Tag Archives: chicken

Prepared

Posted on by under chicken, Farm, pork

Now’s the time to start planning what seasonal goods you’ll need for the year. In MN that’s almost everything, including chicken.

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In this picture we have some zucchini brownies and some spaghetti ready to be quickly made. We have grown to love okra in our tomato sauce. I freeze it whole (super easy) and then blend it into cold sauce when making a recipe. It adds a touch of flavor and makes a thicker, less watery sauce. Our okra has started to produce already and we hope to have plenty to bring to market this year.

You’ll also see our Italian sausage links. Having meat in the freezer and available has put my mind at ease and helped me to avoid shopping, a task I do not enjoy. I always have something available for a quick meal. That’s especially helpful in the busy or overwhelming seasons of the year which for us coincides with planting, weeding and preparing for markets throughout the summer.

We hope you will be able to stop by one of our markets to say hi. We plan to be at the Aitkin Historical Society’s Depot Museum (right next to the Holiday gas station) on Fridays throughout the summer. This Friday we will be there from 9:30 am – 12:30 pm.  Hope to see you there.

Here’s one last reminder. This week is the week to order chicken and turkey for the year! Also, if you’re wanting pork, we have it available by the pound now or halves and whole in the fall. Give us a call this week and we’ll get you all set up for convenient meals all year long.

You can also still order beef and pork to be processed closer to November and December. Send us an email at righteousoaksfarm@gmail.com. We’d love to hear from you.

Printable order form: Click here!

DIY Stocking Stuffer

Posted on by under Recipes

I don’t know about you, but I grew up opening a stocking of little goodies on Christmas day. It’s still one of my favorite traditions. I especially enjoy thinking of and finding things throughout the year that my family will enjoy. Don’t tell, but I will be including some of my favorite handmade lotion in the stockings that I’ve made for extended family. I know they love this stuff and it’s the perfect winter gift.

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I know most people don’t have tallow lying around, but if you’ve saved some from deer or beef cattle, I’ve got the recipe for you:


Do-It-Yourself Tallow Lotion      Time=1 hour       Difficulty=medium

1 cup tallow, beef, deer, sheep or goat (with the addition of lavender oil I did not notice the scent of the deer tallow)

2 Tablespoons olive oil or sweet almond oil

1/2 tsp essential oil (be sure you test a drop on your skin first so that you don’t have a batch of lotion that will irritate your skin – e.g. cinnamon oil often irritates skin)

Place tallow in double boiler or other pan and warm it on low heat until it is just melted. Once melted, remove from heat and add olive or almond oil. Let it cool to room temperature then add the essential oil(s).

Once the tallow, olive or almond oil, and essential oil(s) are combined, pour the mixture into a container if you are not going to whip it. Otherwise, place your pan into the fridge until it is just hardened. It takes about 30 minutes. Then remove it from the fridge and whip it with a hand mixer until it is the consistency you desire (Usually 3 minutes for me). Scrape it into your final container and enjoy!

 

If you don’t have tallow, you can buy it online or sometimes find it at a local meat processor. We also have some beef tallow for $3 per pound. And if you’re not up to making it yourself, our tallow lotion is $2 for a 4 ounce jar. Email or give us a call.

Also, one last reminder for orders before Christmas. We can make gift certificates or provide pork and chicken by the pound or in large quantities. Let me know by Saturday if you’d like me to make you up some lotion. Let us know before December 23, 2017 and we can even deliver to the Aitkin or Crosby areas and anywhere between here and the Twin Cities.

Don’t forget our $15 off promotions run until the end of December 2017. Read more by clicking here: $15 off!

We hope you are enjoying this advent season!

Fall Update and Great News

Posted on by under chicken, Farm, pork

IMG_4390Wonderful news. We have been given a great gift and long-awaited happiness in our lives. On September 21, Asher George Nix was born to us. Asher is the first Hebrew word of the Psalms and one of Jacob’s sons in the Bible. The word means Blessed or Happy! George is Mathew’s amazing dad and the name also means farmer, rather appropriate huh? Please rejoice with us.

In farm news, we are still plodding along and continue to enjoy the fall harvest. Today was our first big frost with the temperature last night reaching 23 degrees F. With the high tunnel, we still have a bit of a growing season, but most of our produce is done. We’re also stocking up on hay for winter so the cows and pigs have plenty to enjoy.

Available products on the farm still include pork and chicken. We will also have tomatoes, spaghetti squash, peppers, watermelon, possibly purple potatoes, and tallow

lotion until they are all sold or the high tunnel gets too cold. Spaghetti squash is a wonderful keeper. The seeds we planted this year were from a squash I cut up in March that was still good from the 2016 harvest. Small are $1.50 and large are $3. Our tomatoes are down to $.75 per pound for seconds and $1.75 per pound for unblemished tomatoes. I highly recommend my favorite green zebra tomatoes. Our peppers are Marconi and $0.50. They are long and a lot like a green pepper, but without the belly ache that some people get from green peppers. Tallow lotion is great for winter skin and only $2 for a 4 ounce jar.

IMG_4249We ordered more chickens than were sold, so we still have some chicken in the freezer. On farm purchase of chicken is $4.00 per pound. Delivered to the Twin Cities is $4.25 per pound. USDA inspected chicken is $4.50 per pound.

Pork! We still have six hogs available for October and IMG_3488November butcher dates, mainly because our main marketing person recently had a baby… We sell in half or whole hogs. Some people have ordered with a friend and split up half a hog. Hogs are normally around 200 pounds. We charge $3 per pound hanging carcass weight plus the butcher fees which varies with your custom order of ham, bacon, pork belly, sausage, pork chops, roasts, etc. As with chicken, we also have USDA inspected pork in 1-4 pound packages for $6.50 per pound. There are still some tasty pork chops, roasts, ground pork and side pork. Small hams are available for $7 per pound and 1 lb. bacon packages are $8 per pound.

As always, our chickens and hogs are pastured and moved regularly. They are fed non-GMO feed and are soy free. We grind the grain ourselves and source much of it from within 30 miles. That also means the grain is fresh increasing the nutrient quality of the food given our animals.

Thanks for being part of our farm family. Without your supporting local, sustainable agriculture, we couldn’t strive to exercise careful dominion over the resources that have been entrusted to us.

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Bundt Pan Roast Chicken

Posted on by under chicken, Farm

It’s been a few months since you’ve heard from us on the blog, but a few months seems like no time at all during springtime on the farm. We’ve been busy enjoying the new baby animals: chicks, turkey poults, calves, and goat kids. The human kids and I (Katie) have also been working hard to get all our tomatoes, cucumbers, squash and melons planted in the high tunnel while Mathew has been fixing what breaks and making more chicken tractors. Things are going well lately and we continue to persevere and see mostly good days in our busy season.

Life gets moving and sometimes we forget things, so I wanted to send this reminder that we’ll need to know your order for broiler chickens by Tuesday, June 6th. Our plan is to butcher July 8th and 15th. If more than 100 additional chickens are ordered from all of you, we plan to butcher September 2nd and 9th as well. With your order, please include your preference for which butcher date you would prefer.

You can also order pork, goat meat and maple syrup. Currently we have rhubarb for $2 per pound as well.

Please give us a call or email. Otherwise you can get a hold of us through Facebook, Instagram, and by mail. All ordering information is listed on this page: https://righteousoaksfarm.com/ordering-information/ . Here is a link to the downloadable printable order form if you need it: Printable Order Form

Now on to what was promised in the post title: Bundt Pan Roast Chicken. I stole this without regret from delish.com. It seemed like too wonderful a recipe not to try with our broilers. I just love roast chicken, and this all-in-one meal is sure to please. I hope you look forward to making this as much as I do come July (though you might want to go straight to grilling and wait for cooler days for this one):

A Month Gone By

Posted on by under Bees, Family, Farm, Honey, Maple Syrup, Pastured pride
Sweetie is not my milking goat, but I just couldn't resist sharing this picture

Sweetie is not my milking goat, but I just couldn’t resist sharing this picture

I can’t believe it’s been a month since I’ve updated you all on farm living. Some new developments have us excited.

  • Our newest increase is that we will be getting a female Great Pyrenees today and hope that she and our male will do well to guard our growing goat herd. We also hope to offer livestock guardian puppies in the future. We’ll let you know if Furry and Juniper (Juni) get along well together.
  • Another cause for elation is that we have chicks hatching today. Yesterday, Moe and Fiesty were born. Last month, we had seven born in our incubator. This has been such a fun process for us and we hope to get some good laying hens for future egg production for our own use. Last months chicks; Hawk, Big Goldie, Little Pepper, Cookie, Little Goldie and Speckled Head, are doing well and love following me around the yard.
  • I have also taken up the challenge of milking our Alpine goat, Ivy. She has been providing us with over a quart of nutritious raw goat milk each day. In early June, we will likely start milking twice a day (a whole new challenge). This weekend, we may even make goat milk ice cream. We have enjoyed the flavor and our many guests have enjoyed a little taste too.
  • Mat’s new chicken tractor design is complete. As a result, moving our pastured chickens twice a day is now enjoyable. A smaller number of chickens has resulted in cleaner, healthier birds so far. If a chicken can be beautiful, I have to say that these are. I have actually said it to them more than once as I’ve seen them this year. Maybe I’ve been on the farm too long.
  • Our pigs are growing strong enough and big enough for our youngest boys to ride them. These two boys have become more daring with age.
  • I don’t think we’ve mentioned that we have three bull calves born last month. They were a surprise since we were told our Scottish Highland cows were bred to give birth in June. We are happy with our healthy and fluffy and soon to be steers. They are growing fast.
  • Mat split one healthy bee hive yesterday and has another out there. Hopefully, this will be the year to brag about when we actually get honey to market.
  • Lastly, our maple syrup season went well. We weren’t so sure at first and it was hard work. At $.25 an hour, Mat doesn’t get paid much for his time with this product, but we enjoy the stuff so much that it’s worth it.

That’s it for now I suppose. Hope you enjoyed hearing about our busy lives. Sorry for the lack of pictures. I guess you’ll just have to visit and pick up some fresh food from the farm if you want to see this stuff for yourselves.

What to do with leftover chicken bones

Posted on by under Farm, Pastured pride, Recipes
Eat good food for a strong body!

Eat good food for a strong body!

First an advertisement:

Want your child to develop strong bones and muscles? Don’t forget us when you’re looking for nutritionally dense chicken. We have a lot in the freezer right now and on September 6th we will have our last harvest day of the season.

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