News From the Farm
StoneBridge Beef and the Local Foods Movement had a banner year in 2009! The credit goes to consumers like you who vote with your dollars, spending money on the best food and not the cheapest. We have the happy privilege of working feverishly to keep up with the demand for more locally grown, grass-fed beef.
Farmers market sales started slowly because we had no inventory in the cold months of May and June 2009. That changed in July and we introduced more and more families to our grass-fed beef during the year. We added Willmar and St. Joseph farmers markets and we are thrilled with all our new customers. Hosting Festival of Farms was another significant event for 2009. We fed and toured about 100 people on a beautiful day in September.
StoneBridge Beef is now available at the following Twin Cities clubs and boutique restaurants: Lucia’s, Dakota Jazz Club, The Marsh, U of M Campus Club, and The Sample Room. Award winning chefs are shifting their purchasing from distributors to local farmers. Many of you will not be surprised that discerning chefs would want to serve our grass-fed beef. And our custom processing seems to fit their needs just fine.
Our customers really do need beef year around so we built a sizeable frozen inventory of variety packs and burger packs and we are ready for 2010. Let me suggest, however, that you plan to buy halves and quarters from us when the grass is green. See the grass-fed link under Our Beef for the benefits of grass-fed over commodity beef.
St. Joseph Meats is our new processing partner. Gerard Hoffarth and his crew are great! Their retail store is one of the best in the State. We are impressed with their professionalism, experience and overall competence. They are strategically located near I-94 in St. Joseph and they love to have visitors at both their processing facility and their retail store.
We are now approved by the ANIMAL WELFARE INSTITUTE (AWI) as a farm and processor team. The Animal Welfare Institute was founded in 1951 and we welcome their participation. “Beyond organic” validation, such as AWI, is consistent with our core values of humane treatment of animals. Like us they acknowledge that preparing meat is part of our omnivore heritage, but the entire process must done safely and thoughtfully.
We anticipate the arrival of about sixty 500 lb. calves in a few weeks. The credit goes to Thompson Land and Cattle Company for another impressive crop of stockers. We will be happy to show them off when you visit the farm.
We are excited about 2010. We love being your farmer and love having you visit our farm.
Mike