Thank You Graze

Well you know me, if there is a soapbox I will stand on it, an opinion needed; I will give one. Like all things it goes back to parochial school. (Ha, you thought I was going to say Kevin Bacon didn't you?) If Sister Mary Gerard hadn't asked me what color the bathroom should be painted when I was in first grade, I might've grown up thinking the world could get by without my opinion. But she did, so here I am.

My raw milk battle continues, although I seem to be fighting it all alone . No I'm not talking about you people, or our customers, or the general public.  I am talking about our fearless leaders who do not want to play with me.

To date I have had no response from any of my emails,advertisements,letters, or phone calls regarding the statute prohibiting raw milk advertising in Illinois. I started this campaign on October 24, over a month ago. My how times flies when you are the one asking questions of THEM.

So I notched it up another level.

I contacted Joel McNair editor of Graze magazine   http://www.grazeonline.com/  and pitched an idea about doing a raw milk update as it related to our farm in Illinois specifically, and the rest of the country in general. Joel had published another article of mine a few months ago and had encouraged me to write for him on a regular basis. I was thrilled that he was interested in this follow-up article " A Raw Deal : You can sell it;  Just don't tell it."

My article summarizes much of what I've been talking about on this blog the last several weeks but still, I am small town enough to think it may draw the attention of the higher ups who might, maybe, please with cream-on-top, be able to tell me WHY this farmer cannot advertise one of our farm products?  I am also small town enough to be excited to see our issues published in a national magazine.

Will I still be excited when IDPH notices and comes knocking, calling, asking to be invited in for a civil conversation about raw milk over a plate full of cookies? Yeah, I think I will be. But at the rate Illinois is moving in regards  to my questions I think I may have a little time to prepare for their visit.

How long exactly does it take for hell to freeze over?

Bored Smored

I am ALWAYS shocked whenever I hear anyone say these two words.

"I'm Bored"

I cannot comprehend that statement. I have so much to do in so little time that I am never ever ever bored.
I, in fact, find myself totally unable to keep up with all that has been occurring lately. Just a few highlights:

Yesterday was Chicago delivery day. We met up with Jared Van Camp and Zeeshan of Old Town Social the very first restaurant to buy our whole pork carcasses over 2 years ago. Yesterdays delivery will be a very famous pig for Jared. He is being filmed TODAY by the Discovery channel for their show The Meat Guy which will be shown on their 3D network. Jared will be taking apart one of our copper haired, certified organic, raw milk fed, Red Wattle hogs.  Piece by piece he will compare it to the carcass of a confinement hog.

This is a big deal. No, we're not a big deal, we're still just two sweaty, smelly, pig and cow farmers but the show will be a big deal as viewers will be able to see with their own eyes the real difference in quality and taste. Well, the viewers won't taste the actual product but if I know Jared he'll be cooking up some fine plates of pork for the TV crew to inhale after the show.

Thank you Jared for choosing our farm, our pig.

Stunt Sow Morticia standing in for the Red Wattle Sow who sacrificed
her hide, her loins, her jowls in order to bring attention to the
fine meat produced by Red Wattles all over the world.

THEN...we recently heard that Joliet Junior College in scenic Joliet, Illinois just won their national culinary competition in Dallas Texas. If you follow the link and look at the entree section under the menu on the left you'll see "suckling pig" http://heraldnews.suntimes.com/6731547-417/joliet-junior-college-culinary-team-wins-national-competition.html  The suckling pig (2 of them ) came from our farm due to the voice of our daughter in law Tab Brownell.

Tab is a student at JJC's Culinary school, a dream she has worked on making a reality, for a very long time, and when she heard the chefs mention they needed suckling pigs she told them of our farm. A few calls back and forth to Chef Bucci and we decided to donate a sucking pig. ( What can I say ?...We really love Tab) They loved it and bought two more to use in this competition. We are very grateful Chef choose our little piggies to compete with and we are even more grateful for the physical strength God has given us to do the work required to raise these fine animals.

In addition, our Farm Store gets busier every day. When we once had 3-4 customers a week it is now common to have 3-4 customers a day. Not exactly Whole Foods customer numbers but strong activity for us. We might have to hire a carry out boy. I will call him Buster. Or maybe Gunther.

One gentleman buys many many gallons of raw milk each week which he feeds his Confinement Pigs as he has discovered the great improvement in their overall looks and health. He has done well in recent swine shows with his "secret" feed ingredient and continues to come back for our raw milk every week. In addition, he stops at our store and picks up a little organic meat for his family. The fact that he wears sunglasses and a ski mask is of no concern to us. The helicopter which hovers overhead each time he makes a purchase, is basically just amusing. At least this time it is not shining down on me.

These top secret purchases make  us gleeful. We live in a area of GMO corn and CAFO animals. Locals are not regular customers of ours.  Organic is still looked at suspiciously by our neighbor farmers and, very few small farms around us even have livestock in their fields anymore, if they own them at all. So when a local farmer tries our products and then keeps coming back for more...it feels quite awesome.

One more reason for not blogging  much this week; it seems my rural writing career is taking off. I've been writing for an online magazine The Renegade Farmer for a few months now.http://therenegadefarmer.com/  Every Saturday a new piece. In addition, Graze Magazine, a national grass farmer focused publication asked me to write an article about our farm. It came out last week and recieved positive comment.

Yup, one farmer wrote "nice" in the comment area on their website. Can't get much more positive than that. The fact that his name was the same as my husbands is pure coincidence. After all that media frenzy, the editor contacted me yesterday and asked if I would be a regular writer for Graze, traveling and interviewing farmers about their farms.

Yes, I said.  Yes.  ( I am such a maroon.) So much for simplifying our lives. You might ask yourself,  "Was anyone really surprised Jay Lo and Marc Anthony are divorcing?" or an even more focused question such as, "Why does this packing- peanuts- for- brains -woman keep taking on more work when she keeps telling us she wants a less chaotic life?"

The answer would be, because we need to build up our new sources of income before we sell off the current sources of income. Sort of the storm before the calm.

So now I lay me down to sleep. Until I pick up the grandkids and resume job number whatever. Doesn't matter, I just know its the best paying job I have with the most unending benefits. One job that will remain the same before, during and after our big life change, at least that is my daily prayer.