Like most things that I’ve done around here over the course of the past few years, I started buying meat directly from a local farmer in idealistic and almost utter ignorance.
I mean, it’s not exactly like I went out looking for someone to sell me half a hog.

As a matter of fact, when I first started looking into buying local food, meat wasn’t even on my radar screen. Like most people, when I thought of “local food” I thought of CSAs and farmer’s markets, which to my limited understanding meant produce, plain and simple. But when I started participating in a local area food group in Southern Maryland, there was much more than produce on the menu. There were eggs. There were broilers. And then one day there was this:

“For one more week, I am taking orders for meat from half or whole hogs for fall delivery.”

Hello! What’s this? Are you telling me that I can buy a hog?

Of course I had a ton of questions. Starting with, why on earth would I want to buy a hog?

Well, for me it was all about the quality of the meat.