Lau Family Farm, LLC grass-fed meats available on November 12th
Lori Anne Lau
LAU FAMILY FARM, LLC
Grass-Fed * No Antibiotics * No Hormone
On Saturday, November 12th, we will be bringing our meat to our Utah customers. Our first stop will be at Crumb Brothers Bakery (300 S, 300 W) in Logan from 9 to 10 am. The second stop will be in the parking lot behind Grounds for Coffee (Corner of 30th and Harrison) in Ogden from 12 to 12:30 pm. Our final stop will be from 2:30 to 4 pm in SLC at Caputo’s Market (300 W, 300 S, across from Pioneer Park). We want to thank our new hosts in Ogden-Grounds for Coffee! Some of you may remember when we used to meet people behind their neighbor, Pizza Runner, before we met the Cochran’s.
We will be delivering to our Idaho Falls and Pocatello customers on November 19th. Our December deliveries will likely be on December 10th and 17th.
While we encourage pre-requesting/ordering we want to remind our customers that we are always willing to adjust an order up until the time it leaves our possession. We don’t want our customers to feel that they must buy something just because they included it in their pre-request.
· November Special: Loin and Rib Chops 10% off. Loin and Rib Chops are the prime cuts of the lamb. They are like the T-bone and rib steak of the beef-tender and delicious. We love to grill or broil them year round. Pan frying is another great option for cooking these chops.
· We have some whole bone-in leg of lamb, half bone-in leg and whole boneless legs available. Supplies of shanks, ground lamb, loin and rib chops are good, but we are a bit low or out of some of the other cuts. We will be harvesting more lambs later this month so anything we can’t bring in November should be available for December.
· We have a couple of beef with which to fill this month’s orders but we expect that we may run out of certain cuts this month. We strongly encourage you to get your requests in ASAP for the best chance of getting what you are hoping for. If you know you meat in December, Pre-ordering now for December may be a really good idea because supplies may be tight then as well.
· We are no longer taking orders for quarter or half beef orders. We are taking names for a waiting list of people that would be notified if we end up with the ability to fill additional orders before November 2012. We are also taking deposits for whole or half lambs to be delivered in approximately February. See http://www.laufamilyfarm.com/whole-half-lamb/ for more information. We have a few lambs that were treated with antibiotics, or their mother was treated while they were nursing, that will be ready to be harvested over the winter. If you would be interested in getting one of these lambs let us know, at a somewhat discounted price. Commercial lamb prices are quite high so we may send most of these treated lambs to the auction yard in the coming weeks.
· We have gift certificates available for our products. They can be made out for any amount and will be good for 6 months from the date of purchase.
· We always offer discounts on 10, 20, 50 and 100 lbs/packages of ground beef- see the details at: http://www.laufamilyfarm.com/ground-beef/. As many of you know, we also have 3 beef bundles that save you 10% off buying the same items individually. You can see the details on our bundles website page (http://www.laufamilyfarm.com/beef-bundles/ )
· We have beef and lamb dog and marrow bones available. We also have lamb heart and a variety of beef organs. Let us know if you would be interested in purchasing some for yourself or your animal friends. In December we will also have lamb liver and kidneys available.
· We have several kinds of sausages available: Beef Andouille, Beef Bratwurst, Beef Frankfurter and Beef Sweet Italian, Lamb & Apple, Lamb Garlic and Rosemary, Lamb Merguez, and Italian Lamb with Sundried Tomato.
· We have several yarns that are from our naturally colored ewes-Spot, Shooter, Jenna, Amber blended with a white, and Darky blended with a white. In addition, we have made a fingering weight yarn from our Targhee ram’s fleece-it is so soft and is a lovely natural white. We have picked a name for our yarns etc- Meadow Made Fibers (by Lau Family Farm). You can meet some of these ladies on their new webpages: http://www.laufamilyfarm.com/our-wool/.
· We have a Facebook page for Lau Family Farm, LLC. I hope you will find it interesting and useful. http://bit.ly/laufamilyfarm.
I’m also hoping to get some white yarn back from the spinner soon so I can get some more dyeing done before the days get really cool. Lynn of Spinderella’s Creations and I had another of our wonderful chats the last time I was in SLC. They now have the ability to create felt, thick rug yarns as well as roving batts. They even have someone who can be hired to weave rugs or saddle blanket type blankets (http://www.spinderellas.com/weaving.html) . I’m trying to decide if I want to branch into those types of wool products as well as the worsted weight yarns. She also gave me some interesting dyeing ideas-dyeing wool of different colors in the same dye and then blending them into a yarn with natural variations. If you have any suggestions/opinions please let me know.
Well, another farmers’ market season is behind us and we thank all of you who supported us this summer. It is hard to believe we’ve been doing this for 7 summers. We had the “roughest” season in some ways…with Lori Anne having to miss 3 Saturday markets due to illness. We’ve never had that happen before, and I hope it is not a new trend! I think John and I were both ready for the markets to end, and it has been really nice to have a couple of Saturday’s between the end of the summer season and the beginning of our delivery program.
This week we will be having our ram lambs (born this year) semen tested. The vet will help us ensure that these rams will be able to create our next lamb crop when they are turned out to breed in late November. We will also be going thru all the ewes to determine which ewes will be staying in the flock. We will also be giving them a vaccination to prevent virus caused abortions. The ewes and the lambs, except the ones to be harvested in November, will be treated for internal parasites, as well. At this time we will also be selecting which ewe lambs will be staying to be future mothers within our flock. I am excited to see if Midnight’s son who is a naturally black sheep will be able to give us some additional colored lambs in 2012. I was very upset to find that my old bottle lamb Midnight had bloated on some high quality hay we put out for the few sheep left at the house farm. This happened while we were at farmers market so we were unable to intervene and try to save her. We also lost another favorite of mine, Daisy, this spring. The vet thought that she had somehow eaten a piece of metal which ended up rupturing her stomach wall causing an infection that we couldn’t beat. This is called “hardware disease” and it used to happen more in the past, especially when hay bales were tied with wire.
The nasty weather we are expecting soon will likely force us to move all the sheep, and all the meat cattle, from our Meadow Farm in the coming days or weeks. Only the mother cows and the bulls will spend the winter at the “Meadow”. We do not have a passable road once the winter hits so we have to move the meat animals to town so we can take animals to the butcher throughout the winter.
We thought we had our excess hay sold but the buyer called recently to say they were out of funds. We were unwilling to have the hay leave the farm with just a promise (contract) of money in 30 days, so we’ll see if they have money in a month and if so then they can take our hay. We moved that hay to town, as well, so that it could be sold when we were ready.
Our new tractor, which is supposed to replace two much older ones, is currently in the repair shop in Preston. We are so thankful that if it was going to break down it did it before the snow hit. This is the tractor that we usually use to feed the mother cows all winter. If this had happened in say January we would have had to try to get the County road crew to open our road so we could get the truck in to pick up the tractor. We would then have to get another tractor (rented or loaned?) out to the farm so that we would have a way to deliver hay to the mother cows. Most of the time when there is something wrong with one of the tractors John, and his friends, are able to make the repair himself, so the fact that the tractor had to go to Preston does not bode well. The first information trickling in, as they try to locate the issue, is sounding very expensive. I guess we know where the money we will make selling the hay is going to go.
We are looking forward to having some additional family come to visit us for both Thanksgiving and Christmas this year. It will be fun to have my younger brother’s family here at Thanksgiving, and to have a second small child with us for Christmas (older brother’s family). My step-mom’s sister and her family will also be here for Christmas. I hope that she is still strong enough to be able to full enjoy their visits. I am more than a bit stressed about how to feed 7 extra at Thanksgiving and 9 extra at Christmas. The fact that we will have dairy and wheat allergies to deal with is also a cause of stress for me…I’ve not yet cooked with any of the dairy substitutes. I’m trying to figure out what I can cook in advance and freeze to make feeding the entire crowd for a week to 10 days easier. If you have any experience with non-dairy milk, margarines and cheese I’d appreciate the input.
While it is very stressful to be dealing with supporting my Dad and Stepmom as her illness progresses, it is also somehow very rewarding. She is such a trooper, so hopeful, and wanting to “live” just as much as the situation will allow. Having the opportunity to help her live as fully as possible is definitely a blessing. She has a distinct longing to swim with dolphins, so I’m encouraging her to pursue this while she at least somewhat able. Maybe I’ll even get to take the train to the West Coast with her so she can make some of these dreams come true.
My first year as Caribou County Farm Bureau president will soon be coming to an end. Where has this year gone? We have not made as many changes as I might have liked but I think we are on the right path. I am looking forward to the Idaho Farm Bureau convention in North Idaho later this month. I really enjoy going thru all the resolutions that have been proposed as well as learning how the various other counties are trying to make a difference in their areas. I have applied for a scholarship which would allow John and I to travel back to Washington DC with Farm Bureau for a week. I’ll find out at the convention if I’ll be one of the five selected to go. We’ll have to find the funds to pay for our meals but lodging and transportation should be covered by the scholarship.
We thank all of you that have supported us over the last 7 years!
Please don’t hesitate to let us know how we can improve our products or services.
Thank you for your continued business!
John, Lori Anne, Tommy & Becca Lau
Lau Family Farm, LLC
Grass-Fed Beef & Lamb...A Natural Choice
PO Box 337
Soda Springs, Idaho 83276
1 Fall has arrived at our "meadow farm". Gold and amber are now the dominant colors as the plants go dormant for winter.
2 On the 6th we got about 6-8 inches of snow at the farm-these temps will cause all of the hay plants to go fully dormant
3A close-up of some of the sainfoin seed we grew to be planted in the coming years. It is a highly palatable and nutritious legume.
4These large square "bags" are called totes and they are so large they must be lifted by the tractor. These are full of the sainfoin seed we grew and harvested this year.
5 Tom being a tarp weight as we get tarps on to our winter hay supply.