Misleading Labels (20 June 11)

Have you taken a trip to Whole Foods lately for some healthy meat and had trouble deciding between natural, grass-fed, grain-finished, pasture-raised, free-range, cage-free, vegetarian, organic, and 100% grass-fed products? They all sound so healthy, and they are so expensive that they must be high quality, right? Right? WRONG! Paying any extra money for most of those labels is an utter waste of your money. Let's look at each of those labels in-depth.

100% Grass Fed

This is the label you you should demand on beef, lamb, milk, and other dairy products. It means that the cattle and sheep were fed pasture, grass, and grass-products (such as hay) and that they were not fed anything else. 

100% grass-fed meat and dairy are healthy and they are far better for you than grain-fed. The omega 3 fats and omega 6 fats in 100% grass-fed meat and dairy are in perfect balance, with roughly equal amounts of each. The standard American diet contains far too much omega 6 fats and far too little omega 3 fats. This imbalance has been linked to a host of health problems including cancer, high blood pressure, heart attacks, depression, schizophrenia, Alzheimers, and more. Additionally, 100% grass fed meat and dairy contain more Vitamin E and the powerful, naturally-occuring anticarcinogen CLA. For more on the health benefits of 100% grass-fed meat, dairy, and eggs, visit Eat Wild. 

Pasture-raised

This label means that the animals have access to pasture at some point in their lives.

If you are buying beef, lamb, and dairy, avoid the pasture-raised label because it means that the animals were fed something else in addition to grass, usually lots of grain and possibly soy too. Beef is often labelled as pasture-raised, which generally means that the animal is eating both grass and grain. Any grain at all alters the omega 3 and 6 balance, creating fat that you don't want to eat. See the section on grain-finished to read how grain for the last few months before slaughter profoundly impacts the fat profile. 

However, if you want the best chicken, turkey, and pork available, pastured is about as good as you are going to find. Cattle and sheep are built to grow and be healthy on grass alone. In contrast, chickens, turkeys, and pigs need some other food to eat in addition to grass and so they are usually fed grain. On factory farms, they eat no grass at all. The quality of their meat improves if they are on pasture and eat some grass in addition to grain. 

With the pasture-raised (or pastured) label, you need to be smart and selective with your shopping. If the label is stuck on beef, lamb, or dairy, don't pay any extra money for it. On the other hand, buying pastured chicken, pork, turkey, or eggs is a good bet. 

Natural

Natural sounds really good and you might assume that it is about the same as organic. It's not. In fact, it is a meaningless label and you should not pay any extra money for it. 

The FDA defines natural ingredients as "ingredients extracted directly from plants or animal products as opposed to being produced synthetically." According to this definition, just about any steak or chicken breast is all natural. 

According to the USDA, "those products carrying the “natural” claim must not contain any artificial flavoring, color ingredients, chemical preservatives, or artificial or synthetic ingredients, and are only “minimally processed." Again, with this definition, most every chunk of meat for sale, such as a pork chop or a beef roast is natural. 

Meat labelled as being from naturally-fed animals is not that great either. According to the definitions, a cow could be fed an "all-natural" diet of 100% corn and soybeans, producing beef from "naturally-fed" cows even if that cow never ate a blade of grass in its life. 

Natural is a gimmick that is put on the label to extract extra money from you, the consumer, and you get no added value from it. Paying for it is an utter waste of your money. 

Grass-fed

This is another useless label. It is regulated by the USDA, but all that is required for the grass-fed label is that the animals eat some grass. In addition to a few mouthfuls of grass here and there, the animals could be eating corn, wheat, soy, strange processed soy products, discarded candy bars, blood meal, processed poultry litter, cottonseed, and all kinds of other junk. 

Even if a cow is being fed large quantities of grass, if it is supplemented with any grain at all, the meat and milk has an unhealthy fat profile. With even a small amount of grain, the omega-6 fats increase while the omega-3 fats decrease, disrupting the critical balance between them. Omega-3 and omega-6 fats need to be balanced with roughly equal amounts of each. This graph shows how the balance is disrupted in milk from cows that eat both grass and grain. Replacing just 1/3 of the pasture with grain is enough to disrupt the omega 3 and 6 balance. 

Some grass is of course better than no grass, but the grass-fed label is generally useless. The animal could eat 95% grain and 5% grass, be labelled grass-fed, and have a fat profile that is quite similar to animals that eat no grass.

Grain-finished

This is another label to avoid. Often, there is much hype about how the animal spends most of its life on pasture eating lots of grass and is then fed grain for "just the last few months" before butchering. This graph shows the rapid disappearance of omega-3 fats in the feedlot. 

By the time the animal has been in the feedlot for three months, the omega-3 fats are almost entirely gone. There is no point in spending extra money for an animal to have been grown on grass if it is finished with grain. 

Free-range

This label is usually applied to chickens but sometimes beef and other meats are labelled this way too. It is an utterly useless label. The USDA defines free-range with regard to chicken production and specifies that the chickens must have some access to the outside, but they don't say what the outside environment must be, how long the chickens have to be outside, or at what point in their lives they access the outside. The vast majority of chicken meat and eggs that are labelled free-range comes from factory-farmed chicken houses (see Food Inc for the inside scoop on what these are really like). To be labelled free-range, the chicken houses typically have a small area where the chickens can go outside. The outside area typically has a concrete floor, giving the birds no grass or other food to supplement their diets of grain and soy. The birds usually do not have access to the outside area except for the last few weeks of their lives. From a health standpoint, the free-range chicken meat and eggs is generally indistinguisable from conventional. Don't spend any extra money on this label. 

Cage-free

This label is generally used on chicken eggs. It is useless, from a health standpoint. It simply means that inside a giant factory-farming chicken house, the birds run around loose instead of being in cages. Cage-free chickens might have a slightly less awful life, but the eggs that they produce are no better for you than from caged chickens. As far as your health is concerned, don't spend money on it. 

Vegetarian

The vegetarian label is often used on pork and chicken meat and eggs. Pigs and chickens are naturally omnivores. They need animal protein and do not reach their full potential without it. Feeding them a vegetarian diet is unnatural and not healthy for them. It is not healthy for us either. When they are deprived of animal protein, they are fed large amounts of processed soy, typically soy meal which is a byproduct of making heavily processed soy products for human consumption. For a long list of the potential harmful effects of soy on  human health, see this summary. When animals are fed large amounts of soy, it affects the quality of their meats and by some reports someone who is allergic to soy can have a reaction from eating meat from soy-fed animals. 

Organic

Certified organic food is produced without the use of synthetic fertilizers, pesticides, or herbicides and is GMO-free. All else being equal, I would certainly choose organic over nonorganic. Organic products have lower pesticide residues. However, the organic label is insufficient to ensure healthy meat, eggs, and dairy. Organic pigs and chickens may never see a blade of grass in their lives. Organic beef may be grain-finished in a feed lot. The organic label tells you nothing about the fat profile of the meat, eggs, and dairy, other than that it has less pesticides in it. 

Where to Find Products

One option is to go to a store such as Whole Foods, Trader Joes, or a natural food co-op and read the labels carefully. Look for the 100% grass-fed label on beef, dairy, and lamb. Look for the pastured label on eggs, chicken, turkey, and pork. 

The other option is to find a local farmer and buy your meat, dairy, and eggs direct from the farm. This is surprisingly easy; see the Eat Wild website for a list of grass-fed products available in your area and contact farms near you. They will usually be happy to tell you about their products (ask them exactly what the animals eat), have reasonable prices, and often provide delivery to major urban areas. If you buy from them, you will have the added benefit of truly knowing where your food comes from and you will be supporting your local economy. If you are in California, I highly recommend Barbarosa Ranchers. 

How to Stretch Your Dollar

100% grass-fed beef, lamb, and dairy, along with pastured pork, chicken, turkey, and eggs, are more expensive than grain-fed meat, dairy, and eggs. This is because our government subsidizes grain. Sadly, because of the misguided government grain subsidy, buying only healthy 100% grass-fed and pastured products is not affordable for most American families. What's a person to do on a limited budget? You have to spend your money where it matters the most.

First, when buying beef and lamb don't waste your money on pastured, grain-finished, and grass-fed; these labels do not ensure that the meat is any better than the cheapest meat you can find. Buy either 100% grass-fed or whatever is cheap. 

Second, when buying pork, chicken, turkey, and eggs, buy either pastured or whatever is cheap. From a health perspective, don't pay extra for vegetarian, cage-free, or free-range because those labels do not ensure that the meat has any added quality. If you do buy pastured pork, chicken, turkey, or eggs, I highly recommend researching the farm where it is produced because there is a lot of variation in the diet of pastured animals. Some eat largely grass while others eat hardly any grass at all. If you are paying premium prices, you want to be sure that the animals are really eating a lot of pasture and not much grain at all. 

Third, if you can't afford to buy all your beef, lamb and dairy as 100% grass fed and all your turkey, chicken, pork, and eggs as pastured, then buy your beef, lamb, and dairy as 100% grass-fed and just get whatever is cheap for the rest. There is a huge difference between 100% grass-fed beef, lamb, and dairy and the feedlot version; the fat is much, much better for you. In contrast, the difference between pastured chicken, turkey, pork, and eggs and the feedlot version is not as dramatic. 

Fourth, if you can't afford to buy all your dairy 100% grass-fed, then get the products with fat in them as 100% grass-fed and buy whatever is cheap for lower-fat products. If you're buying skim milk and nonfat yogurt, they don't have any omega 3 or omega 6 fats, so the cow's diet matters less. Butter, on the other hand, is nearly all fat, so make sure that it is 100% grass-fed. 

Fifth, buy your meat directly from the farmer, and buy it by the whole animal. If you do this, you can get 100% grass-fed beef for about the same price as grocery store feedlot beef by the cut. You will need a chest freezer to store the meat. However, if you do not have the cash or the space for a chest freezer and do not have the money to pay for a year's supply of meat up front, you can still buy meat by the whole animal and take advantage of the cost savings. Just find some friends and divide the meat up amongst yourselves. One of you will place the order for the meat and coordinate with the farmer and you'll all get the healthiest meat on the planet for rock bottom prices. 

Note: Buying meat by the whole animal sounds intimidating, but do not be deterred. The meat will come in neat little packages wrapped in plastic and labelled with the cut, just like you see it at the grocery store. You can even specify exactly how you want it cut and have the steaks just the thickness you like, the roasts the right size for your family, etc. 

Supplies and Equipment for Making Cheese (17 June 11)

So you want to make cheese? The hardest, most complicated, and most intimidating part of the whole process is staring at the catalog trying to figure out what supplies and equipment to order to get started. 

Milk

The most important ingredient is the milk. More than any piece of equipment or any other ingredient, the milk will affect the final product and how much fun you have during the process.

Your milk should be 100% grass fed; this will improve the flavor and increase the yield. Furthermore, if the cheese is from 100% grass-fed cows, it will be healthier than cheese from grain-fed cows. Milkfat is incorporated into cheese, and whether that fat makes you sick or healthy is determined by the diet of the cow. If the cow eats grass and grass alone, the omega-3 and omega-6 fats are in perfect balance, with roughly the same amounts of each. However, if the cow eats even a small amount of grain, the omega-6 fats increase while the omega-3 fats decrease, resulting in higher incidences of cancer, cardiovascular disease, autoimmune disorders, allergies, obesity, diabetes, dementia, and various other mental disorders. Furthermore, if the cows are 100% grass-fed, their milk contains four or five times as much CLA, which is one of the most powerful dietary anticarcinogens known. 

If possible, your milk should be from a breed of cow that has been developed for quality instead of quantity of milk. Guernseys, and some other breeds, produce milk that has more fat and protein t han Holstein milk. The more fat and protein in the milk, the more pounds of cheese you will get from each gallon of milk.

We prefer raw milk for cheese-making, but if you use raw milk, be sure to know your source and get it only from a farmer you trust. 

Shopping List

Cow share from Sunny Knoll EcoFarm (100% grassfed milk)

One share will give you about 5 to 6 quarts per week. Easy 30-minute mozzarella needs one gallon (4 quarts) per recipe. Hard cheeses such as cheddar and parmesan need two gallons (8 quarts) per recipe. With one share, you could make a batch of mozzarealla and have a quart or two of milk left for your cereal, drinking, or cooking each week. With two shares you'll have enough to make a batch of cheddar or parmesan and have about three quarts leftover for cereal, drinking, or cooking. While goat and sheep milk can be frozen for a month or less before making cheese, we do not suggest making cheese from frozen cow's milk. The different parts of cow's milk separate from each other upon thawing. 

Citric Acid and Cultures

To make cheese, the first step is usually to acidify the milk. To make mozzarella with the quick and easy 30-minute method, you use citric acid. To make hard cheeses (e.g. parmesan, cheddar, jack, and swiss) and many soft cheeses (e.g. fromage blanc, cream cheese), the first step is to innoculate the milk with a culture and the culture acidifies the milk. Mozzarella via the 30-minute recipe is a good place to start, so buy some citric acid. While you're at it, buy some cultures for hard cheeses too.

Shopping List

Citric acid (for mozzarella)

Mesophilic starter (for cheddar, jack, colby, cream cheese) 

Thermophilic starter (for parmesan, provolone)

Fromage blanc starter (for fromage blanc)

Rennet

Rennet is used to coagulate the milk. The second step in making cheese is to add rennet. A variety of rennet options exist, with something available to suit everyone's preference. Animal rennet is made from calf stomach. Vegetable or microbial rennet is made from non-animal sources and is appropriate for vegetarians. Animal rennet is usually sold as a liquid while vegetable rennet is usually sold as a tablet. I have tried both and have got much better results from animal rennet. I also find that it is easier to use because the animal rennet, as a liquid, is easy to dilute. In contrast, the vegetable rennet tablets are more trouble to dissolve and dilute in water. While I initially felt a little squeamish about using rennet from animal stomachs, I do eat meat because humans are evolved to eat meat. If I'm going to be eating meat, I want the whole animal to be used and nothing wasted, so it makes sense to me to use the stomach too. Unless you are a vegetarian, I recommend buying the liquid animal rennet.

Shopping List

Liquid animal rennet (get the vegetable tablets only if you are opposed to eating calf stomach)

Salt

You could just use whatever salt you already have in your kitchen, but I have got better results with cheese salt. Buy a lot of it.  It is cheap and you'll use a lot, especially if you make parmesan and other cheeses that are soaked in a brine. 

Shopping List

Cheese salt

Equipment To Buy

You can make cheese without these handy gadgets, but you'll have a lot more fun doing it if you invest in a few new kitchen gadgets.

Shopping List

Curd Knife (stainless steel)

Curd Ladle (stainless steel)

Dairy thermometer 

Cheese cloth

Mini measuring spoons (1/8, 1/16, 1/32 teaspoons)

Equipment You Already Have

Checklist

Big stainless steel pot (2 or 2.5 gallons is good for hard cheese; 1.5 or 2 gallons is good for mozzarella)

Stainles steel collander

Some small glass bowls for diluting rennet and citric acid

Measuring spoons

Cheese Mold and Press

If you buy a cheese mold, make sure that you buy one that comes with a follower designed specifically for the mold. Cheese molds come in either plastic or stainless steel. It is possible to put random heavy objects on top of the mold to press the cheese, but balancing them is difficult. I have made plenty of tasty cheese this way, without a real press, on the cheap. It is a great way to start out without making a big investment. However, balancing the heavy objects does not give as good results as a real cheese press (many cheeses need to be pressed with 50 pounds of pressure), and I have been spending way too much time and trouble due to random heavy objects falling off the cheese in the middle of the night. 

Shopping List

Cheese mold 

Cheese press (balance random heavy objects if you don't want to spend the money on a real one)

I'm saving my pennies for a stainless steel mold so that my cheese will never touch plastic. http://www.lehmans.com/store/Kitchen___The_Home_Dairy___Making_Cheese___Stainless_Steel_Cheese_Press___33050285?Args=/

I'm also dreaming of a real cheese press and am debating between the stainless steel one at the above link and this one, which is the one that I think I'm going to purchase http://www.cheesemaking.com/store/p/49-Dutch-Style-Press.html

Note: I buy all my cultures and rennet, along with some equipment from this website. http://www.cheesemaking.com/

The cheese book that I recommend is this one: (please follow this link from my website to support our farm with your purchase)

http://www.amazon.com/Home-Cheese-Making-Recipes-Delicious/dp/1580174647

How to Build a Guinea Hog House (6 May 11)

For the first summer, our guinea hogs called a patch of earth under a tarp home. It was not a fancy house, but it gave them shade and they were thrilled to have a shady spot with glorious dirt to dig into to cool themselves off in the summer heat. When fall arrived, we built them a proper house so they would be warm and cozy for winter. While it was a major step up from the rigged up tarp, their new house is still nothing fancy. Their winter house worked so well that I built another one this spring so that I could split my guinea hogs into two groups living in two separate paddocks, each with their own house. Here's how to build your own guinea hog palace.

Materials you'll need:

1. (2) 2x4x12
2. (5) 2x4x8
3. (3) sheets of corrugated sheet metal, 2 feet wide and 8 feet long
4. 2 1/2 or 3 inch deck screws or galvanized nails
5. 4 bolts with nuts and washers
6. roofing screws or nails to attach the corrugated sheet metal
7. exterior paint

Tools you'll need:

1. Miter saw (you could use a circular saw instead but it will take a little longer to make the cuts)
2. Power drill or hammer
3. Paint brush
4. Tape measure

Directions:

1. Cut each 2x4x12 in half to get (4) 2x4x6 boards
2. Cut (4) of the 2x4x8 boards in half to get (8) 2x4x4 boards
3. Cut one end of each of the (8) 2x4x4 boards to make a 41 degree angle



4. Cut the other end of each of the (8) 2x4x4 boards to make a 48 degree angle; when you do this, make sure that you cut the angle in the right direction, so that your board looks like this when both ends have been cut
5. Prime all the boards and then paint them with exterior paint on all sides; you can skip this step, but the paint makes it look nicer and last longer
6. Screw or nail the (4) 2x4x6 boards together and add a bolt to each corner for added strength, if desired.
7. Screw or nail the rafters to the base and to the ridge pole, leaving one foot of the ridge pole sticking out on each end for handles
8. Place the sheet metal on the rafters, bending it in the middle, and screw or nail it down
9. Carry pig house to pig pasture, using handy handles
10. Add copious amounts of straw or hay if the weather is cold
11. Watch happy pigs in their new guinea hog house

The red pig house is currently open at both ends to allow for airflow and facilitate summer cooling. In the winter, I'll add a wall to one end to make it warm and cozy, so that it looks like this. 

Advantages of this design:

1. Affordable
2. Easy to build
3. Lightweight and easy for one person to move around
4. No floor means that it is lighter, easy to clean (just move to a new spot), and the guinea hogs can use the earth to cool themselves in the summer

This pig house has a 6x6 foot footprint. It has been a good size for three half grown guinea hogs to live in for the winter. It's just big enough for two small to medium sows to lie in together to nurse piglets. It would be big enough for one large sow with piglets. While the house is not spacious, the cozy size is actually an advantage because that helps the pigs to stay warm in the winter, as long as it is filled with copious amounts of straw. 

If you've used a similar design, or a different design alltogether, I would love to hear your experiences as I am always looking for ways to improve our facilities here on the farm.

I'm now adapting this design to make a portable sheep house for rotational grazing, so look for a blog on that coming soon!

Thick Homemade Yogurt Without the Additives (5 May 11)

Ever since we started milking our own cow a few months ago, I've been trying to make yogurt and it's been turning out with a runny, unappealing consistency that leaves my preschooler begging for storebought yogurt. The online advice for making thick homemade yogurt is to add gelatin, powdered milk, or pectin, which is not what I want to do because the whole point of making my own yogurt is so that my family can eat yogurt made out of grass-fed, grain-free, soy-free, A2, organic, local, pure milk without a bunch of weird additives. (Check the label of your favorite brand of storebought yogurt and you might be surprised by the ingredients!) 

On the suggestion of my mother, I decided to try heating the milk to 180F and holding it at that temperature for 30 minutes before cooling the milk, adding the culture, and incubating it. The result was wonderful yogurt every bit as thick as storebought yogurt but without the additives. Here is my current recipe:

1. Pour 2 quarts of milk into a pot and heat on the stove to 180F and hold at 180F for 30 minutes

2. Place the pot of hot milk into a cold water bath and cool rapidly to 115F, changing the water in the cold water bath as necessary to keep it cold

3. Add starter of your choice (I am currently using about 1/4 C of plain yogurt of the Seven Stars brand

4. Incubate between 110F and 115F for 6 hours. 

5. Refrigerate and enjoy.

The yogurt tastes great and is nice and thick, but I do have mixed feelings about this recipe. The reason why the  yogurt is thick is because the proteins are denatured when it is heated to 180F and held at that temperature for an extended period. Some of the raw milk advocates say that it is better to consume the milk without denaturing the proteins. If that's the case, then we should be making raw milk yogurt that is never heated to a temperature higher than when it comes out of the cow at around 100F. I have to do some more reading on this topic before I form an opinion on it. What do you think about it? For now, I'm going to enjoy the yogurt I just made, knowing that even if it is not the ideal yogurt it is still a much better alternative to storebought. 

PS--My preschooler can't tell the difference between yogurt from this recipe and storebought yogurt. 

Using Hogs as Gardeners (9 April 11)

The iconic American famer is male, drives a tractor around the farm, and brings overflowing buckets of grain to the animals' feeders. I don't fit the description. But I do own guinea hogs, an Ameican original. They are an American breed developed in the eastern United States over the past three centuries. While they were once common on the farmstead, because of the industrialization of agriculture, they have become extremely rare with only a few hundred individuals existing today. The guinea hogs are my plow, so I don't need a tractor. They feed themselves lots of grass, so I don't bring them much grain. But I do feed them some grain because, unlike cows and sheep, hogs do not have digestive systems built for thriving on grass alone. My hogs are currently eating grass and some grain too.

The excessive amounts of money I spend on soy-free, certified organic grains for my hogs is not healthy for my farm's bank account, and the meat produced from grain-fed animals is not healthy for people to eat. Most everybody says that 100% pastured, grain-free pork is not possible, and I've found only one or two places in the entire country that offer it for sale. I would like to produce meat without pesticides, herbicides, GMO's, soy, and grain, all for a reasonable price. Feral hogs survive and thrive without grain and so I figure there must be a way to produce grain-free (or at least almost-grain-free) pork. 

My first step was to choose the right breed of hog for this endeavor. I settled on the American Guinea Hog, which is advertised to thrive on pasture, requiring relatively small amounts of supplemental grain. I've been very satisfied with these hogs. They've been eating far more grass and much less grain than the typical hog, but I am still looking for ways to increase the foraging and reduce the graining. 

This year I'm growing vegetables for my hogs to eat, and the hogs themselves are going to assist with tilling the soil, spreading the fertilizer, planting the seed, and harvesting the crops. That's right, the pigs will do almost all of the work. I'm directing their activities with a few tools taken from rotational grazing. I used temporary electric fence to divide the pig pasture into small paddocks. Limiting them to a small area focuses all their digging and rooting activity in one section of the pasture. Providing a little irrigation when the soil is dry encourages rooting. A few weeks ago, the pigs had their first section nicely tilled up. I waited until it rained and was very muddy and then broadcast seeded forage turnips and forage beets. I left the hogs in the seeded paddock for a few hours, with whole kernels of corn scattered throughout ito to encourage them to walk around the whole area. Sharp little pig hooves trampling around in the mud effectively planted the seeds.

I then took the hogs out of that pasture and moved them to the next section. They were delighted to have a whole new area of lush grass to eat and dig in. In about a week, the turnips and beets had sprouted. They're now growing well in the soil that the hogs themselves fertilized over the winter. I'm continuing to move the pigs down the pasture, allowing them to till up one section at a time. When the turnips and beets in the first paddock are ready to harvest, I'll turn the hogs back into that section. They'll graze the tops and dig up and eat the roots. 

The side benefit of all this rooting activity is that these hogs are also making me an orchard. I eventually plan to convert this small pasture to an orchard with an understory of clover instead of grass. I'm trying to get rid of the grass and the hogs are assisting with this effort. I don't need herbicides, insecticides, chemical fertilizer, a tractor, or any other heavy equipment. The additional benefit is that the pigs are also fertilizing the future orchard. Other than manging the electric fence and throwing some seeds on the ground every so often, I get to sit back and watch while the hogs grow and harvest their own food. My hogs will soon have some of the grain in their diets replaced with beets and turnips, and I'm off to investigate what other non-grain crops we can grow for our hogs right here on our own farm.