Sausage Recipes and Farmer Gatherings

Boy, the farmer gathering last night at Leyden Glen Farm was great.  Many thanks to Julia, Kristin and Mark for hosting a lovely little dinner party.  The leg of lamb was wonderful, as was the Coyote Hill Farm mashed  Gilfeather Turnip and (whole) Brussels Sprout dish topped with Parmesan Cheese, the Severance Maple Farm Baked Beans, Linda’s Applesauce, and we got many compliments for our sausage and cheese meatball appetizers.  We had a wonderful time eating our harvest.

Here is a recipe that I unearthed in my search for a quick and simple sausage recipe to share at the party last night.  I did not make it for sharing last evening, but it sure sounds like one to try!

Sausage Cake

1 lb. Sweet Italian sausage
1 cup cold black coffee
1 cup granulated sugar
1 cup dark brown sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp. ground cinnamon
1 tsp. nutmeg
1/2 tsp. ground cloves
1/4 tsp. salt
2 cup self rising flour
1 cup chopped nuts of choice
1 cup raisins

Add sausage and coffee and mix in a big bowl. Add granulated sugar and dark brown sugar, mix well. Beat in eggs. Add cinnamon, nutmeg, ground cloves and salt, mix all ingredients well. Add flour, mix well. Add chopped nuts and raisins, mix well.   Do not grease the pan!

Pour in angel food cake pan and bake in 325 degree oven for about 1 hour or until inserted knife comes out clean.

During the holidays it is commonplace to soak a cotton dish towel in Rum and wrap it around the cake and put it in the refrigerator for about two weeks. Cake may also be decorated for any holiday.

 

Yummy Sausage Recipes

What happens when a bunch of farmers get together for a Saturday night out, together? I am not sure, but my husband and I will find out tonight, as we have been invited over to Leyden Glen Farm for a get-together with the farms and farmers who faithfully participated in the rain and wind blown Tuesday Farmers Markets through the summer and into the fall in Bernardston. This is just a little seasonal social wrap-up, as I understand it. The great part, though, is that we are all bringing a dish to share. It had to be a dish that features a product that you grow (raise, etc.) Now, if you are a veggie farmer, I can see bringing a potato or squash (storage veggie) dish — seasonally appropriate and all of that, and if you make maple syrup, I can see a wider variety of possibilities: a pie, cookies, even a meat dish — who knows… and then there is us. We sell meat. Tasty meat from grassfed beef, lambs, pigs, turkeys, chickens, goats, and eggs… all of the proteins on the farm, really. So, when I decided to feature SAUSAGE for the “dish to share” I thought that the playing field was wide-open.

Do you know how many sausage recipes there are out there that are truly horrible? It was astounding. I read through countless cookbooks (good thing that I collect them!) before I found a couple of recipes that were real contenders. I thought that I had decided on The Recipe for about twenty-four hours, and then changed my mind yesterday morning… so out went the Fennel Shallot Sweet Italian Sausage Quiche (though I will share the recipe here, another day) and in came two much simpler recipes.

We’ll see how the vegetable farmers like what we bring for sausage dishes!

 

The kids are not coming to the dinner, we have secured them with grandparents for the evening. The four year old will not be listening to A Prairie Home Companion on the radio this evening because of that — is it strange for a four year old to watch television, namely “Between The Lions” on PBS, and say:” Mommy! Look! It’s Mister Fred Newman from the radio!”

Is there something sweet about that statement happening in 2009?

I thought so.

 

At Least We Didn’t Get Snow. Oink, Oink.

Well, at least we didn’t get the snow that was possible last night. It was another cold night nonetheless.
How do we begin our mornings on the farm? Get up, pour a cup of coffee, and look out the window and see where the turkeys are in the yard. I am serious. Recently, our shortened daylight hours are spent herding the flock of turkeys back from the road and the neighbor’s lawn, and the vehicles in the driveway, and any other shiny object that the birds find interesting.  One turkey will get it in their head that they want to explore something and go.  The bird closest to it will wonder what the first bird is doing, and follow.  Next thing you know, you have a flash mob of turkeys doing something that you wouldn’t necessarily want them to do in a very public and inconvenient place.

Herding turkeys is a bit like herding cats. There are submissive females who you can talk to using turkey calls, and they will follow you to the ends of the earth without any fuss, but the associated tom turkeys with the females are a bit of a problem. They are alpha males and a little bit aggressive – more so if you are short and tentative – like my four-year old son. So some of the birds need to be led (the hens: a la Pied Piper) and the toms need to be herded (a la cats). It is a full-time job to simply keep the birds safe during the day.

Nights are another story, for another day…

Speaking of turkey, the “Great Turkey Countdown” is on!  We have some Heritage Pastured (really a misnomer — they are Free Ranging in the very most Free sense of the word!) Turkeys available both as Fresh and Frozen, for Thanksgiving 2009.  Still $4.50 a pound. (Still a great deal) Vegetarian fed, never fed scary byproducts, meat products or medications.  The varieties that we have are Lilac, Standard Bronze and Bourbon Red, all heritage (heirloom) varieties.

Additionally, we still raise a Tasty Pork Product. For Bacon Lovers there is the Thick Cut Maple Syrup Cured Hickory Smoked Bacon – $8 a pound.  Wonderfully Flavorful (when was the last time you have a flavorful chop?) and Tender Pork Chops – assorted cuts – assorted prices.   Kid-friendly (my kids love it!) Sweet Italian Sausage (without casings! Bulk, ground) is just $8 a pound.  And then there is my favorite sausage, the Breakfast Sausage, also $8 a pound.   Our pigs are raised in pastures (they actually, usually stay in the pasture fencing) and fed vegetarian diets which include New England processed grains, vegetables and milk from our Registered Jersey cows (very high butterfat, deep cream line, tasty milk).  The pigs are all Heritage Varieties – if they were vegetables, they would be call Heirloom varieties – Tamworth, Gloucestershire Old Spots, Large Black and Red Wattle.

 

Have you reserved your turkey yet?

…Just a thought… you know… because we will sell out before Thanksgiving.  So far, we have reserved birds for:

Wendy & Vin, Karen, Bev & Bill, Gloria & Ervin, Kurt & Kayce, Louise, Haynes & Nancy, Bill C., Jay, Brian, Wendy, Ed, Whiney, Fred, Mary, Garth, Donovan & Meggin, Michelle & Justin, Adrian, Jackie, Dan, George, Mark, Jessica, Ryan,  Bill W., Dena,  Joan… and two co-workers of Wendy’s!

You could add your name to the list with an email to carrie *at* wellstavernfarm.com

 

Attention Localvores: Heritage Pastured Turkey for Thanksgiving – Order Now

Are you eating locally — is your “radius” 100 miles, or 250, or the Eastern Seaboard? You are amazing for your committment, and I applaud you.

Have I got a meal for you! Thanksgiving Dinner! — our turkeys are truly local. One variety of heritage turkey was hatched and raised on our farm, from stock that we keep year-round. They live healthy, happy lives on Western Massachusetts soil, and are processed locally enough to keep their mileage under 100 miles, round trip.

What do you get other than a real local dinner? A fabulous tasting bird to share with family and friends. You get warm and fuzzy points knowing that you did business with a “Local Hero” family farm. We enjoy raising the birds, and by doing so, assist in conserving the varieties — very old strains of birds that just take a lot longer to grow up than the White Broad Breasted Turkeys that most people eat at Thanksgiving. We have put in a considerable amount of research and time into deciding the most tasty and the most threatened varieties of bird to raise, and have then gone ahead and (in two varieties cases) found the chicks, (and in all cases) raised them for nine months to get them up to size. We can personally assure you that our birds ate only clean, never-medicated feed, vegetarian only grains, and really did appreciate the grass and sunshine on pasture here on our farm.

We hope that through your flavorful dinner, our conservation efforts will bring the spotlight onto these magnificent breeds and perhaps entice others through word of mouth, to raise these lovely varieties of heritage turkey: Standard Bronze, Bourbon Red and Lilac.

It is time to order your turkey for this Thanksgiving. We look forward to hearing from you.

 

Freezing and Freezing…. Brrr

Anyone out there with connections read this blog?  Can you see if we can turn up the heat for another month or so — we awoke to a snowstorm this morning.  That is just not right for the middle of October.  It is difficult enough to deal with cold weather when it comes in November, but half a month early — geesh.

Predation and Freezing temperatures are driving me crazy.  We have lost a couple of turkeys recently to very large predators.  i believe that the predators have four feet, and are probably of the cat family. They eat the head, neck and a little bit of the breast, and leave the rest of the bird.  I feel terrible every morning when we find another turkey life lost.

This morning I was freezing cold, and so were the turkeys.  We plan on somewhat cool, but not wintery, weather for raising the turkeys for Thanksgiving.  Because the very cold weather has come so early, and the predators have been active, I am in a pickle:  We need to protect the turkeys from other animals and the weather.

The best solution that I have been able to come up with, is one that I am not entirely happy with… what do you think?

Dear Select Customers: How would you like to enjoy a tasty heritage variety pastured turkey from Wells Tavern Farm, already frozen for Thanksgiving this year?  Some of our birds are ready for processing (depending on the size that you are looking for) and we can arrage processing for you, and delivery of a frozen turkey either sooner, or later —

See? I am not really into changing the process three-quarters of the way through the season — we have been providing Fresh Turkey for Thanksgiving for a few years, and that is what people come to expect… but, I suppose, for the good of some of the birds, this is the next best thing.

So, what say you?  If you are not already totally in love with idea of  having your turkey processed in November for fresh turkey (never frozen) for the holiday, what about a few reservations from people, NOW, for FROZEN turkey.  You can still get one for Thanksgiving for fresh, and put this one (frozen) away in YOUR freezer for Christmas, or a gift for a neighbor or co-worker.

If we are able to process a dozen or more turkeys sooner rather than later, than our farm will be better able to protect the remaining birds from predators, and the weather.  We do a great job of hatching our own turkey eggs, and raising little chicks up into big birds — but, somewhere along the line, we run out of barn space for the birds when they gain that extra 15 plus pounds each (taking up MUCH more room) and are now “large flying dinners”.

Looking for Turkey, fresh or frozen? I can take care of you.  Please send me an email through our website: www.wellstavernfarm.com

Thank you!

 

Joseph Sebarenzi’s Farm Visit

We just provided a mini-farm tour to Joseph Sebarenzi who will be speaking at Smith College in Northampton tomorrow evening.  Sebarenzi is a Rwandan who is living a life of love, compassion, and forgiveness, even after his Tutsi family was murdered in the ‘94 genocide.   The story is recounted in his published memoir entitled “God Sleeps in Rwanda: A Journey of Transformation”.  He is the former head of the Rwanda Parliament.

I have not yet read his book, but you can bet that it will appear on my short list of things to do now.  What a treasure of inspiration and such a lovely surprise visit from him!  He said that he grew up on a farm in Rwanda, and had cattle, goats, sheep, chickens — “but not those”  he said – pointing to the turkeys.  We stood for a few minutes watching and calling to the turkeys, and talking about the reasons for his dislike of pigs.

Here are the details for the Smith lecture tomorrow:

Lecture  “God Sleeps in Rwanda: A Journey of Transformation.” Joseph Sebarenzi, former head of the Rwanda Parliament will discuss his book, which traces his life as a Tutsi youth in rural Rwanda, and the political maneuvering of which he became a victim after the genocide. Reception and book signing to follow. 7:30 p.m. Neilson Library Browsing Room (The Neilson Library is located off of Green Street in the center of the Smith College campus.)

 

Brrrr. It’s Cold Outside.

Geesh.  It is like we got broadsided by WINTER — it is cold outside!  The sudden change of season brings the lazy, laid back ease of summer animal tending to a swift halt.  Now the hoses are freezing, the grass is wilting, and the animals will need to move to their supplimental housing more often.

Any day now, we will turn into the water bucket-lugging barn-jacketed family, who must hand-carry all the water to the smaller animals on the farm (all non-cows).  That is a drag.  A serious annoyance.  It takes forever, and lengthens your bucket-toting arm by about a foot. After you finish with morning chores,  for the rest of the day, it feels as if you are walking around with a kink in your back – which you probably are – and dragging your knuckles on the floor – which you may or may not be doing -  until it gets dark at 5:30 p.m., and you need to go outside and do it all over again.

Farming has its moments.

Things can be great – sometime in the middle of the summer, and everybody is happily munching grass on pasture.  Fall and winter — not so much – as the saying goes.  Feeding bales of hay that cost an arm and a leg, but provide the essential nutrition to grassfed cows are a necessity.  Though we don’t hay any fields ourselves, we do have to go and pick up the bales from the farmer who makes them, and then we have to put them away.  Each bales weighs in at about 40+ pounds.  Now that we are at hay-feeding season, we now unpack the bales that we tucked into neat stacks in the upstairs of the barn (some stacks easily sail twenty feet into the air when we are caught up with haying) and lug them to the pastures full of hungry animals who wordlessly devour the preserved grass from half a year gone by.

 

Interested in Trying a New Product?

Farming keeps us on our toes.  Nothing is ever the same one day to the next, despite our planning, and arranging for it to be that way.  So, too, is our line up of meat offerings.  It is great for us to be able to raise such a varied and diverse barnyard of animals: from Thanksgiving Turkeys (heritage breed and pastured, fresh for Thanksgiving by pre-reservation only) to Pastured Heritage Pork, to Grassfed Beef and Lamb and Goat… plus the chicken, eggs, duck, duck eggs, geese — it makes for a tasty and varied experience.   Well, we have decided to add another product to our humane little farm: “Rose Veal” — not the caged, confined & abused factory farmed calves who sacrifice their lives for diners who appreciate their vitamin deprived, anemic pale meat… rather robustly healthy calves who soak in vitamin D rich sunlight, drink healthy Jersey cow milk  (also mineral rich water) and eat hay and grass.  The resultant veal is slightly darker in color, with a distinctive and lovely taste.

Anyone interested in humanely raised LOCAL veal?

Wells Tavern Farm Veal: No grain. No pain.

 

Trust Your Local Farmers Who Raise Grassfed Meat

The rise of O157:H7 E. coli across the nation was brilliantly described in the article in the New York Times a few days back.  It is terrible that pathogens can cross into food so easily on feedlots and through slaughter facilities “out West” — yes.  It is nearly impossible to become sick after eating Grassfed Beef from our farm, or from our neighbor grassfed farms: Wheel View Farm, or Foxbard Farm?  Yes. Nearly impossible.

The benefits of raising animals on pasture and grass are clear. Cows fed forage and grass diets have been shown to have no E. coli pathogens known to be harmful to humans. On the other hand, cattle coming from feedlots have been shown to carry the deadly E. coli O157:H7 and other unsavory diseases. The bacteria live in their unnaturally balanced intestines and then can be carried on the cows’ hides (through feces). The feedlots where these cattle stand in their own fecal matter and are fed an unnatural diet are without a doubt the source. As long as we continue to allow grain-finishing and humongous cattle feedlot operations, it should come as no surprise that E. coli thrives in today’s common supermarket beef.

So, how do you make sure that the meat you share with your family is safe and uber-tasty? I would gently suggest that you stop by our farm, and pick up some ground beef from our grassfed (no grain at all) Belted Galloways and taste the flavor difference, and feel secure in the knowledge that it is a clean product.  If you can’t make the scenic fall foliage drive to our farm, try our neighbors beef, Foxbard Farm Angus Beef, or Wheel-View Beef, both available at some local markets shelves.  In fact, Carolyn Wheeler told me yesterday that their farm is hosting some open farm days this weekend, and next.

If you do visit Wheel-View Farm this weekend and pick up your Sirloins and Tenderloins from their Grassfed Beefers, come by Wells Tavern Farm, and get some Pastured Heritage Breed Pork (Bacon, Sausage, Chops, Ribs), or Lamb (Ground, Chops, Leg, etc).  We are a quick five minute drive from John and Carolyn’s, and only a few hundred feet off The Mohawk Trail (Route 2) in Shelburne.

We have the yellow Buy Local CISA sign in the front yard, and a whiteboard with “free Range Chicken Eggs for $3″ out front — White House, Red Barn. You can’t miss us.  Really.