Where do I buy a whole pig for my freezer? Or whole lamb? Whole cow?

[jennyjen]

I have been wanting to buy a whole butchered animal for years - the challenge of cooking all of it (over a few months, that is!) intrigues me. Where can I buy a sustainably raised (no hormones, no antibiotics, pastured its whole life) pig, lamb and or cow and also pick it up already butchered and packaged for my freezer?

[cgarner]

Another source (I can't believe I forgot her) Nitya Ackeroyd has a stand at the Skippack Farmers Market, her and her mate have Woodsong Hollow Farm
http://www.woodsonghollow.com/
Chicken, lamb, goat, pork and eggs
http://www.skippackfarmersmarket.net/...
The market has moved indoors to the 4-H facility
but you can contact Nitya through her website

[Bigley9]

The farmer who had the truck at the No Libs Saturday market at the Piazza offered whole or half pigs and cows. I can not for the life of me remember his name.

[Hungryin theBurbs]

I think it's MB Farview. They also come out to the markets in the burbs and are very accommodating with special orders.

[cgarner]

Hi Jennyjen,

Tussock Sedge Farm has grass fed, grass finished cows. they're AMAZING flavor and you can buy by the whole, half or a sample package (of course the whole cow is the cheaper cost per pound option)
http://www.tussocksedgefarm.com/About.htm
They're the nicest people and are happy to answer any questions you have.
All meat is fully butchered and they're quite picky about the quality of the cuts. They've just changed butchers in the last year or so because they weren't happy with the last one... they pay attention to the details which is indicative of people who care

Hendricks arm and Dairy sell pork and lamb (and awesome tasting chickens) but I don't know about whole pig, also very nice people working there. You could call them and possibly special order

http://www.hendricksfarmsanddairy.com/

another place to look is Eat Wild, Pennsylvania
http://www.eatwild.com/products/pennsylvania.html

or local harvest

http://www.localharvest.org/

[JohnnyKBar]

Hendricks doesn't raise pigs anymore, but they've started raising goats, which might be interesting for you. You could probably work something out with them.

I thought I read somewhere that Happy Farm in Kintersville had heritage pigs, but could be wrong. They have plenty of fowl, though, and all pastured.

You may want to check out the cooperative extensions' farm-to-table maps and call around. For really good stuff, you might want to consider heading up into the Lehigh Valley or Berks to get heritage pigs. I haven't heard of anything definitive about a source in the philly burbs.

[Bashful3]

Jen, you must have one heck of a freezer. I get freezer envy whenever I see this post. Mine is just the bottom part of a very large refrigerator, and it isn't at all big enough for my needs.

[cgarner]

I didn't know that JKB

Is this very recent? I see their sausages and just assumed they were made from their own pigs (but then come to think of it, you see the goats and the chickens and the cows... but I haven't seen a pig there that I can recall)

[JohnnyKBar]

I think I was there about a year ago when I was picking up a pork shoulder. They said that they get the pig from up in the Lehigh Valley. Raising the pigs was more work than it was worth, especially when they could get Berkshire pork from a good farm locally. They had started raising goats by then.
I do love their sausage, though. Bob does a great job.