Who's Your Farmer?

I was recently talking with a friend who is heavily invested in the slow food/real food/local food movement. He’d happened to catch a news story about the egg recall, in which a CDC expert assured people how to make sure they were consuming eggs in a safe fashion. “It was all about cooking the eggs till the yolks were hard,” he told me in frustration. “They missed a phenomenal opportunity to tell people that the best way to avoid salmonella poisoning is to just know their farmer.”

It’s not that you can’t possibly get sick from a local farmer’s egg. And the advice was sound; it just left out a whole story about the way the vast majority of chickens are raised, and how unsurprising it is that an unhealthy food system produces chickens that are infected with salmonella. Here is one urban farmer's perspective: backyard flocks are key.

Fortunately for those of us who aren't in a position to keep our own chickens, there are plenty of small farmers who raise them for us and offer their eggs at farmers markets all over town. When I went to Binford Market last weekend, a long line stood in front of Homestead Heritage Farms’ table. I heard the apple-cheeked Amish(?) proprietress tell someone ahead of me, “They just need to get the chickens back on grass the way God intended.”

“People I’ve never seen before are buying eggs today,” she told me.

I responded that those folks were probably going to get hooked and start turning up at her table every week. Pastured eggs, with their rich orange yolks, are a far cry from the sad, anemic eggs the grocery store carries.

For my part, until I am able to tend my own little flock (possibly never) like our SkillShare presenter Beth Harp, I am making a point to buy from local small farmers whose hens are happily raised on pasture.