Before getting pregnant and having children and a husband who are huge fans of meat, I was almost completely vegetarian. One of the families for whom I was a private chef was vegan, so a good deal of my cooking and preparing and eating was devoted toward delicious vegetarian foods. Then I fell in love with a man who eats things like steak tartare, got pregnant, and, because my body didn’t have extra stores of iron and dense protein, I found myself in a bit of trouble nutritionally and needing to revamp my diet.
My feeling is that, if our family is going to eat meat, we are going to eat very high quality meat that has been raised humanely, not pumped up with hormones, and has been allowed to graze on grass, if that is the animal in question’s natural diet. The reasons to buy and eat this way are too numerous to get into right away, but I promise that, during November, I will try and talk about some of those reasons, especially as they relate to cooking for and with your kids. In short, though, the key is quality over quantity.
When my upstate-living sis-in-law wrote me to let me know that Fleisher’s would be beginning home delivery to New York City, Brooklyn, and Long Island, I squealed. Right away, I put my name on the mailing list and emailed Jessica to see if she’d do a little write-up about their business. She’s a new mommy, too, and I’m hoping that she might be back to share a couple more recipes as her son gets bigger. Seriously, we’re all salivating over her brined pork chop recipe linked to below. If you don’t live in the New York City area, please use this as inspiration to check out your local butchers’ sources. Here’s what Jessica Applestone had to say:
My husband Joshua and I started Fleisher’s Grass-fed and Organic Meats four and a half years ago in Kingston, NY. At the time Josh was a vegetarian, a chef, and a third generation butcher. I was, for many years, a vegetarian myself (with a bacon exception) but looking to eat and cook healthy, sustainably-raised local meat. At the time the only thing that I could find was farmers who wanted to sell me sides of beef, which would have taken me three years to work my way through, or frozen meat at the farmer’s market which I wasn’t always sure what to do with or even sometimes what it was.
It seemed to us that there must be other couples in “mixed” marriages and foodies who just wanted a simple freshly cut steak or chops and some advice on how to cook them. And so Fleisher’s sprang into being, Josh became a carnivore (it was our nitrate/nitrite free homemade bacon that turned him), and we suddenly found that there were, in fact, many, many people who were looking for the kind of meat that we were selling.
We source directly from local Hudson Valley Farms and only sell meat that comes from well-treated, healthy, pasture-raised, drug-free animals. Our products are so good, we were recently named “one of the best butchers in the country” by Bon Appetit magazine, and Saveur magazine chose us for their Top 100 in 2008.
Until recently you have had to visit one of our shops to enjoy our products. That’s about to change. Fleisher’s Grass-fed and Organic Meats is about to start a door-to-door, fresh meat delivery service to Manhattan, Brooklyn and Long Island City. We will bring whatever it is you want right to your home or office. And everything that arrives on your doorstep is cut, ground and packaged the same day.
Not only have we been expanding our business, but our own family has been growing as well. On June 30, I gave birth to Isaiah Wolf Fleisher (perhaps a 4th generation butcher?!) and have come to realize how important quick, healthy meals are. We always encourage our customers to eat less rather than more meat, fill your vegetables and fruit, and use meat in small amounts. It’s healthier and, of course, more economical, which in these times is no small thing.
Dinner tonight is pork chops with a side of lentils. Check out our brining recipe in November’s Food & Wine here. I cannot wait to make it for Isaiah some day. Make more time and share the experience of food with your family, taste new things, and let your kids know where their food comes from. And, if you are interested in home delivery, go to our website, click on the NYC Delivery tab, give us your information, and we will keep you updated.
