"Farming is a blessing," "cheese is life," and other mantras from a homesteading wife.
Happy #Februdairy from the farm! We sacrificed the month's first young puppy for rennet & meat. He was 5 weeks old, he was with his mom his whole life, we loved on him every morning & evening. He had a great short life.
Rennet is an enzyme found in the stomach of mammals drinking their mother’s milk & it's used in cheesemaking. (Most hard cheeses--Parmesan, Cheddar, Manchego, Pecorino Romano, Swiss--are traditionally made with rennet.) We processed this puppy to produce our famous single-source cheese (everything in our cheeses comes from the farm except salt!) #CheeseIsLife
Is it hard being a dog meat farmer?
People often ask if taking the life of a dog we love is hard. What does "hard" even mean? It's MORE difficult for us to consume food from animals who suffered their whole lives in a factory! So, yeah. This is what we do instead. It's the only option. We do have feelings but we have a deeper understanding & acceptance of what it means to sustain life. And as we all know, there are absolutely no animal-free alternatives to milk, butter, or cheese!
Cheese is the only thing that matters. Cheese.
Isn't this inhumane?
No. Now, we know what you're thinking. Ok, YES--this cheese is older than the puppy! BUT--we will use every part of the dog. The hide will be tanned using the dog's brain. The cheeks were eaten the next day--and my god, they were delicious. The dog meat was hung in the cooler to age for one week and was cut to be consumed here on the farm. The bones will be for stock or to feed our barn cat. The dog's liver will go into sausage. We ate the dog heart raw the night we killed the dog in a fabulous tartare made by Landon. The blood and other inedible parts went into the compost pile to later feed the vegetable garden.
This is life and we are quite grateful to have the resources, knowledge, and skills to live it like this.
P.S. Please follow along all this month as we share facts from Elwood's Organic Dog Creamery!
Aged Manchego now available!
Reserve a wheel: ElwoodDogMeat.com
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