Wednesday, March 3, 2010

Beef Pickup Day!

I'm ready - my mini-freezer compartment is cleaned up, ready to take on the next portion of my quarter of a cow. My cow lead its happy life in San Juan Bautista, which is about 45 minutes south of San Jose, at the farm of Morris Grassfed Beef. Rather than buying a freezer and taking the entire split half at once I opted for the CSA delivery, where I pick up the meat on 3 dates over the year.

How do I get the meat? Joe Morris drives it closer to me. At the appointed time I show up at Doerr Park in San Jose, where his refrigerated truck is parked. At the last pickup it was sunny, and lots of people were getting extras, so there was quite a happy line of waiting customers with their coolers. Today it's pouring rain, so no line. Yeah! Joe's truck is his little office, with a laptop with his customer's info on it. We chat a while - nice to know the people that are growing your food, and he's a keeper! And I'm all stoked, they'll put my recipe for brisket in their next newsletter! Yeah! Anyways, Joe's helper finds my box and loads it in my car, I pay, and the 3rd of the quarter cow is mine.

 

I get in the car and get my loot home as quickly as possible, I want it to stay frozen after all. Perhaps I should get a larger ice chest after all?

So what's really in the box? The Morrises give you a good rundown on their website - www.morrisgrassfed.com - but I thought it would be interesting to show it. So here it is. For a close-up view click on the pictures.

  

Top layer: Eye of Round, Short Ribs, Sirloin Steak (see my other post on how delicious that looks), Swiss Steak (???) and Beef Stew (no, the cats were not part of the deal....) 
Bottom layer: Two more sirloins, another Swiss Steak, two more Beef Stews, and a bunch of ground beef. I feel that I forgot something, but I can't recall.

Earlier shipments included more roasts, I think they are trying to split it up that you have more steaks in the summer, and the roasts in the winter. 

And yes, you see it correctly, it's all labeled NOT FOR SALE! It mainly means that it's not packaged for individual sale, and no, it's not bad for you (or cat food, as you may think from the pictures). Au contraire, it's good for you, much healthier than grain fed, and much better for the environment because the beef gets to graze the grass and isn't force fed corn. Their website has some neat aerial photos where you can see that their land is super healthy and green.

So now I'll have to plot what my last meal in the old kitchen will be.... A steak? A stew? Meatballs? Hmmmmm......

4 comments:

  1. So what's the 1st meal gonna be? Love the picture of the box with the 2 curious kitties (I have 2 cats myself).

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  2. Still thinking.... Took some ground beef out. Home along tonight and tomorrow. Perhaps some little meatballs with ginger and chiles rolled up in the leftover romaine with some sweet chili sauce? Hm. Or a frittata with a bit of beef, onions, and a few cracked eggs that I need to make? Research has to start soon. I'm hungry already!

    I really like cats until they start stealing the food from you. They were like sharks yesterday when we had the lamb steaks - LOL! I hope yours are better behaved....

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  3. Mine are bad too. I can never leave any food alone with them. Even fruits they play with. Two summers ago, I left a bowl full of peaches, apricots, and nectarines on the countertop, went upstairs for 1/2 hour, came back, all the fruits have claw marks!!! I don't think they want to eat it, more of curiosity and they want to play (they were less than a year old at the time). Now I leave fruits in the pantry. They also steal dishwasher sponge and play with them LOL!

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  4. Mine love carbs. We caught the grey one the other day cleaning out the bowl I had used for my (sticky) bread dough. Paw in, dough on, paw to mouth, lick. The worst is beets. Sometimes I leave them outside to cool off after I roast them and forget. And then I have red all over my kitchen, and only half beets left.

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