Local Meats, Better Quality/ Prices Supporting Local Farms

So for many years I have been going to my local Farmers market as well as Slater's Meats. Located off of 38 about 11 miles from my home. Bob Slater, the owner makes many of his own meats to sell as well as other local meat makers. When I asked him how long he had been Butchering, he laughed and said "long before you were born, 1957" When I asked him about his meat supply, he stated that some was local, and the other from out west. He made it clear that it was the cost of raising the beef locally and what farmers could get per pound. I also know from talking to another farmer locally that supply can increase on a weekly bases. 

It was a very clean store and you can tell a lot of attention goes into their up keep. There was clean saw dust on the floor around the cutting stations, and the veggie cooler was perfectly clean. They offer a wide variety of HOMEMADE loafs and meat mixes as well as a large selection of locally sold spices from a local company. You just got the feeling that this was a shop for locals, no gimmicks or thrills, just a down right country store.

If you happen to be passing through or are local, stop in and try some of their deli meats. They will allow you to free sample some, just like the old days!

Here is Bob Slater and one of his other butchers. Bob was cutting NY Strips while his other butcher was cutting a piece of fresh Top Round for me to make my jerky from. His knife was very sharp I might add.

 Here you can see the butchers rail coming from the freezer while a mule deer looks away from the butchers table.

Butchers rail

  Prepping some meat

 Trimming off the fat of my top round

 Look at this selection of cold cuts, homemade sausages, loafs and meat mixes!

 How good are these prices?

 Local Chicken

Prices so good, it is worth the drive for the price alone not to mention the quality!

 What grocery store can claim they make their own lunch meats? I did sample and bought a pound each of the Pepper Loaf and Dutch Loaf. The Pepper Loaf taste just like a hot pepper sausage, but its flat! YUMMY!

 Other local meats and sausages as well as a wide selection of cheeses. I am going back today to pick up my pork bellies for bacon makin! They also supply me with my pork and fat trimmings to make my homemade sausages!

Sugar Season Is Coming, Get Your Pork Bellies Ready

Last summer Joshua and I headed into the woods to mark our own Maple trees. Armed with a Canadian flag and pictures of types of Maple trees, we started scouting in the middle of the front yard. Joshua spotted our first tree. Using blue plastic marking tape, we tied the tape around every tree we found that we could tap for sugar season this year.

We found 39 trees on the homestead that could be tapped, 14 of those are sugar maples. So then I decided to gather the two different saps separate in order to sell off the batch made from the sugar maples as the syrup is a better quality. I see that syrup is going for $88 dollars a gallon, so I hope to sell some to pay for the new barrel I had to buy and cover other minor cost. I had wish listed most of my supplies so I consider those as gifts in order to keep my SS fund above $1K. 

Make the task of gathering the sap easier, not knowing how much snow will be on the round, we mapped out our trail around the property to gather the sap. Than I decided it would to our advantage to clear and trim out the path around the property. We removed old logs, used some as firewood, cut limbs below head level. We drove the tractor around to decided which approach would be the safest for us. 

As the cold weather is here now, the smoker is cured and ready for meat. This years bacon video will include a smoking how to as well. In order to the best use of the smoker, we are going to smoke the sausage and bacon together but do two separate videos. As I type this, I have bacon in the fridge curing...

Its a simple 3 ingredient cure and any one can make/smoke their own!!!