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Stretch Your Food Dollars with this Ham, Bean, & Veggie Soup
Now that we are a couple weeks into fall, I’m getting excited for all the soups and broths. Soups are cozy, easy to make, and usually utilize the more inexpensive cuts like chicken broth bones, pork neck bones, or like in this recipe, ham hocks. The hock is basically the very bottom of the leg bone where the foot attaches to the leg. It’s a lot of skin and fat with a bit of meat so many butchers have these smoked & cured to add flavor and a bit of meat to beans, broths and soups.
Meal Planning on a Budget
I wanted to walk you through some tips and tricks I’ve learned along the way for how to plan and prep meals inspired by what you have on hand, especially when you already have a freezer full of awesome meats.
Nourishing Your Pet From the Farm
We work really hard to raise our animals well and we are so grateful for the nourishing meat they provide for our family and our community. However, there are some parts of the animal that are less desirable and we want nothing to go to waste. A huge part of being as little waste as possible is to offer those less desirables as food or treats for pets. These items are all safe, human grade (except the chicken pet grind since it has ground bone) and are great sources of protein, fat, & nutrients. And the feet are like nature’s toothbrushes for dogs!
Farmhouse Chocolate Chip Cookies
There aren’t many things that I’ve made more of than homemade chocolate chip cookies. We made them a lot with my mom growing up. I make them every month or so and we always make about 6 batches right before Christmas to have on hand for Christmas parties.
Homemade Chicken Ramen Soup
It’s soup season! And this is one of the most cozy, filling and nourishing soups I’ve had yet. My sweet friend Kathryn that helps us so much with the farm and our kiddos inspired us to try this. She is an amazing cook! So I got all the ingredients one day that she was coming over and she walked me through it. I remember that afternoon leaving the kitchen a disastrous mess, because all we wanted to do was sit and enjoy every bite and sip of this soup.
Cooking With Bone Broth
I had written a blog here on our website a few years back all about the health benefits of bone broth, how to make it and some simple ways to use it. I wanted to write up a separate blog to expand specifically on how we use bone broth, because it has honestly become a...
Homemade Pumpkin Pie with Lard Crust
If there’s one thing I think of when it comes to fall, it’s homemade pumpkin pie! My mimi (Rachel’s grandma) always made the best pie crust. She simply used crisco, salt, ice water, vinegar and flour. So I put my own spin on it to include our lard and I’m so excited to share it with you!
Back to School Quick & Easy Dinners for the Week
I know the weeks when school starts back can be stressful and chaotic as you adjust to a new normal. I wanted to create a meal plan of simple, yummy and quick recipes for that first week back to help make the transition as smooth as possible for you, mama!
Best Southern Green Beans I’ve Ever Had
Now that summer is here, so many veggies are in season! One of my favorites is green beans and whenever I picture green beans in a meal, I always think of bacon. Bacon just always takes things to the next level, am I right?!
Never Eat a Dry Pork Chop Again
You know what I’m talking about….the pork chop you have to slather gravy over or need to chew for minutes before swallowing. I grew up thinking pork chops were tasteless, tough and dry. I honestly wasn’t that excited to try ours when we harvested our first pork, because I was expecting the same thing.
Mason’s Current Jobs on the Farm
One of the biggest reasons we started the farm was to be able to raise a family around farming and the beautiful lifestyle that went along with it. To be able to teach our kiddos how to nurture & care for animals and the land, how to have responsibilities that require of you even when you don’t feel like it, how to work hard on a project or a goal, to fail but keep going, but most of all how to work alongside each other as a family and build something that is a blessing to our local community.
Our Guide to the Perfect Quiche
One of my favorite thing about making a quiche is that you can keep it as simple or as fancy as you’d like. You can use what you have on hand or you can buy a few perfectly curated ingredients (or whatever is in season at the farmers market) depending on what you’re craving that week. I also love that you can make this and then eat off it for a few days and the flavors seem to mesh more and more each day, yum!
Dying Eggs: White VS. Brown
With Easter coming up, I thought I’d do a fun experiment to see the difference between dyed white eggs and brown eggs. I honestly thought that you couldn’t dye brown eggs for the first several years we had the farm. Mason was still young enough that he wasn’t interested, however, even if he was, I was fully convinced that I needed to buy some white eggs from the store if I wanted the dye to work. Boy, was I wrong! I actually love how deep and rich brown eggs can be when they’re dyed and I’d love to bring you along for this fun learning experience.
Cooking With Grass-Fed Beef
It can be intimidating to cook with grass-fed beef, I’ve been there! Grass-fed beef tends to be leaner than other beef you may have cooked, but not to worry, it just needs to be prepped and cooked a little differently to ensure a delicious final product!
Chicken Soup on a Budget
There’s nothing like a hot bowl of nourishing chicken soup on a chilly evening or when you’re feeling a little under the weather. Fresh veggies, rich broth, yummy spices….delicious!
Cooking Through a Half Pig
I gotta admit, there were a lot of pork cuts I was unfamiliar with or unsure how to prepare. However, we are really finding value in making sure nothing goes to waste and learning how to use the whole animal, organ meat and all. Not only is purchasing pork in bulk cost effective, it’s also reassuring to know that you’ve got a stocked freezer that you can shop out of weekly. Plus, you know how the animal is raised and you have that connection to your farmer & your food.
Lard – Good Ol’ Natural Fat
After starting the farm, we began to really explore what we were eating and what’s actually good and nourishing for our bodies. We discovered that fat is actually not a bad thing, but something our body needs. And the best fats are the ones that are not processed but come from natural sources such as animals, especially those raised in their natural environments.
Our Family Favorite Sausage Dishes
One of our favorite pork products is our sausage. It’s so versatile and I love how you can use the various flavors of our sausages to spice up lots of meals in a unique way. I wanted to take some time to walk through each sausage type that we currently offer along with some fun meal ideas for each and hopefully inspire some excitement in you to go whip up some yummy food!
A Great Way to Start Cooking With Livers
Y’all, I gotta admit…..I wasn’t too keen on the taste of livers. I think at first it was a mental thing, but honestly, I still wasn’t a huge fan. I really wanted to like them though! Mostly because chicken livers have so many health benefits which I dig a little deeper in this post.
Two of our Favorite Leg Quarters Recipes
Are you ever intimidated by leg quarters?! It’s much easier to think about cooking up a pack of thighs, right? Well, leg quarters are even better in my opinion, because you get BOTH the drumsticks and the thigh…plus they’re super easy to separate if you prefer to do that. One of the main reasons we love drumsticks and thighs is that we find the meat is much more tender and flavorful. Anyone else agree?!