One of our all-time favorite ways to eat grass-fed beef is with Point Reyes Original Blue Cheese. We love to crumble it on a steak or burger. Here are a few other recipes for when you are feeling a bit more adventurous.
Point Reyes Blue Cheese Compound Butter
Herb Marinated Steak with Point Reyes Blue Cheese & Sweet Onion Relish
This time of year our sheep begin to lamb. We have had about 40 new baby lambs born in the past 2 weeks. Seeing the little lambs run through the green grass is just amazing. Here are some of the newest additions, they were born on Christmas Day.
These are twins when they were just 1 day old.
Another shot of the twins.
A group of sheep.
Grown in Marin is a publication of the University of California’s Agriculture and Natural Resources Cooperative Extention. Grown in Marin has published a series of articles about succession planning for family farms. The most recent article featured Loren and Al Poncia from Stemple Creek Ranch. It is a great article, take a look!
Loren and Al in the Grown in Marin article.
A few weeks ago we put seven of our bulls in with our cows. They will have about sixty days to breed. Since this is a family friendly website we’ll spare you the details and real action shots but here is a photo of one of our bulls in a field of about thirty cows. This bull weighs about 2,000 pounds and is two and a half years old. He can easily breed up to five cows per day. Not too shabby considering he was a virgin two weeks ago!
Bull #7860 taking a look at his prospects.
The Marin Agricultural Land Trust (“MALT”) is a land trust that protects agricultural land in Marin County. The organization is near and dear to our heart, and part of our ranch is protected with a MALT easement. Loren’s father Al served on MALT’s founding board of directors in the 1970′s and Loren has been on the board for the past nine years or so.
Stemple Creek Ranch is proud to support MALT by donating 10% of our sales through the end of January 2010 to the organization. All you need to do is place an order and let us know you want to support MALT. Our grass-fed meat makes a great holiday gift!
This map shows the Marin County farmland that is protected forever with a MALT easement.
Seasons are changing at the Ranch. We just recently turned seven of our bulls in with our cows. There are about 30 cows for each bull . . . and yes, that makes some very busy bulls! They will be left in to breed for the next sixty days. We are pretty sure that if they could talk, they would say: “We love our job!”
Mytty is almost two months old. She and her fellow calves are growing like weeds, enjoying the amazing green grass we have been blessed with.
Mytty at almost two months.
This time of year it is very clear why we raise grass-fed animals. Take a look for yourself . . .
The animals are loving the new grass and cool weather.
Stay tuned for our next post . . . the bulls get put in with the cows for some FUN!!
October has been a kind month to us. We have had four inches of rain and some fabulous sunshine, all great growing conditions for our pastures. This is a sweet spot for us because the days are getting shorter and the colder, frosty weather is just around the corner and that slows the growth of the grass.
A rainy and sunny October is a great start to the growing season.
Mytty at one month old.
We’ve had many pot roasts that are just not that exciting. Pretty ho hum. But Barefoot Contessa has a pot raost recipe that she calls Company Pot Roast that makes pot roast worth eating. It truly is a meal that you would be proud to serve dinner guests. Try it and let us know what you think.
Our latest water development project is well underway. Over the past week we have dug over a mile of trenches and laid pipe that will carry water to the new water tanks and troughs that will be installed. We got this part of the project done just in time – we are due for a major rainstorm tonight and tomorrow.
Loren at the controls.
Laying pipe in the freshly dug trench.
Creek Ranch is a family owned and operated cattle ranch in Marin County, California. We raise our animals on our own pasture land just a few miles from the Pacific Ocean. Our beef and lamb is all natural and grass-fed, and we are confident you will enjoy and appreciate it as much as we do. We invite you to Taste What You've Been Missing.You are currently browsing the Stemple Creek Ranch Blog blog archives for the year 2009.