass in the fields, the hay bales, the little herd, the tractor -- everything.
Please know that I count you among my blessings, even though I may not know you by name.
Thanks for joining Dave and me as we take steps to establish our small grass-fed beef operation, Bull Brook Keep. Thank you for the time you've taken to read the blog posts, view the short videos, and listen to the Deep Roots Radio podcasts. I'm continually surprised and grateful when guests agree to be interviewed on the Saturday morning radio show. Thank you to the many experts and pioneers - the farmers and ranchers, chefs and film-makers, teachers and scientists - who have shared their time and perspectives with us this year.
Thanks for your companionship on our journey. Dave and I wish you a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend.
Sylvia