March 2024 CSA Newsletter

A brisk morning start of 12F for Eathon and Cole who are heading up to our butcher to pick up the beef & pork for your CSA shares. I’m getting this newsletter ready to send out and pondering what to make for lunch. Aretha Franklin was interviewed and asked what the most difficult thing she had to do was. Her answer, “Figure out what she was going to make for dinner, every night.” I think that is pretty much spot on. Currently in the fridge smidgens of sweet peppers, onions, garlic with ground beef and tomatoes, rice, two slices of ham and a tiny little bowl of soup. The plan is to heat up the rice, add some frozen summer veggies and eggs. Dice the ham and pop it in the soup, warm the ground beef and veggies. Perhaps topping it was some aged cheddar.

BLT’s – Eathon style

February flew bye, not without its losses. One of our older cows slipped on the ice and we were never able to get her back up and on her feet again. She was born here, lived and raised several generations and now rest here as well. The days are stretching out, the cold & ice is being replaced with birdsong as they welcome in what seems to be an earlier spring than usual. Check out the newsy section at the bottom for more.

SOURDOUGH – Place your order by Saturday the 24th so we can include in your share!  Check out the post here for varieties and the price is still $9.75 for each item.

Our Spring/Summer Shipping Schedule is below! We typically ship every week during the winter and then as it starts getting warmer, we go to once a month shipping. All of your shares, the orders we receive, as well as those who order a whole beef or pig… all get piled together and loaded up and taken to Albany’s UPS hub. It ensures you get your orders the next day and frozen, despite summer temperatures. I know this can cause hiccups along the way if you are traveling or not at home on delivery week. We WILL ship from our home if requested on another week but those boxes will be traveling for two full days (instead of the one) and will likely show the affect of that extra day in transit. Please keep this in mind! We are happy to combine months so you can skip the ones you will be away on. Just email us!

Share invoices come out on the 21st of every month and I will post this newsletter on our blog shortly after. I will also email you the link so you don’t miss the news. If the first shipping date doesn’t work for you, just let us know and we can arrange a later ship day. Here is the upcoming schedule!

• March Shares Shipping; March 4th ( or any other week)
• April Shares Shipping; April 1st ( or any other week) 
• May Shares Shipping; April 30th 
• June Shares Shipping; May 28th
• July Shares Shipping; June 25th
• August Shares Shipping; July 30th
• September Shares Shipping; August 27th

We ran out of bacon and were very low on our sausages but you will be happy to know we have both of these back in stock and available in your share this month! Share options for this month ( below is an example share for a Small Beef, Pork & Chicken, your share may be different) are pretty flexible, let us know if you would like to switch out any cuts or need something for a special dinner. LAMB! Finally… if you love it and want a 5 lb. additional share ( $75) let us know or we are happy to add some to your current share. Just let us know!

• Berkshire Pork Roast ( Shoulder or Fresh Ham)
• Ground Beef or Beef Stew Meat
• Ground Pork,  Sausages ( Breakfast, Sweet or Hot Italian, Chorizo or Kielbasa) or BACON!
• Beef T-bone, Porterhouse, Rib Steak, Ribeye, or NY Strip
• Chicken Breast, Leg/Thighs or Drumsticks ( we are running low now!)
• Beef Flank, Flat Iron, Skirt or Sirloin Steak
• Lamb! OR a request extra of something you want!

You can also add; Maple Syrup, Honey, Meat Sticks, Jerky, and Sausage to your share. Just email us with what you are looking to add and we do the rest!

Curious Cows

February was a mixture of relaxing by our wood-stove, ordering & scheduling things, reassessing our summer crew, updating our farmhouse kitchen, and making lists.

Our laying hen flock was sold in the fall and “The Hennery” is being put to use as “The Piggery” in just a few, short weeks. My nephew Connor is beyond excited at this prospect and I can see him spending as much time as possible for a busy 10th grader with them. Our “grand plan” for this year is to do as much as we can ourselves. The beef will calve in May on spring grasses to minimizes the danger of calves who could get wet or muddy earlier in the year. Piglets will be moved out onto pasture and while naughty doesn’t begin to explain them, they should have spent enough time with us in “The Piggery” to be quite happy following us to the next spot and its lush grasses, nuts, fruits, and other treasure they can find. Lowering the number of chickens we do this year will make it possible for us to do them all ourselves. Labor has become a very real issue to deal with, or rather, the lack thereof. On top of that, because of managing the pastures better we now have overabundance and we want to mow, rake and collect that extra grass for winter. This will lower our feed bill, hopefully by a good amount. The summer should be a full one.

 “The sleep of a laboring man is sweet, Whether he eats little or much; But the abundance of the rich will not permit him to sleep.” Ecclesiastes 5:12

I’ve eaten too much a time or two and regretted it. Too often I look around at young men and ladies who wish to labor and are not allowed to. There is no grandparents farm they can spend their summers working and earning a bit of cash, no neighbor they can work evenings and weekends while at school. This loss is to the farmer, whose help this was invaluable and to the kids who learned more than just a job. The sweetness of falling down into bed that night, exhausted, knowing they served a purpose larger than themselves.

Our Meat Chicks for the 15th Season are due to hatch May 1st! Abe & Lizzie’s family  has had some additions over the past two years; 4 weddings, several grand-babies born and kids moving to different areas. Without the much appreciated help of several of the newlyweds, we are going to be starting the meat chicks ourselves and doing the processing as well this year.  We wish Katie and Mary off on their own new journeys and will miss them.

Time to go put that lunch together and get this newsletter out to all of you.

Our thanks for laboring with us,

Kassandra

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