Lau Family Farm, LLC grass-fed meats available on Sept 17th
Lori Anne Lau
LAU FAMILY FARM, LLC
Grass-Fed * No Antibiotics * No Hormone
On the September 17th we will be meeting Pocatello customers from 3:00 to 3:30 pm at the Old Town Pocatello Office at 420 N Main (near where the farmers market is held). Our next trip will probably be in mid October.
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. Some beef steaks and roast supplies are going to be fairly tight by 9/17 so please consider getting your requests in earlier even if you want delivery on 9/17.
September 10th Special: Chuck Roasts 10% off. The cooler nights, and kids being back in school, have us and our customers thinking about breaking out their crock pots again. The beef chuck roast is the quintessential pot roast cut. While not inherently tender they are excellent when cooked “low and slow” in the liquid of your choice. I like to use my crock pot or a covered pot in the oven to make my pot roasts, but another good choice is to simmer a covered pot on the back of the stove. I love to add lots of onion and garlic as well as potatoes, carrots and other root vegetables. I love to get home from a busy day to a ready to eat meal, as well as loving the way the house smells. If I’m really ambitious I’ll set up the bread machine to complete a loaf just before dinner. YUM! (Most of our chuck roasts are 2-2.5 lbs each, but we have a few that are around 1.75 lbs and a handful that are over 3 lbs each).
We all really enjoyed the sauce on these short ribs (http://allrecipes.com/recipe/slow-cooked-short-ribs/detail.aspx )…I am anxious to try it with a boneless cut (maybe an Eye of Round roast). So easy and yummy. If you use short ribs consider cooling the meal overnight to make it easy to pull the thick layer of fat off). Of course that fat is where the Omega 3’s and CLA’s are found so maybe we shouldn’t avoid all the fat.
· We have had a few 1/3 lb patties made, as well as some thicker New York and Rib Eye steaks. It is possible that supplies of beef steaks, and maybe roasts, may be tight during the second half of September. We will have more beef cut by our butcher at the end of September but in the mean time supplies are getting tighter.
· Orders are rolling in for quarter, half and whole beef which will be delivered in early winter (approx February). Please consider getting your deposit in soon for an earlier delivery date. More information can be found at http://laufamilyfarm.com/quarter-beef/ or http://www.laufamilyfarm.com/whole-half-beef/. We are also taking deposits for whole or half lambs to be delivered beginning in January. See http://www.laufamilyfarm.com/whole-half-lamb/ for more information.
· 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 kidneys, and beef tongue. Let us know if you would be interested in purchasing some for yourself or your animal friends.
· We have several kinds of sausages available: Beef Salami, 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.
· Our newly redesigned website is now active. If you find any errors or slow loading photos or other issues as you explore the site I’d appreciate hearing about them. If you have any suggestions for additional info to be added to the site that would be good to hear as well.
John is stacking the final bales of our second crop of hay this morning. Unfortunately half of our second crop of hay was rained on a few times. The rain damage will severely affect what we are able to sell this surplus hay for. We believe we already have all the hay we will need for the coming winter. Leasing the extra 100 acres of hay acreage has helped to ensure we can produce all of our feed needs most years. Hay prices have remained really high-about double or more of recent normal prices. We are so thankful to have enough hay this year. Purchasing hay has really impacted our bottom line the last several years. Even with the lease on the land we can make hay far cheaper than we can buy it, at least with current prices.
John has also cut our sainfoin ( a legume we grow for hay) seed patch so that the plants could dry enough to be run thru the combine which will collect the seed. We are hoping that the heavy rain we have experienced has not knocked too much of the seed to the ground and that it won’t take so long to dry out that the viability of the seed is compromised. Our small patch of wheat was cut yesterday and barley patch is nearly ready to cut as well. Things will stay really busy on the farm until mid November when the snow comes in earnest and prevents outside chores from being accomplished.
School is began after Labor Day (today in fact) this year so we are enjoyed one extra week of relative freedom. We still hope to be able to get up into the hills to pick huckleberries, and were glad to be able to help our friends get their lambs shipped. John had to report for jury duty a few weeks ago so we missed their first lamb shipping. Since he knew all the parties involved in the court case he was dismissed from the jury pool, which was a bit of a relief. We are all glad to have my Step-mom and Dad back in town. They’ve been having a rough spell this spring/summer and we are glad to be able to provide some support to them.
John and I have been having a lot of discussions about how our products are priced over the last year. We have been extremely hesitant to raise our prices because we know that everyone is being squeezed by higher food and fuel prices. We too have seen our costs increasing every time we buy fuel or go to the grocery store or to the farm/hardware/part suppliers to buy something from the farm. Our livestock producing neighbors have been receiving record high prices for their calves and lambs for the last season or two. We have chosen to keep our prices stable and not move them up and down as live cattle and lamb prices fluctuate. If we sold our lambs this fall to a feedlot we could get significantly more than what we are charging for a cut and wrapped lamb. We have been tightening our belts, just like all of you, as the retail prices we pay have been creeping up. At some point in the future we may find it necessary to raise our prices a bit to ensure that we are earning enough to pay our own bills.
We thank all of you that have supported us.
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