A mob called Bonah are putting together meat packs. It's organic and free range, and you can get pork, beef and lamb packs. Chicken is coming soon. It's $15.99 per kilo, and the boxes range in size from 2-3kg samplers up to 15kg. You get a mix of roasts, chops, mince, stirfry strips etc.
My freezer is a bit too full at the moment, but while the renovations are on I'm trying to eat from the pantry and freezer and not buy too much more. When I get some space, I'll check it out. I'm especially keen to get free range pork - lamb and beef in Aus are mostly free range anyway, but pigs are still kept in quite cruel conditions.
I'm not 100% clear on the concept, and the website is quite irritating. All flash, with insufficient information, and it plays music (hate hate hate). But at least you can turn the music off. If I understand it right, you put in an order with the local distributor, and the Bonah people deliver the pack there for you to collect.
Who is the local distributor? It's the farmers' outlet, Choku Bai Jo in North Lyneham. They have flyers. Go check it out.
10 comments:
Hey ho Ms Cook
Free range pork - ah, bliss. There used to be a producer from Cootamundra (I think their line was called "Frork"?) which came to the EPIC markets with the most wonderful produce. Lovely sausages, pork cutlets and the best bacon on the planet. They'd be worth dropping in on if you happened to be going past. Seriously.
OMG that music is so annoying and what dip stick designed the site I wonder, totally useless!
No local provider near us in the Blue Mtns unfortunately, I'd like another provider apart from Clevelands (?) at IGA. The lower mtns has a dearth of good organic meat, though Hurelys Butchers at Springwood can be good.
Woohoo!! There's an outlet near me! (Cedar's Organics in Goulburn).
Mind you, seeing as I've been promising myself to use Minto Galloway (an actual local supplier of Galloway beef: http://gallowaybeef.com.au/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=87&Itemid=44 is a nasty URL but goes direct to the order page), I should probably use that first.
There's also the local biodynamic cattle mob out my way, whose name I have temporarily forgotten; again, they do consumer packs of beef and again, I've been meaning to use them for a while.
There's also a couple of free-range pork suppliers that will do home packs - Bundawarrah - and I think I've seen one called "Halls Hogs" that do the same.
Only vaguely related, but The Land had a feature about a way one can get access to raw cow's milk - legally - last week. It's called Herdshare, and you basically buy a share in a cow or even a herd of cows. As the owner of the cow, you can have milk supplied in any way you like. I've made contact and will let you know results!! Website is http://herdshare.com/ but it's incredibly basic right now.
But the idea of combining all kinds of meat is a nice one.
There's good stuff to be had at EPIC - the Minto Galloway people come there, and several others. IIRC, Hall's Hogs pork is distributed at the Bungendore Food Lovers? And of course there's my fave Eco Meats at Belco Market.
Raw milk? For cheese, excellent! But if not making cheese for aging, please please please pasteurise it yourself. Salmonella is no fun. Good long article here - http://www.quackwatch.org/01QuackeryRelatedTopic/rawmilk.html
I've seen the bonah packs in the fridge at Choku Bai Jo. It's all vacuum packed (which I'm not a huge fan of)and I didn't like the labelling on some packs, eg "stir fry strips" or "diced" instead of the actual name of the cut it's taken from. But I haven't tried it, so no comment on quality.
I get my pork and beef from Mountain Creek Farm and am extremely happy with it. You do have to pre-order and wait, so you don't get the convenience of bonah (that name it itself's a bit of a turnoff!).
"Raw milk? For cheese, excellent! But if not making cheese for aging, please please please pasteurise it yourself. Salmonella is no fun. Good long article here - http://www.quackwatch.org/01QuackeryRelatedTopic/rawmilk.html"
From the recipes I've got, cheese milk gets scalded anyway; for ageing or eating quickly. I presume our ancestors worked that out in order not to die from making the cheeses from the backyard cow :) (which would be called "artisinal" these days, I guess).
The advantage of raw milk is that I wouldn't have to use citric acid to de-homogenise the milk, and I'd get the flavour improvement that's the whole reason for making "green cheese". The cheese-making process involves scalding the milk anyway ...
The Land article did somewhat promote the benefits of drinking raw milk; as I don't drink plain milk, except in small quantities in coffee, cereal, etc, I'm neutral (as I am on all such health claims not backed up with proper medical studies).
After reading the Quackwatch article, I still remain neutral as to whether I should be concerned or not about the potential risks (disease transmission, bacterial contamination, etc)vs potential benefits (dubious health benefits and definite flavour improvements) of drinking unmodified raw milk.
I would like to say that I had drunk raw milk, and that either there was no discernible difference to MY taste buds (quite feasible) or it blew my mind with the difference (also feasible!).
I believe one can buy raw goat's milk for medicinal purposes in Australia (eg making soaps) - if people then drink the milk when they get it home, it's apparently their concern. There was an article in Food&Wine a little while ago mentioning it.
BTW, pasteurising != homogenising. Back in the day when milk was delivered in bottles, it was pasteurised, but you'd still get the cream rising to the top.
Can you still get Cleopatra's Bath Milk? It is/was raw milk that is sold as a cosmetic. Mountain Creek Wholefoods used to have it, but I'll ask them next time I'm there if you like. Organic Pork is a good thing. The dudes from Cootamundra have their meat (beef and lamb)in the Ainslie and Hackett IGAs and Stupidbarn.
Raw milk. I was raised on it as a kid in fact up to about age 15 yrs and never had the problems that the scaremongers like to peddle. Even been known to squirt it straight from the cow into the mouth.
I have been in contact with the Mountain Creek guys only last week. They do not do raw milk in any form according to Michael. I would appreciate any feedback from anyone who knows where in the canberra region it can be obtained.
Free range pork does contain more salmonella than indoor pigs. Indoor pigs are better protected from disease. Please cook your free range well, don't leave it pink in the middle. Don't take my word for it. http://library.wur.nl/ojs/index.php/njas/article/viewFile/347/66
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