This isn’t as much a recipe is as it is an idea. It is simple: boiled beets, sliced–dressed with white balsamic dressing, olive oil and sliced orange with fresh mint. So good!

Back when I lived in Manhattan, there was a Turkish restaurant that had a delicious Adana Kebob and had a subtle spice and sweetness. It was sweet because of the addition of sweet red pepper, I added sweet paprika to accentuate the sweetness in this recipe, you can also use lamb in this too, but it is excellent with ground grass-fed dry aged beef too. A simple grilled recipe that is better than takeout!

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At New Years it is easy to dwell on all that one hasn’t done. When one is self employed, it can be even easier to get into a self-inflicted slump. I thought that I would be overwhelmed come New Years with feelings of inadequacy, but instead I found myself feeling better than I expected about the year we have had. After all, we accomplished a dream of mine: to sell at a farmer’s market and my buying club has been an OK success. I look forward to working on making it better, and we have finished the kitchen to a point where it is really workable. Moving to Long Island has been a bit difficult psychologically because when I envision my ideal life, I want to be on a farm. Yet, I didn’t marry a farmer in large part because of the financial instability that plagued my childhood even though I wish to be one myself.  So, I have been trying to dwell in the positive. 

We have made a lot of headway on the house, my husband jokes that I make it look too nice on Instagram because it is still a work in progress, which makes me giggle. Truth be told I have been putting a lot of my creative spirit into the house which has been nice too. I have started to do some pastels and hope to work on a big painting of pigs on pasture. Stay tuned for that! 

Some of my winter super food favorite: white kruat chee and turkey bone broth that is made with only a turkey carcas (with some meat) water and sea salt. The secret is a nice fervent boil until it becomes dense with collagen.

Irish bullock, County Sligo, Ireland

The New York Times just featured a piece on the announcement that Irish beef will be exported to America soon. For those of us who follow such things, this isn’t news, as it has been in the works for some time. The announcement is great news for Ireland, which has been suffering under austerity rules imposed by the EU after the 2008 crash, which acutely impacted Ireland’s economy.

“This U.S. market is a huge prize given its size and the demand we know exists there for premium grass-fed beef,” Ireland’s agriculture minister, Simon Coveney, said in an official announcement Monday on Irish national radio. “We now have first-mover advantage as a result of being the first E.U. member state to gain entry. There is also the large Irish-American community, which will be a key target of our promotional efforts.” via the NYT.  

I hope that the USDA upholds its label requirements for grass-fed beef because grass-fed should mean from mother’s milk to forage and grass from pasture, with no grains ever given to the cattle.

This is the USDA definition from their website:

Grass Fed Marketing Claim Standards

Claim and Standard: Grass (Forage) Fed – Grass and forage shall be the feed source consumed for the lifetime of the ruminant animal, with the exception of milk consumed prior to weaning. The diet shall be derived solely from forage consisting of grass (annual and perennial), forbs (e.g., legumes, Brassica), browse, or cereal grain crops in the vegetative (pre-grain) state. Animals cannot be fed grain or grain byproducts and must have continuous access to pasture during the growing season. Hay, haylage, baleage, silage, crop residue without grain, and other roughage sources may also be included as acceptable feed sources. Routine mineral and vitamin supplementation may also be included in the feeding regimen. If incidental supplementation occurs due to inadvertent exposure to non-forage feedstuffs or to ensure the animal’s well being at all times during adverse environmental or physical conditions, the producer must fully document (e.g., receipts, ingredients, and tear tags) the supplementation that occurs including the amount, the frequency, and the supplements provided.

Kerrygold’s butter, a favorite of mine, claims it is grass-fed but this claim is misleading because I believe they mean “pasture-raised,” as most Irish dairy farmers supplement their feed with some non-forage feed stuffs. This doesn’t minimize the fact that Irish farms are pasture based, and produce some of the best quality pasture-raised products in the world. On their website they make a convincing case for why Kerrygold’s butter is so great, and that Ireland really is a grassland utopia. My point is that if Irish beef is being marketed as grass-fed beef, it should meet the requirements set by the USDA: forage only, no grains EVER.

While this news might be great for Ireland and its beef producers, it could thwart the growth of a domestic wholesale market for grass-fed beef which faces a myriad of infrastructural challenges made worse by a domestic beef industry openly hostile to home grown grass-fed producers. I hope that Irish beef, if labeled correctly, will help in part to create a higher end grass-fed beef market that would in turn facilitate domestic producers  supplying our growing interest in premium grass-fed meats.

With all this said, it is still important to buy directly from domestic producers of grass-fed beef, as we can’t compete with exported beef from Australia, New Zealand and Uruguay which is becoming more and more common at local supermarkets and stores like Trader Joe’s. Fingers crossed that Irish “grass-fed” beef will be marketed as a high end product and that it is labeled correctly.

My husband and I  had our last market date at the Roslyn Village Famers Market last weekend, and I sold out of shares already in my buying club. All the marketing work is hard work but it is rewarding. I know that I am trying to keep our farm financially afloat which sometimes fills me with such anxiety I can’t sleep.

This article in the watershed post about the declining numbers of school children in Delaware County, speaks to how little economic opportunity there is in Upstate New York for young people, especially in rural counties. Connecting food producers with suburban costumers feels like an important link that needs to be made.. Makes living off the farm easier.

A self portrait I took after a big birthday a few months back

I have been maintaining this blog since 2006, on and off with mixed results. I started this blog as a means to articulate and connect with people, but most of all express myself. This is always been a place where I could work through ideas, grow as a writer(this is an important point because I have a learning disability) and share beautiful pictures of my beloved upstate New York. It is with a certain amount of irony I realize, that I feel in love with a Long Island-based teacher, and have made a home with him here on the South Shore, hundreds of miles from my family’s farm. It is funny how life works out, one has a grand plan and then things fall into place differently.

Yet, this blog has in many ways has helped preserve my family’s farm because of all the connections I have made with it, and even though I don’t live on the farm, I help with marketing, and have started a successful buying club(Long Island Meatshare) and now sell at the Roslyn Village Farmers’ Market every Saturday which is organized by one of the nicest and passionate traditional food advocates! There is something about Long Island that feels like a food frontier and it is a real treat to meet like minded people.

I have been trying to be kind to myself too, as the last two years have been extremely challenging.

I have found instagram to be a delightful way to express what I am up to of late, so follow me there if you are so inclined.  I share a lot of what I am cooking and what will be available at the market. I haven’t been sharing as many recipes here because I am trying to focus on creating a pamphlet for our customers. I am sure many of the recipes will find themselves here. It has been actually real nice to work outside of the online content world.

I am in the process of researching commercial kitchen space of an idea I have for better utilizing parts of the pig that seem to not sell at the market, which I am rather excited about too!

This article in the New York Times about how many megastar bloggers are feeling tired and overworked. Thankfully this blog was never really that popular and I have haven’t been plagued with burdensome correspondence. It has always been a place for me to be creative and I am grateful for that.

I hope to also focus more on my struggles with being an adult with dyslexia. There are so many dynamic and wonderful recipe blogs out there and I have felt a need to write about my struggles with a learning disability for sometime and it feels like an approporaite time to focus on it here.   Food will still be the focus here I am sure, however I want to write few posts on dyslexia which I hope will raise awareness and connect with others who are “blessed” with a funny working brain.

All the best, and  thank you for being part of this journey, Ulla

After an inspiring tapas dinner in Brooklyn with a dear friend last night I recreated one of the small plates we enjoyed. Today’s lunch: sardines dusted with spicy paprika. Have to get my hands on the Galician-type sardines they served there– which were far superior to the trader joe’s variety I always have in my pantry( even though they are great too).

In Spain, sardines are served with grilled oilive oil brushed bread slices.

I have also never had sardines with wine(because I usually have them for lunch) the combo was marvelous.

Does it get any better than this? Stale bread, really ripe tomatoes, basil, olive oil, white wine vinegar and sliced red onion..