Down on the farm

As those of you who know me well will already know, I am obsessed love food.  I like planning menus for the week (even if I don't always then follow them), I like to read recipes (even if I don't always then follow them), I finish one meal and I am thinking about what to cook or create for the next.  I do a culinary tour of the world each week - Mexican, Thai, Caribbean, Italian, Indian, Chinese, English, Middle Eastern..... I cook them all, constantly looking out for and sourcing the most authentic ingredients.  I also like to look out for ethical and local food where possible.  But 'local' might be stretching it a little on my most recent adventure in my quest for the best quality food for my family, even if it ticked all the ethical boxes.  On my insistence  we hired a care and drove out to rural Ontario (St Thomas to be precise).  A mere 2hrs and 17 mins according to google (though it takes longer when you get a bit confused with the directions) to buy organic chicken, organic eggs, and organic, grass-fed beef.

Anyway, my argument for this madcap adventure, that saw Sofia go ballistic both directions, was that not only was the chicken free range, organic, cheaper than it's Toronto equivalent and fresh (as in slaughtered only the day before we picked it up), but it would give the kids a chance to get out of the city and reconnect with the countryside.  And I was right.  They loved being in the wide open space.  They loved meeting the baby chicks - even though they knew that they would face the same fate as the chicken in the boxes that we had come to collect.  And Jasmine was only a little worried to hear how the chickens are killed and made ready for customers - well, she did ask!  I think it's an important lesson.  If you are going to eat meat, you should know how and where we get it from.

the highlight of our trip however, was the appearance of the dreaded 'Golden Rooster'.  There were signs around the farm warning not to approach it if it should appear.  And appear it did.  And it puffed out it's chest and started to inch closer, and closer, and closer..... until the farmer decided it was close enough and chased it off with a switch made from some long grass!  What a spectacle that was!

The infamous Golden Rooster

beautiful, open countryside

baby chicks!

baby turkeys