Field Trip to The Farm

We drove out to the middle of nowhere to tour a sustainable, organic and humane farm which specializes in raising rare and endangered breeds of livestock. The middle of nowhere, by the way, is beautiful. Rolling green hills, clean air, no cell phone service - it was a nice break from the hustle and bustle of urban life.

I pulled up to the Manor House on this 880 acre farm and my jaw dropped. I've never seen such a magnificent home. And the kitchen in the home - unbelievable. We started our livestock tour at the barn. I've never seen such a magnificent barn, either. Admittedly, I haven't spent much time on farms, but if they all look like this one, then I've got a new aspiration. The interior reminded me of a Ralph Lauren store. The barn houses the Shire horses - no joke, I've never seen such magnificent horses. They are the tallest of the heavy horse breed (larger than clydsdales), and have a kind disposition. This farm manages 30 Shires, plus a one week old foal, named Jane. It is a large number of Shires considering only 4,000 remain worldwide. I had a little crush on the Shire stallion, Edward. I couldn't help but snap a picture of him.



The calves were adorable. Most of the veal in the United States is not humanely raised - here, they are allowed to run, play, and eat real food, opposed to only milk. Highland cattle (the furry one pictured) and Ancient White Park cattle are raised along with Shorthorn cattle. The farm's veal is wildly popular in the area and has been picked up by many local restaurants - at a pretty penny. The farm's veal runs about $18 per pound - wholesale. The steep price tag has a lot to do with the Certified Humane slaughter techniques employed by the farm. Animals which are inhumanely slaughtered are usually frightened and the presence of adrenaline and state of the animal's muscles (tense and tight) at the time of slaughter will greatly affect the taste and quality of the meat.





My favorite stop of the day was the pig pen. We watched a giant Gloucestershire Old Spot sow give birth to piglets. These too are a rare breed with about 1,000 purebreds in the world and only 6 breeding boars. This farm owns one of the boars, and geez does he have the life. He's allowed to roam the farm's wooded areas freely and every other day, the farmer's drop four or five sows in his woods. They pick the girls up a few days later, and 90% of the time, they're all pregnant. The sows are good for 5-10 litters, until they get too big and accidentally start squishing (and killing) the piglets when they lay down. The dirty girl in the picture below is one such sow - she had her 10th litter about a week ago and squished all but one piglet. They'll let her hang in the mud for a few weeks (primarily to allow her hormone levels to drop) and then send her to slaughter.



We were treated to a fabulous lunch on the Manor House terrace. The farm's chef prepared turkey, roast beef and barbeque pork sandwiches (the turkey, beef and pork was raised, slaughtered and cooked on site, the cheese was aged in caves on site using milk from the farm's own cows, and the micro greens were picked fresh from the farm's produce beds that morning). Talk about fresh.



As a parting gift, we were given on of the farm's famous chickens (not live, but ready to pop in the oven). These chickens are raised from day old chicks and allowed to roam free. They are humanely slaughtered on-site (every Wednesday) and brined for six hours prior to packaging. Walking through the slaughterhouse and touring the killing room was a bit unsettleing, but a certain peace of mind is achieved when you know exactly where your dinnner came from. Hooray for all the organic, sustanable, certified humane farms in the world. These places are tremendously difficult to run successfully - it takes owners who are dedicated to certain practices for the right reasons, staff who share the owner's passion and consumers who are willing to support the products these farms produce.