Dawson Valley Free Range

Dawson Valley Free Range

Friday, November 9, 2012

Christmas Delivery


We will be delivering pork and ham to Gladstone, Rockhampton, Biloela, Baralaba and Woorabinda in the week before Christmas. I have designed a new order form for the Christmas Delivery.
 
As you are aware, it’s the two hind legs that are used for leg ham and these are usually sold as a full or half ham. We will be selling half hams, which will be about 2-3 kg’s in size. We can’t just sell a leg ham on its own however, as we need to get rid of the whole pig. Therefore if you would like to buy one of our leg hams, you will also have to buy a 5kg BBQ pork pack. This will include sausages, chops and ribs. We will also be offering Bacon and Shoulder Hams. You can buy more than one 5kg pack if you like, but if you want to get two hams (or a full ham), I’m afraid that you will have to buy two 5kg Packs.

On another note, if you are planning on getting a Nitrate Free Ham to serve for Christmas lunch, be aware that people used to only eating conventional ham may not enjoy it. I personally don’t think the NF ham is as nice as the conventional and don’t believe it does justice to either our quality pork or the butchers ability to make tasty ham. In saying that, I think that the NF bacon is lovely. The NF ham doesn’t have as strong a smoky flavour, because apparently the nitrate is needed to “carry” the smoke into the centre of the ham. The bacon gets the smoke flavour as it is a lot thinner.
 
The delivery date isn't finalised, but will most likely be between the 17th and 22nd, so please let me know if you are going to be going away before that and we might be able make other arrangements.
 
We look forward to getting your orders by the 1st of December. Please send your orders in as soon as possible though, as the number of hams are limited to the number of pigs we have available. I will be sending an email out to everyone on my mailing list, so if you don't receive an email, I apologise - send me an email to let me know and request one.

Wednesday, October 24, 2012

Recipe Request

I had a request today for a Pork Belly Roast recipe. I've just put one on the Recipe tab, so check it out....also one for Pork Pad Thai - a great way to use the diced pork.....yum. I cooked Pork Belly the other night and did it the first way - simple, easy and so good!!! I much prefer the Belly Roast to the Spare Ribs. When you cook it as a roast, the fat just drips away and you can then tip it off easier. Spare Ribs can be a bit too rich - even though I do love fat!

I know that I should have taken photos.....I really must start taking photos of my pork dishes, because I do like to experiment - especially with Pork. It really is very versatile - you can cook it with just about any style or flavour. You just don't want to over do the flavours as the Pork tastes so good.

Monday, October 22, 2012

What's Happening

We've been busy on the farm lately. Following Kim's accident, my work load has increased, but as I also work fulltime, it's been a bit tricky fitting everything in. Thank goodness that we have Maitland (our son) home, although he heads off overseas on a holiday next month. Kim has been doing more and more, but he is still limited with really only having one good arm. Oh well, it's all character building!

I should have had my invoices out by now, but am a little behind. I will hopefully get them out tomorrow night. But never fear, I will get around to it.

Delivery to Gladstone  is still planned for Saturday the 27th. We have some new customers again this time, so that's all very exciting! I really look forward to seeing you all and will let you know times and meeting place next time. We will aim for Calliope about lunch time and then over to Tannum Sands after that.

Some of our new piglets - I love the colours in this one. Not sure where the orange colour came from!

Sunday, October 7, 2012

Rocky Done - Next Stop Gladstone

Well Rocky deliveries all done (thanks Maitland) and it wasn't without a few hassles. It's always a bit tricky starting  a new business, so thanks everyone for your support!

Gladstone deliveries are at the end of this month. Orders close this weekend (20th October) so please get them in. It really helps us plan what pigs we need to take over to the butcher and he needs time to see the orders to tell me how many pigs to send.

I hope everyone has enjoyed the pork, ham and bacon. We won't be delivering to these areas again until December. Also, please let me know if you are likely to want a Christmas ham so that we can plan how many we will need.

Thursday, October 4, 2012

Late Orders

The butcher tells me that we have extra pork - I think I may have sent too many pigs over. I got a little distracted on Monday as that was the day Kim had his operation!

If you live in the Rockhampton, Biloela or Baralaba area and want to put in a late order, please send me an email before tomorrow night. This is for fresh pork only, not ham or bacon.

Happenings of late

We've had a hiccup in our placid, farming life lately! We were rounding up the goats to take to the butcher last Friday when Kim had an accident on the Quad bike. Friday night found us sitting in the emergency ward at the Base Hospital in Rockhampton after a short helicopter joy flight. He's home now, but has a broken elbow (pinned and plated) and two broken ribs. It has meant that our goat orders aren't going to be filled in this coming delivery to Rockhampton and that I'm way behind in telling people delivery times and all that sort of stuff.

I do apologise to all our Rockhampton customers for any disorganisation that ensues from this and hopefully we will get back to normal soon.

Tuesday, September 18, 2012

Deliveries for October and November

Rockhampton delivery will be on the 6 October.
Gladstone delivery will be on the 27 October.

We will also do a separate delivery for Biloela, Theodore, Moura and Baralaba on the 17 November. If you live in these areas or know some who does, can you please pass on our details.

Order Forms will be emailed out - if you have any trouble opening or filling the form in, please let me know.

On the order form, you will notice that we are giving you the opportunity to buy extra pork mince, pork sausages or diced pork by the kg.

Christmas Hams
We would like to start planning for Christmas, if you would like a ham, can you please let us know via email. We will sell hams separately at Christmas time, but leading up to then, they will only come as part of the 5kg ham and bacon pack.

Goat
This time we are trialling Goat packs. We will sell them as 1/2 a goat pack, and because we don't know how much this will weigh, they will be sold by the kg. We only have a small number this time and will then have a few more after Christmas. Whether we continue after that, will depend on interest and profitability.

PLEASE NOTE: If you would like some goat and you live in Gladstone area, please respond now, so that we can make sure you don't miss out.

Thursday, September 13, 2012

Real Food Festival

We went to Maleny on the weekend to attend the Real Food Festival - read more on my Healthy Farming Healthy Food Blog. We met some interesting food producers - the Sunshine Coast is lucky to have so much food on their doorstep! We bought and taste tested some Kidaman Beef. They are a fairly new business to the local food market down that way and we were VERY impressed with their quality and professionalism. We enjoyed their rump steak and sausages one night and then a Mussaman Curry with round steak the next. Absolutely Great!! We also visited a Fejoa stand. When the Owner/Producer said that their Fejoa White Balsamic Glaze was great with pork, well we just had to buy some! (I'm yet to try that) Hopefully we've also made some good contacts for our own produce. Other great products included: olives, honey, bananas, coffee, dairy, fresh fruit and veg, as well as products produced locally - jams, cheese, bread, chutney, jam and sauces - just so much food! If you're in the Sunshine Coast region, try and support these businesses and other local food producers. I also wonder if we can do something like this in our Region of Central Queensland - we also have some great food products!

Monday, August 27, 2012

Post Delivery Comments

We had a huge day on Saturday delivering our pork. We picked it up in Monto, went to Calliope via the Boyne Valley - that's a really pretty drive through there. Dropped off a pack to Travis (just before Calliope) - who has already sampled and given us some great feedback, so make sure you read his comments in the Testimonial Section of the Blog. Then onto Tannum Sands after dropping more pork packs, plus a spit pig in Calliope proper. On to Gladstone, then Rockhampton and then finally home. Finished the deliveries locally the next day. Wow, it was a big day, but so good! Luckily Kim and I don't mind driving! But the best part was meeting our new customers - I like that part the best, as it's so positive to talk to people that like the same sort of food that we like! Oh, it was also good to see our continuing customers!! Also, we met people with great attitudes - we were a lot later than we thought we would be and so a big thankyou to all those that we mucked about. It's our first big delivery, and trying to time it was obviously a lot more tricky than I had originally thought. Your patience was greatly appreciated! I can't wait for the next delivery day! Hopefully September for Rocky and then October for Gladstone - stay tuned for a more accurate date.

Sunday, August 19, 2012

Answer to some Questions

We've had a few questions from some of our new customers, so I thought I'd share my answers here. Our philosophy on raising animals, is that they should live a good life - with plenty of fresh air and sunshine. They are not confined except for when they are farrowing, when we place them in a smaller pen - often a portable structure inside their existing paddock. This is to protect the babies mostly. When the sow furrows, which can take a couple of hours, she is unaware of much going on around her and it's not unheard of for other pigs to be a nuisance around the babies. It's also safer if a fox or other preditor manages to get through the outer fence, as they won't get through the portable pen. Our paddocks are quite large, although we are in the process of making them smaller, so that we can rotationally graze them better,which will improve the quality of the pasture they graze on. We are true free range, which means that they are on pasture, not just bare dirt like a lot of "free range" farms are. GMO - we don't feed the pigs any feed that includes GMO grains or other products. We don't believe in using chemicals in the feed or on their bodies. The grain they eat is not organic, so they are fed grains that have been grown with chemicals. At this early stage in our business growth, we can't afford the extra cost to feed organic feed to the pigs, but hope to down the track. We are opposed to GMO in any way, shape or form! Antibiotics - if we need to treat a sick animal we will, because we believe that it's cruel not to. However if we need to treat an animal, it will be removed from outside sale. Fortunately this is a very rare occurance, as true free range animals don't get sick very often. If anyone has any other questions, please leave a comment.

Monday, August 13, 2012

Orders Closing Soon

The next deliver of pork to Gladstone, Rockhampton and locally is getting close to filling, so if you would like to get some great tasting pork, email me for an order form.

Sunday, August 5, 2012

Pork Delivery Dates

We've been busy at Dawson Valley Free Range. We've got a new order form, with changes to the packs that we offer. Please email me to get the form emailed to you. Click on the Ordering Page for more information. Leave a comment if you want to know anything!

Rockhampton, Gladstone and Local Orders - Delivery Date is the 25th August - please send your order by the 14th August.

Sunshine Coast - Delivery Date is the 7th September - please send your order by the 28th August.

Monday, July 23, 2012

Pork all sold for this month

We've had a great response to our pork sales once again. It's great to see so many people supporting us, and it just makes us realise that we do have a good product and that people want it. We offer a pork product that is so different to what people are used to buying - ours has a flavour and texture that I don't believe you get from conventional pork!

Next sales will be in August and we'll have ham and bacon then too. The ham and bacon has been very well received so far. We'll be changing our packs, so stay tuned to see what we will be doing.

Sign up to receive an email update from us. This will let you know what we are doing, as well as what and when we are selling. I won't be blogging all the time - only when I want to tell you, our customers something.

Saturday, July 14, 2012

Pork Sales Update

We will be delivering pork to Biloela, Baralaba and Rockhampton Areas during the week ending 27th July. So if you haven't got an order in yet, there's still time. Please refer us on if you know anyone who wants to try our great tasting pork. We have been getting some great feedback from our customers and really appreciate the comments. These comments include some really good ideas for how we may be able to improve our service and product delivery. We are hoping to have some different pack formations for future deliveries.

Friday, July 6, 2012

Pork for Sale - July 2012

We'll be selling our next lot of pork in the next couple of weeks. This is one of the porkers a few weeks ago.
He's in a pen with quite a few others and here are some more photos.
Who said that pigs don't eat grass?? Unfortunately there are a lot of people that think that pigs don't and that they are quite happy in sheds!
These are happy pigs. They love having a wallow to lie in. Wallows keep them cool in summer, so are essential. The mud also helps to stop sun burn. As it cools down it's not as important, but they still use them. They then lie out in the sun and sunbake.
We use self feeders for the grower pigs. The idea is that they eat what they need. It's important to make sure there's plenty of grass, or else they could spend all day at the feed bin. It's really necessary for pigs to have a grain ration, but a pasture diet ensures their meat (and fat) is nutritious.

Saturday, June 16, 2012

About Dawson Valley Free Range

This Blog will be all about our Farm and the animals that we raise on it. It will also be about a lot of other stuff about free range farming, growing healthy food, the ethical treatment of animals and the selling of our pork and other products as they come on board. Please feel free to comment or ask questions.