Cows of a different color

All four of these ladies are jerseys!

Yep, that's right: all 4 of these cows are jerseys. Meet Cupcake, (back left), Peanut Butter (Back right), Betty (Center, black cow) and Cookie (front, black and white). Jerseys can be all different colors. This is one of the reasons I love the breed. Betty is 1/8th holstein. Just enough to keep her a lovely black and make her one heck of a milker! Cookie is 1/4th New Zealand Frisian. New Zealand genetics are AWESOME and highly sought after for grass based dairies. In NZ, they breed their herds specifically to grow on grass only. Our current bull is also NZ Frisian (Half jersey, have NZ Frisian).

Cupcake, Peanut Butter and Cookie are all first year milkers. They all calved about a month ago. One of the reasons why we supplement the girls with alfalfa and our non-GMO cracked corn is to help maintain body condition, especially after calving. The first year of milking is one of the most difficult for cows. Cows grow until they are 3 years old. Dairy cows are bred to calve when they turn 2 years old. So the first year they're making milk, they are also still growing! AND growing another baby! It's a lot of work. This is one of many reasons why we don't feed for production or try to push them to produce as much as possible. Our goal is to keep our cows healthy and strong so they can produce consistently and longer. We love our girls and try to do what's best for them which works out for the best for us too.

The Unfamiliar Cuts: Pork backbone or Country Style Ribs

As our chest freezer gets lower and lower, I have to start getting creative with the cuts that remain. I had a whole pile of pork backbone and wondered what the heck that even meant. Once again, I turned to google to tell me. One of the most frustrating things I've found about getting meat in bulk is processors don't all use the same words for their cuts. No cut seems to have one set name...It's super annoying to try to find exactly what you're looking for and thus, it took me about an hour to figure out what the heck backbone even is. But here's my simple (and perhaps incorrect) description.

Pork backbone is what is left after the ribs are cut. There isn't a whole lot of meat on these suckers but man, oh man, the meat that is there can be ever sooooo tasty. I believe some folks call these bad boys Country Style Ribs. Once again, I may have TOTALLY misunderstood what I was reading because, as I said, no one calls anything the same thing in the world of meat, it seems.

So what do you do with these things?! I think most folks use them for soups and stews or perhaps similar to ribs. I decided to try using them like ribs. We aren't grill people. I'll be totally honest. It isn't that I don't like grilled food. I do. It's delicious. But I hate the process of grilling. Frankly, I'm impatient and I don't like to wait around for the grill to cook my food. Ironic given what I'm about to say...I fired up my crockpot. (See the irony here?) I cook most of my ribs in the crockpot because you can get a great, fall off the bone dish from it and not have to worry about it making things soggy.

I threw in some beer, barbecue sauce and a healthy amount of our favorite seasonings (usually montreal steak, with a few other variations.) I like to use the crockpot for dinners that I can prep and then cook while we're at the barn milking the cows for the evening. I set it to high (because I never think of this stuff far enough in advance to go low and slow) and left to milk my cows. 

When milking chores were done, we got home and were greeted with an aroma you might expect when you throw meat, beer and barbecue sauce together: pure delicious goodness. I didn't even wait to cook my sides. I pulled off the lid and popped a piece on a plate to test it. It was a little more time consuming to get the meat off the bone than it is when you're just eating ribs, but man oh man, was it ever rich and delicious. Holy moly. Tender and absolute melt in your mouth perfection.

I'm sure there are plenty of other things you can do with backbone but this option is probably my favorite. We like hardy, rich foods with deep, complex flavor. I'm so glad I don't have to be afraid of this cut in my freezer anymore. I love to have so many different options for meals. This one was a great one to add to our recipe book!

~JoAnna

The unfamiliar cuts: what to do with uncured bacon and jowl

When we took our first piggies to the slaughter house, the first thing I thought of was how absolutely delicious the bacon would be. I am a complete sucker for bacon. I could easily eat a pound of the stuff in one sitting. Just ask my mother in law about when she made BLTs for me when Ben and I were dating. ;) 

Imagine my dismay and disappointment the very first time I tried to cook my very own bacon straight from the processor. Oh the sadness in seeing the beautiful pink and white strips turn to a sad grayish brown and flop out of the pan onto my plate. Further sadness followed when I tasted these sad hunks of meat and they had virtually no flavor. The little flavor they did have tasted pretty much like a pork chop. I was so let down that it would be 4 years before I had the courage to try again. 

But today was that day. The day I said, “Dangit! I WILL make those slabs of raw pork taste good!” I believe I have discovered several important keys because holy cow (or pig) did I get a surprise this afternoon.  

I have been googling my heart out trying to figure out what the heck I’m missing. I keep hearing from folks that uncured bacon is the bestest. Whatever, dude.  

After about an hour of reading various posts on cooking blogs and forums, I found someone that suggested adding smoked paprika. Okay y’all. Confession time. It’s probably only been in the last year that I actually started regularly using paprika or even considering it an actual spice instead of just a topping for deviled eggs. But seriously, the paprika is the key. That and a healthy (...maybe not so healthy...) amount of salt. and of course pepper. The other tiny thing I did that was a little different was to increase the temperature and cook time. I have a plain ol’ electric stove, nothing fancy, that we got for literally $5 dollars at an auction. Anyway, usually I set the temp to 5 (or medium) but with the uncured bacon, it seemed to cook and actually get crispy at a higher temp. It also seemed to take a little longer than “normal” bacon. Really, it’s okay by me because it. tastes. so. good. I shamelessly ate the entire package. Granted it was small, but I’d say it was close to a half a pound or so. IT WAS ONLY 7 STRIPS! DON’T JUDGE ME! 

The next day, I wanted to make more because I wanted Ben to try this wonder I had found. So we made chicken, bacon and ranch subs for lunch with caramelized red onions. Well that tasted like I’d died and gone to heaven.  

Propelled by my success the previous week, I bravely decided to attempt cooking up some jowl. Jowl looks pretty much just like bacon. The strips are shorter and wider. Bacon comes from the belly of the pig and if you tell your processor to leave your bacon as a full pork belly cut, you can make an unreal delicious roast from it. The jowls are the cheeks of the pig.

The jowl meat looks quite like the bacon. I decided to give it a go and make up a package for myself. I cooked the jowl the same way I did the bacon: slightly higher heat, salt, pepper, paprika. I was nervous because several customers had said that the jowl is different and the lady that runs our processor said that the jowl is more suitable IN things than by itself.

well it tastes just like bacon to me. And it’s in the perfect sandwich sized slices. I’m getting hungry just thinking about it! (That could be a side effect of the intermittent fasting we’re trying...)

I hope this helps someone else not fear uncured meats. Because dang. I may never go back!  

Just to make your mouth water a little, a photo of our chicken, bacon, ranch sub:

~JoAnna

Twice a day, every day, until the day we die

When we first started milking six years ago, a harsh reality hit me and my wife, this is a big commitment I've undertaken. In some ways, she has felt it is a bigger commitment than our marriage. She doesn't have to see me twice a day, but she does have to see our milkers twice a day.
For the first month that we were milking, my wife would cry during every milking. The sheer weight of the responsibility was that enormous. Eventually, milking just became a part of our life, and we accepted the responsibility, and it just became our routine, like breakfast.
That was six years ago, and for the first three years, we would occasionally have family members take over milking on some days to give us a break. For the last three years we have milked every day, twice a day, every day. Okay that's not exactly true. JoAnna got a few days off after giving birth to our first daughter. And I actually got a day off from milking when I had to have major surgery on my hand last year.
Of late, the tie to the farm has been wearing us down. We want to make great, delicious milk for our customers, we want to serve our customers, we want to make a living, but we don't want to sell our life to the farm. Maybe we'd like to take our kids to the beach, maybe disneyworld, maybe visit family, maybe go snowboarding.
The simple solution would be to get a replacement worker or farm hand. That sounds easy, but it doesn't seem so easy. First affording a full time farm hand won't be easy, training a farm hand isn't as easy as it sounds, and it's tough to get someone to get to the barn at five in the morning, and leave at seven in the evening. We will be working towards a farm worker, and if you'd like to learn dairy farming, and how to make a livelihood on a farm, contact us, we'd love to talk. But in the meantime, we need a solution, and we think we've found it.
The solution we believe is once a day milking. I had been contemplating how to find someone for evening milking and then I just asked the question, why do we need it? Well a million questions immediately popped up: Will the cows lose production, will the cows get sick, what would happen? Where does anyone go when there are questions on anything? the internet of course.
A deep in depth internet search showed that not only does once a day(OAD for short) milking work, but it also appears to work really well with Jersey cows, and rotational grazing. Most of the OAD milking information comes from New Zealand, or Middle Earth as its known to all of us nerds in the world. The Shire, I mean, Middle Earth, is leading the way in grass based dairy farming with improved genetics, and Regenerative farming techniques.
So once we discovered OAD milking was viable, we realized all the implications and opportunities potentially available. With the afternoon milking, we will often not work as hard during the day to "steel" ourselves for the evening milking, so hopefully we can actually be more productive during the middle of the day
We're crazy excited about what this could mean for us, and maybe opportunities which we have foregone. We might be able to go to church, go to hang out with people or activities later than 4 PM, we might even be able to go on a dinner date. Who knows, maybe we'd get to see you at the farmer's market.
We'll keep you updated as we start this progress. Still many more changes to be made, but we're very excited.

Fall and the changing seasons

We often get asked, is this your busy season? Our answer is usually, its always the busy season. We do try and stay busy, but the different seasons do always mean different things for us to do, different weather, and a different feel to the farm.

    The last fall, was, well frankly, horrible. It never rained. Our farm felt like a desert. The dust, combined with the smoke from fires everywhere, ruined my lungs and made me feel absolutely miserable. 

    This fall so far has been lovely, rain occasionally, grass growing like gang busters, hay is plentiful. And the sky, maybe it's cause I've never bothered to look up from my job before, but the sky has been incredible, clear, and beautiful clouds and the most beautiful sunsets.

    The summer and the fall are pretty different too, summer keeping the cows cool is paramount, with it usually being too hot for the grass to grow well. Summer was also mega project time. We received a grant for a beautiful hay barn, which the deadline was September 1st. This time we made it with a whole week to spare! We're getting super responsible. After all, we only had a year to build it.

    The hay barn is amazing, super tall and nearly 2,000 square feet. Uncovered hay can lose 35% of it material if it gets rained on over the winter, and the quality getting worse. And our princess cows only want the best hay.

    With fall here, it's time to start filling our lovely hay barn up with hay, always a challenge because our cow turns their nose up at hay unless we spend a premium.

    With JoAnna pregnant, we have been prepping for a new baby on the way, which means that eventually the day will come when I, Ben, has to do all the work on the farm. When that day comes I'd like to preemptively apologize for all the mistakes that will probably happen to your milk orders

    We are looking forward to the leaves changing, and looking to steeling ourselves towards winter, which we've discovered we no longer like. But even though we now severely dislike the cold of winter, we are looking forward to welcoming our daughter in December, the holidays, and enjoying the wonder and newness that another season brings

A girl mom on a farm

Some of you may know, we have a 2.5 year old daughter. I'm also 5 months pregnant with another daughter! We are thankful for our children regardless of gender. (Although, I do hope one day to have a boy!) Sometimes I just feel like having girls is "wasted" on me. We live on a farm and I'm about the least girly girl I know. I was always a tomboy growing up and hated dresses, the color pink and generally preferred to do "boy" things like climb trees, play in the creek and play army.

It feels a little odd that the Lord would choose me to be the mother of two girls. Me, who always wanted ALL BOYS! I imagined myself raising boys my whole life. I don't have a clue how to french braid hair (Or do much else besides ponytails, basically), I think bows are fussy and annoying, skirts and dresses get in the way when pants are much more practical. I'm not afraid of bugs, worms, blood, poop, spiders or mud. (I do have a thing with frogs...the just give me the willies. Something about the hopping...) I have a stomach of iron and am generally very down to earth. Really, I think the Lord specially designed me to live and work on a farm...

As odd as it sounds after all that, I feel like the Lord has been preparing me my whole life to be the mother of girls. My whole life, most every big life experience I have had has been all girls. Dance, Sonic Drive-In, human ecology, fibers, I was always surrounded by almost all girls (with a few pretty cool dudes mixed in there).

I feel like all of those experiences have pointed and prepared me for raising girls of my own. I saw the actions of girls I admired and actions of other girls that I didn't. And I wonder if the Lord chose me to be a girl mom so that I would raise more girls like me. I'm not saying that I'm perfect. (Definitely not!) but I think the world needs women that are willing to work as hard or harder than any man and aren't afraid of getting a little muddy along the way. Women who aren't superficial and care only about their looks. (I rarely wear make up, don't really keep up with fashion and get my hair cut like every 2 years...Those things aren't bad, they just aren't as important me as good character)  Women who love life, God's beautiful Creation and love to be in nature as much as possible. THAT'S what I want my girls to be.

I'll probably never be the mom that gets matching outfits for my girls. Or messes with bows (let's get real: how often do they leave them in longer than 5 minutes anyway?!) or has the perfect Christmas/Easter dresses planned out months in advance. My girls will probably have a bit of a wild side (maybe feral would be a more accurate description...) but I can tell you that at two and a half, my oldest loves fiercely. And she would rather be outside playing in the water of our local creek or on the river in a kayak with her mom or dad than just about anywhere else. I pray that both our girls will learn that hard work is (as their "Poppy" says) "good and good for you!" I may not have a clue what to do with girls, but I pray that the Lord would continue to guide me as their mother and help me to teach them how to be truly awesome women that are inspiring, love the Lord with all their hearts and who are deep, sincere and real people. I think that's what every mother wants for any of their kids.

-JoAnna

The goats are out, now what?

So the goats were out, roaming about the island. How do you capture goats? We have no idea, this was very out of our wheelhouse. And the goats weren't in a nice area. Right next to a lake crawling with huge 12-16' alligators. Swarming mosquitoes, no see ums, scorpions Also very grumpy water moccasins, rattlesnakes, and generally an area you don't want to go to. Did we mention the giant alligators? We spent the next two days trudging through the island, trying to find them. The goats were very distrustful of us, having never met us(their mommy must have told them to never talk to strangers). It was at this point we learned a valuable lesson, goats are quick, and crafty. As soon as they saw us, they would bolt back into the woods. The neighbors saw the goats, and would call us with a location. No sooner would we get there, they'd be gone, and a call from the opposite side of the island. Quick little buggers.

Somehow, miraculously we got them back, and put the fear of God into anyone who left the gate open .

How we got started

Ben Bleasdale

How did we get started milking? Well it all happened over 20 years for me. We sure didn't know what we were getting ourself into. Before thanksgiving, my parents had found a farm near us that had retired dairy goats. We picked out two, but decided to pick them up after thanksgiving. Thanksgivings were spent at my grandparents dairy farm in Pennsylvania. Playing in the dairy barn, playing outside in the snow, eating too much pumpkin pie.

We returned from Pennsylvania to bring our dairy goats home. Our life was a little different then. We lived in a large fancy house in a nice island subdivision in central Florida right next to the St. John's river.  We put the goats in there area, feeling quite happy with our new purchase.

  Later on, grandpa(who had raised goats years before) stopped over to check out the goats. As soon as the gate was open...... ZOOM. The goats pushed past him and ran away into the huge woods/forest/swamp.  And thus began our ordeal to find them