My Farmer

A couple of years ago I started using the the term "My Farmer" when talking about the person who grows my food for me. At first, it seemed even to me to be rather contrived. It just did not seem to roll off the tongue at all. And to others I'm sure it may have even seemed pretentious. But really, these attitudes towards those words only demonstrate how far removed we have become from our food. And in my opinion, this is an extremely unhealthy situation for our society.

You do not have to think long to find other examples of where this phraseology is used - we do it all the time. We all talk about "my doctor", "my dentist", and even often you hear "my lawyer". And nobody thinks anything of it. "my mechanic" and "my plumber" are also extremely common terms that many of us use quite regularly. We use these words because it shows that we've developed a special trust relationship with those people when performing those services for us. It shows that we do not want some anonymous person doing those things for us - we want someone that we've developed a trust relationship with. When it comes to a medical issue you are experiencing, do you shop around looking for who is having the best rates this week? Is that what you do when having your car fixed? Maybe some of us do, but most of us would sooner pay a bit more - but still a fair price - to have our car fixed by someone we trust.

So why is this such a foreign idea when it comes to one of the very most basic necessities of our life - food? Why do the words "my farmer" seem so awkward? I dream of a day when this is no longer the case. When most people will talk about their farmer they way most people today talk about their doctor or their mechanic.

Now, a bit about my farmer. At the moment I deal mainly with Gord, who with his wife Janet and their half-dozen or so kids, own and operate Saffire Farms. And funny enough, I met Gord when he showed up at my house about 8 years ago for the first "Big Brew" that our homebrew club was hosting. Here are some pictures of that event. Gord was pretty new at all-grain brewing, and he'd come out for the day to learn the ropes from some more experienced brewers, like me. He brought with him several lbs of his organic ground beef, and this is when I dubbed him "Organic Gord" - a name which has largely stuck amongst the homebrewers in the Ottawa Valley.

At first I did not send Gord and Janet much of my beef business because I'd already been dealing with another farmer for 2 or 3 years by that point. But the quality and flavor of their 100% grass fed beef slowly won me over from the stuff my other farmer was selling, which was largely grass fed, but finished on grain. Now I get all of my beef from Gord and Janet. And this year is the 4th year now that they are operating a Community Shared Agriculture, or CSA. My wife and I have been with them from the beginning, and we are sticking with them again this year. It was kind of slow going for them at first since they were primarily beef farmers and did not know a whole lot about vegetables, but they are learning quickly and have the support of the local farming community around Almonte.

It seems farmers do not compete against each other the way things work in so many other industries - they are all in it together and they help each other out. This past summer Gord's delivery van broke down - and a neighbouring farmer was more than happy to lend him hers to make his deliveries, until his got fixed. That is the type of community spirit I like to support with my food dollars, rather than the cut-throat world of supermarkets and industrialized food.

I've already been talking with Gord about doing a series of articles and videos this year, on and around his farm. He is keen to have me come out reguarly to learn more about all the different aspects of both the beef and vegetable sides of his operation. In the spring I'll start going out for the maple syrup harvest, and to see how they start their veggies in the greenhouse. On the beef side, there may also be some matters around procuring calves at auction. Then I'll follow him and his family through the season til harvest / slaughter time.

So please stay tuned - I hope it will be a fun year! I know my boys are already looking forward to making regular weekend visits to the farm. I asked them the other day whether or not they would still be able to eat our beef if they got to know the cows first. And our youngest - the real meat-a-vore - exclaimed without skipping a beat "YEAH! And we can even name them first, too!". That comment made me proud that we've been raising our boys properly. They are 6 and 8, and they know in excruciating detail where their food comes from. We even watched one of the "cruelty to animals / factory farming" videos with them to show them how most animals are raised for food, and why we choose to purchase ours the way we do. It all goes back to trust - I trust Gord and Janet to treat their animals humanely. And I know they do.