Tag Archives: farm beef

Is Your Beef Organic

Enloe Farms, ,
Although our beef is not certified organic, we do meet the standards for organic beef.
In order to be an organic certified farm, we would have to follow certain rules set up by certain watchdogs, and jump through certain loopholes set up by certain lobbyists. As a “mom and pop” operation, we have neither the desire nor resources to bow to these bureaucrats.
Therefore, we hold ourselves accountable to keep our beef product equal to, or above, the standards set by the National Organic Program found in the Code of Federal Regulations. (Code of Federal Regulations of Certified Livestock)
Herein stated:
(a)    We provide livestock with a total feed ration composed of agricultural products, including pasture and forage, that are organically produced and handled
(b)   We do not:
a.       Use animal drugs, including hormones, to promote growth
b.      Provide feed supplements or additives in amounts above those needed for adequate nutrition and health maintenance
c.       Feed plastic pellets for roughage
d.      Feed formulas containing urea or manure
e.       Feed mammalian slaughter by-products
f.       Use feed, feed additives, and feed supplements in violation of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act
g.      Provide feed or forage to which any antibiotic has been added
h.      Prevent, withhold, restrain, or otherwise restrict our animals from actively obtaining feed grazed from pasture during the grazing season
(c)    During the grazing season we:
a.       Do not feed our cattle more than 30% dry matter, and then only in dire situations
b.      Our beef cattle graze on lush, green pastures for more than the 120 days required by certification
So, Yes…our cattle are Organic, just not Certified.

 

For information on buying our beef, click >>HERE<<, or go to the Buying Beef tab at the top of this page.

 

Ready For Summer

Enloe Farms, , ,

Anyone ready for summer? I certainly am. I’m not only tired of the cold weather, but I’m also ready to refill my freezer.

I always get a little testy this time of year, because all I have left in my freezer is one-pound packages of ground beef.

Our steaks are usually eaten up before winter comes along, because we use them through the BBQ season, along with a lot of our hamburger patties (which we I gladly pay extra for). Then we go through the roasts and stew meats. And now we only have ground beef. I’ve often joked about writing a cookbook on 1,001 ways to cook ground beef, since we use it so often.

I really should be more thankful, since there have been times (when all the kids were home) when the freezer was completely bare before the next harvest. Fortunately, it won’t be long until I’m giving away all the extra liver, heart, and tongue we have left over from last year to make room for the beef for this year.

In fact, we are taking orders now for an expected delivery in June.

If you are interested in ordering any beef, please click >>>Here<<<, or the “Buying Beef“ tab at the top of the page.

Or request a beef by filling out our Contact Form.

From The Pasture To The Picnic

Enloe Farms, , , ,

It takes over a year to get the perfect steak on our picnic table.

The calves are born in the spring. They stay with mama until weaning time, which is sometime in November. At this point, we put them in a pasture by themselves where they stay until they are well over a year old. Soon afterwards, their diet is supplemented with locally grown hormone-free/antibiotic-free corn. This is what gives beef it’s highly prized marbling texture and increases the meats flavor and tenderness.

At the beginning of the next summer, when we see the calves approaching their optimal weight, we begin contacting our customers and set an appointment up with our butcher at Swiss Meat. A quaint locally owned family business (but that’s a story for another day).

After two or three weeks processing time, The Farmer and I pick up the meat and bring it back to the farm so our local customers can pick up their meat from the farm where it was raised.

The steak that took 16 minutes on a hot grill took 16 months to prepare.

      So we savor every bite!

This is what we had for supper last night. I also made Homemade Peach Cobbler for dessert.

I added the recipe >>Here<< or go to the "Recipe” tab on the right of this page.

Harvesting Cattle

Enloe Farms, , ,

Farming can be so unstable. No matter what we are doing, the final result is usually out of our hands. Although the Farmer is a very hard worker, everything he does around here depends on the weather, the seasons, or the money 🙂

Last year we informed our beef customers that we would have meat around April or May, but had to push back the date because the calves weren’t gaining quickly enough.

This year we slacked off of weighing them–mostly because it was so wet and we didn’t want to have to swim to the scales. But we went out and weighed them this past weekend and they are ready to go!

We have one topping out at 1200 pounds, which is really the max weight of what we like to get them to. Another one weighed 1,180 pounds, so these two can go to the processors today!

Fortunately, the rest of them are just right, weighing 1,035-1,075 pounds. We have an appointment at the processors set for the end of May and these calves should be ready to harvest at that time. I guess I should give an honorable mention to the two calves that are still in the 900 lb. range. We seem to always have a couple of late bloomers.

So bottom line…we will be taking orders for the next two weeks. If you would like homegrown, naturally raised, grass-fed, grain-finished beef, we’ve got some available.

Take a look at the “Buying Beef” tab at the top of the page (under Enloe Farm) for more information on ordering beef. Or Click >>Here<<