You are doing the exact right thing supporting those local ranchers and farmers. You are lucky to know how to find them!

When I was a kid, living in Iowa, we had an enormous chest freezer and we would freeze away sides of beef. It wasnt until we moved to Texas that I realized that things were different in different parts of the US.

While there are quite a few americans who are utterly out of touch with their food source, I am betting the people who commented here and those who read foodie blogs in general have a better clue. I try to give people the benefit of the doubt and not give off a strident attitude in that respect. This is about conversation and I think its best to keep a positive open mindset.

On meat, being a barbecue lover at heart, the easiest thing to do is to go to Sam’s and buy whatever they have. I’ll admit that I usually do this for a competition, for several reasons. However, for home use, I’m finding myself either buying half a steer from a farm I know, a hog here and there from other farmers I know, or buying more expensive cuts from a better butcher. The large grocery store meat department is pretty much skipped over.

With local farmers, I can verify they’re giving care to the animals. I’m not an animal rights person (more animal welfare), and I believe some animals are here to feed us, if we want to use them for that. However, we can overdo it, and we can treat them badly. I try to at least support those that do their best to treat the animals well.

In today’s world, I can’t keep my job and raise all my own food. I’ll buy from locals as much as possible, though, and support their efforts, even at a higher cost to me.

Interesting questions all. We moved to a small farm too late to raise our chuldren her….big regret!…but still with lotsof time to raise vegeetables, herbs etc. With a cold old farm basement, we can put away enough to last until spring, but I still find myself cruising the produce aisle looking for the wonderful thngs that come from 1000s of miles away. Some self discipline is in order.

We have also branched out to wild meat. We snare rabbits, and in the fall my husband shoots some geese. Friends who hunt give us venison and moose. After a marvellous, chemical free stew of rabbit braised in a homemade red wine, it’s hard to go back to the chemical mess that passes for meat in the supermarket, so I guess I’m becoming more of a part time meat eater.

We even try to get the manure from our garden from some Mennonite farmers who feed their cattle organic meal. There’s so much to think about in trying to clean up our food source, but I se so much illness around me, I am convinced we are doing terrible things to ourselves with our supermarket diets.

My question for those of you still considering raising animals for meat – is will you be sending these animals out to be butchered — or will you be killing these animals yourself.

If you are sending them out to be butchered, the question for you is why?

If you are going to be killing these animals yourself — the queston for you is – what is your emotional state when doing this?

Have you thought about why milk production and veal production are hand in glove? It is my thought that milk production is not viable without the corresponding killing of animals.