Summer 2010 Piggery CSA

“I’d like to mention how good the CSA has been so far. We have really enjoyed the new treats and old ones. Several things we have never tried before and they are great. The rillettes are YUMMY. The salami is spiced just right. The cranberry sausage has been a treat. It is lots of fun to open our box each week to a new surprise.”

-Current CSA Member

New Manhattan Location! The Piggery is pleased to announce that we will be offering our CSA shares to our friends in NYC with a new pickup location at Jimmy’s No. 43 - 43 E 7th st near 2nd Ave. The shares will be delivered every week from early June to mid November (24 delivery dates). Shares are available Thursdays from 5-8pm. CSA members who purchase a quarter hog share will receive one box every other week. Members who purchase a half hog share will receive one box every week.

New Brooklyn Location! The Piggery is happy that we can continue to provide our products to the Williamsburg market with the addition of our pickup location at DBA Williamsburg. The shares will be delivered every week from early June to mid November (24 delivery dates). Shares are available Thursdays from 5-8pm. CSA members who purchase a quarter hog share will receive one box every other week. Members who purchase a half hog share will receive one box every week.

Ithaca Locations Unchanged. We are again distributing our Ithaca shares in association with the Full Plate Farm Collective.

Signup Here.

Hey Friends! Even as we are in the midst of producing our winter CSA it is already time to start thinking about next summer. The Piggery is happy to be offering a 24 week 2010 summer charcuterie CSA that will be distributed weekly from mid June through mid November. We will again be offering shares through the Full Plate Farm Collective for our Ithaca-area customers.

So far, our winter CSA has been a success! We seem to have found a formula that works for people. Check out what they’re saying. In a nutshell this is how it works: You purchase a quarter or a half or a whole hog. If you purchase a half hog share, you will pick up a box every week containing a variety of FRESH, never frozen items. Over the length of the share these items will equal a half hog. On a week to week basis, this ends up being a fresh cut or pound of sausage, half to three quarters of a pound of our sliced items (bacon and deli meats) and a variety of “treats” and “bonuses” such as pates, lard, cracklings, rillettes, confit, etc. Here is a typical share box:

This box has a pair of T-Bone chops totaling almost two pounds as it’s “main course” item (retail value $18.50), a half pound of bacon (retail value $6) as the “sliced” item, a 6-ounce slab of rustic pate (retail value $6) as the “treat” and a pound of cooking lard (retail value $4) as a “bonus”. This box would cost 34.50 at our market stand but only $25 through the CSA. Not every box has this much stuff, but many of them do and some have more - the retail value of a big Boston Butt or roasting ham can exceed $30 alone. Conversely, the guaranteed minimum value of a box is about twenty bucks (a pound of sausage plus a half pound of bacon plus a jar of mousse pate, for instance). We expect the average value will come to about $30/box if purchased at our market stand.

What we offer

The Piggery is different from other local meat producers in that we have a state licensed kitchen on the farm where we produce our own line of dry cured bacon, sausages, pates, deli sliced meats and more. Our product line is made fresh every week and delivered to you FRESH, not frozen. Our recipes feature local ingredients such as garlic from Red Tail Farm in Jacksonville, NY.

We raise American Mulefoot cross pigs on 30 acres of fenced pastures, woodlands and springs on a diet of whatever they forage plus locally grown small grains (barley, wheat, triticale, field peas). We believe that our handcrafted products from happy, pastured, heirloom pigs offers the finest eatin’ you’ll find in pork in New York, or any other, state.

What Is a CSA?

CSA stands for Community Supported Agriculture. The idea is that the CSA members support the farmer by buying a share of that years crop up front. This helps the farmer pay for the up front costs of the product and eliminates the uncertainty of up and down sales at farmer’s market stands. The farmer knows just how much he needs to produce each week. In return, the member gets a variety of fresh, local products throughout the season at a better price than they would get by buying those products individually at the farmer’s market stand.

Realize that the farmer and the members enter a contract to share the risks and rewards of farming together. For instance, 2009 was a terrible season for tomatoes because of the early onset of late blight. Many CSAs had to pull their plants, reducing the number of tomatoes distributed to members. The flip side of this is that in a great year for tomatoes the members would receive the full benefit of the bountiful crop with extra tomatoes in their box. Pork is a more reliable crop than tomatoes, but we could still be lose product due to, for instance, a refrigerator failure. Furthermore, we try hard to keep our animal sizing consistent, but the reality is that throughout the season we harvest animals of differing sizes. This means that some weeks the chops and ribs that members receive will be bigger than others. The same is true for sausages, pate portions, etc. We are confident, however, that at the end of the season, you will receive as much or (more likely) more than estimated in the table below.

The Half Hog Share

This is our basic share that we would recommend to most smaller families. It consists of a box just like the one described above delivered weekly for 24 weeks. A half hog share is $600. Over the course of the 24 weeks you’re guaranteed to get at least:

The Quarter Hog Share

A quarter hog share may be better for individuals or families who eat less pork. You will get the same boxes as the half hog share delivered every OTHER week. A quarter hog share is guaranteed AT LEAST:

Whole Hog Share

For large families we offer a whole hog share for $1200. You’ll get two boxes delivered every week. You’re guaranteed to get AT LEAST everything in the half hog share twice.

Payment Details

We will accept either personal checks or paypal payments. After you’ve signed up, there will be a link to click if you’d like a paypal invoice. If you’d like to pay by check (and thereby save us the paypal fees), send your check (payable to The Piggery) to:

The Piggery
5948 Sycamore Creek Dr
Trumansburg, NY 14886

Monthly Payment Option

The purpose of a CSA is to help farmers pay our upfront production costs. We have 150 or so hogs that need to be fed and bedded until the CSA starts in June. Nonetheless, we understand that not everyone has the ability to pay up front for six months worth of food. Therefore we are allowing some members to pay for their share on a month to month basis. Just divide your total by six to figure your monthly payment amount. One month’s payment will be due upon signing up to secure your membership in the CSA.

How do I Get it?

Ithaca Customers:The summer CSA will be available for pickup or delivery through all of the options offered by the Full Plate Farm Collective for their summer CSA. The pickup locations are Stick and Stone farm on Rt 96 North of town (Wednesday 3-7), Mama Goose downtown (Thursday afternoon), Ludgate Farms in Ithaca (Thursday afternoon), Three Swallows farm in Danby (Sat 9am-12 noon) and Rememberance Farm in Trumansburg (Thursday afternoon). Home deliveries will be dropped off by Garden Gate delivery.for a fee of three dollars per week on Thursday afternoons.

Manhattan Customers: Shares will be available at Jimmy’s No. 43 - 43 E 7th st near 2nd Ave. The shares will be delivered every week from early June to mid November (24 delivery dates). Shares are available Thursdays from 5-8pm.

Brooklyn Customers: Shares will be available at DBA Williamsburg - 113 N 7th st between Berry and Wythe. The shares will be delivered every week from early June to mid November (24 delivery dates). Shares are available Thursdays from 5-8pm.

How do I sign up?

Fill in the form here.