by Leah Bender
At both our France 44 Cheese Shop and St. Paul Meat Shop, we’re frequently asked about the origins of our high-quality meats. Folks understandably want to ensure that the beef, pork, or poultry they purchase was raised nearby, treated humanely, and pastured sustainably. As a monger who receives these questions and as a curious, conscientious eater myself (former vegetarian here), I decided to try and get to know our partner farms and their practices a bit better.
So for the first post in a series profiling the many awesome, local farms that France 44 works with to source our meats, we are featuring Peterson Craft Meats! Hopefully this series will help you to understand why we work with the farmers that we do, and offer some insight into what it takes for your dinner to get from farm to table!
France 44 Cheese & Meat has been working with Peterson Craft Meats (currently our source of Beef and Lamb) for over a decade, essentially since first incorporating whole-animal butchery into our business. Likewise, it only seems right to highlight the exceptional quality of Peterson’s products, as well as their commitment to land stewardship and animal welfare. I spoke briefly with Andy Peterson of Peterson Craft Meats about his family’s multi-generational business, the year-round work of raising livestock, and the challenges (and rewards) of running an independent, sustainable farm.
I’m curious to hear a bit more about your family’s story: I read that you started out as a small dairy farm, and in 1969 started farming cattle, pork, and poultry. What prompted that change?
“So that would have been my great grandfather’s era. I think they had a dairy farm just for income and you know, survival, since this was back in the 1940s-50s. I know that about ten years ago we actually still had some extra milk cans that they used to use back then! So, I think after that they just switched over to livestock like a lot of farms did at the time (although some obviously stayed in dairy). It was kind of like Old Mcdonald’s farm in the 60s and 70s, when my dad’s generation came of age. They had chickens, pigs, cows, beef cattle, horses…they kinda did the whole thing, like a lot of farms in that era did just to have different revenue sources. They started to do some crop farming as well.”
What does land stewardship mean to you?
“Well, we consider ourselves soil farmers more than anything else, because we’re really managing and stewarding the soil. We’re just using livestock and different species of plants to build soils, to add organic matter, and to create vivacity. So that all of those ecosystems-- really more like sub-ecosystems-- contribute to a healthy overall soil ecosystem. Probably the most important ecosystem is the one that is beneath the soil-- the one that we can’t see: the subsoil. There are microorganisms, rhizomes, vermiculture (worms)...all those populations are so crucial to soil health, and they all live underneath the soil. So, when we’re managing the soils, we’re managing these sub-ecosystems that all contribute to the health of the larger soil ecosystem. So we’re really soil farmers more than anything else, especially when someone takes a stance like we do, which is using no synthetic chemicals on our fields or on our pastures.”
What does an average day of work on your farm look like?
“So some things are always the same, like chores and animals that need to be fed (they’re the top priority, so that’s always the same). Weekdays are a little different … and farming is very seasonal. Winter is by far the quietest season but it’s also the season where you can catch up on bookwork and planning for the next year. Spring is intense and Summer is an interesting season where there’s obviously good weather, so you’re getting a lot of hay done. Basically it’s the old adage ‘Winter is here and then Winter is coming.’ So in the summertime, we’re getting all the foodstuffs that we need for our livestock into bins and our barn, and we’re getting our hay baled up so that we’re ready for Winter … In the fall there’s a lot of harvesting going on, prepping equipment…there’s a whole mix of tasks to tackle. So I wouldn’t say each day is the same, but there are certainly some rhythms of the seasons. Really what it comes down to each year are these rhythms of the seasons where you have these different checklists.”
What are heritage-breed livestock and why do you prefer to use them over modern livestock breeds?
“‘Heritage breed’ can mean a slightly different thing to different people, but we use it to mean breeds that aren't as popular or as common as, say, some of the major breeds within different species used in the livestock industry today. So an example of a non-heritage breed from the dairy industry would be the Holstein breed of cows, because they are very, very popular. At Peterson, we use breeds like Limousin in beef and Berkshire in hogs, breeds that are not the most popular, but have some carcass characteristics that we believe really shine through. A Rambouillet sheep would be another example of a heritage breed with qualities that aren’t highly popular or highly commoditized in the industry. So that’s why we use the term heritage-- it throws back to some lesser known but very delicious breeds that were historically more prominent than they are now!”
Aside from free raising and grazing, what are some practices you implement to ensure the welfare of your animals?
“First of all, comfort! Especially in the wintertime. We have harsh winters up here in the north, as I’m sure you’re aware of. We want to make sure the animals are dry, that they have warm bedding, that they’re out of the elements as much as possible. We don’t want to take them out of their natural habitat, but we want to preserve them from the wind. We want to make sure that a pig can get out of the rain, that it can burrow down into a warm, deep-bedded pen in the wintertime to stay comfortable. That goes along the lines of animal health as well, because the more we can balance keeping natural habitats for our livestock as well as allowing our animals to be animals, the healthier they will be.
I guess the point I’m trying to make is that we don’t want to put them into incompatible environments such that we would then need to cover up any illnesses or disease. I’ll give you an example: a high percentage of pork and poultry in this country is raised in tight spaces, and that’s just the reality-- indoors and in tight spaces. We are the inverse of that. Also, as part of some of the larger commodity programs in America, they make use of antibiotics and other pharmaceuticals to help prevent disease from spreading and animals from getting sick. So, our focus for our livestock is saying ‘Hey-- we want you to be in nature, in your natural habitat, and we want you to be as comfortable as possible.’ In turn, the livestock are going to take care of themselves and they’re going to be healthier.”
I’ve read a lot about the disappearance of family farming operations over the past 50 years or so, with so many farms being replaced by factory farming initiatives. Has it ever been challenging for you to stay independent from and competitive with corporate agriculture?
“Yeah… I would say in general, yes. It’s a big reason why we are in the business that we are in the way we are, if that makes sense. With each generation, the number of kids who have grown up on a family farm has dwindled, and the percentage of us who will be able to continue on in the family farming tradition is shrinking, and a lot of that is just pressure from economics. There’s a lot of farming kids who don’t see an economic opportunity in doing what their family has done…or they’re lured away by better-paying jobs, and that’s part of the reality too. So, each person has to put their pencil to the paper to figure out how to make it go for themselves.
Farming is hard, and if you can’t make a living that is going to meet or exceed the competition or the competitive career landscape, then it’s hard to make the decision to stick it out. It really is just economics, and for as hard as a business as it is…I think that’s where the difficult decision comes from for people-- especially in my generation-- that are trying to consider how to make it viable.
A clear way forward is to find a niche, because otherwise you’re competing on a playing field that has diminishing rates of return. I mean, it’s basically a race to zero if you’re going to do commodity agriculture, and I would say environmentally that’s a race to zero as well.“
How much of what you do is science-based and how much is rooted in knowledge passed down through your family?
“That’s a good question-- I would say it’s probably roughly equal. I don’t know if that’s exactly 50/50, but I would definitely say that it’s a lot of learned skill sets that I’ve been learning from my dad since I was 12. Science does play a role in terms of understanding how our ecological systems work. We do things like selective breeding through artificial insemination with our cows in order to get better genetics, so that’s a scientific tool we use. We definitely want to utilize knowledge that preserves the natural state of livestock, but also use technology in a way that helps advance our business. So I would say it’s about an equal share between the two!“
What has been the proudest accomplishment for your family’s business in the past ten years or so?
“Hmm, the past ten years or so? Well I think seeing my brother’s and my kids… seeing our fifth generation now coming up into the farm -- that’s probably our proudest accomplishment, because it speaks to our ‘why’ of why we’re in this business, why we farm. So to see the next generation coming up-- and to be clear, it’s not that the next generation has to follow in our footsteps-- but we want to create that opportunity for them if they want to.”
Where do you see your business in the next 10 years? Do you have any dreams for ways your operation might grow and expand?
“Well, we try to operate our business by the adage of “our focus is to get better.” By doing that, whether it’s the product, the service, the offering, the farming side, etc… by focusing on getting better, we believe that our customer base will naturally expand and grow. So far we’ve definitely seen that happening! So I think that’s how we’re going to be looking at the next ten years: how do we get better in each area? How do we leverage our human and monetary capital to get better at what we do-- to better serve our customers? I think with this kind of focus, the rest takes care of itself.”
Lastly, I was looking at Peterson’s food pictures on social media and it made me super hungry!— what is your favorite recipe or dish at the moment?
“Favorite of the moment…well, my wife has been making a kind of meat stew with Oxtail lately, and it’s high in collagen and good vitamins. It’s like a bone broth, or a beef broth-- anyways she’s really ramped that up lately and has been playing around with some recipes like that, and it’s been really yummy! Our youngest son has a bit of a sensitive stomach, and the gelatin and collagen in the broth is supposed to be really good for healing gut issues. We’ve been on a big journey with our microbiome and gut health recently, so meat broth with beef oxtail has been a fun one-- our son just slurps it up and loves it (so do we)!”