Canter Hill
Farm
WHY WE GROW
We grow because we care what we eat. We care even more what our children eat. And we think you care, too. We founded Canter Hill Farm in 2008 with the goal of growing our own food so that we knew exactly what was (and what wasn't) in it. We didn't set out to start a business - we had two full-time careers of our own. But then we started talking to people who read the books that we did and cared as much as we did - and we decided to try to grow for them, too. That's how it all began....
WHERE WE ARE
2138 Valley Hill Road
Malvern, PA 19355
We are open on Fridays from 12 - 4.
Email: canterhillfarm@yahoo.com
Phone: 610.827.1594
(For a quick response, email is best!)
HOW TO BUY
SCHEDULE
Bryn Mawr:
Every Saturday from
9 am - 1 pm
Location: Parking lot of the Bryn Mawr Train Station (Lancaster Avenue & Bryn Mawr Avenue)
Chestnut Hill:
Every Saturday
10 - noon in April
then 9 am - noon until Christmas
Location: in front of the Mermaid Inn.
Kennett Square:
Get on our "Kennett Dropoff List" by sending us an email
Media:
Email to get on the "Media dropoff" email list. I'll alert you when I'm coming to Media and we can meet up for a pickup.
Farm:
Farm hours are
Friday from 12 - 4 pm (or request an appt.)
HAM IT UP!
Easter Planning
Order your Easter meats (and ingredients for all the other meals this weekend) NOW!
EASTER FAVORITES:
HAM: tender ham sliced off the bone,
LAMB: braised lamb leg or juicy and delectable lamb racks
BEEF: slow smoked beef brisket or boneless prime rib roast
Get them FRESH this week at the farm, in Media, Kennett or at the markets (BRYN MAWR & CHESTNUT HILL)
SCHEDULE:
FARM HOURS:
MONDAY: 10:30 – 4
THURSDAY: 12 – 4
FRIDAY: 12 – 4
KENNETT SQUARE:
THURSDAY evening meet up
MEDIA:
FRIDAY morning meet up
BRYN MAWR:
SATURDAY from 9 – 1
CHESTNUT HILL:
SATURDAY from 10 – noon
SALE:
I know, we shouldn’t put anything on sale this week – it’s too busy.
But we are – and it’s what you should be buying to round out your Easter weekend: breakfast links and bacon.
BRYN MAWR: Save $1 / lb on bacon (regularly $12 / lb, so enjoy $11 / lb)
CHESTNUT HILL: Save $1 / lb on plain pork breakfast links (regularly $12 / lb, so just $11)
As always, FARM pickups, MEDIA and KENNETT SQUARE pickups and all pre-orders can enjoy BOTH SALES.
SEE THE STORE:
Our shelves continue to fill. In addition to delicious meat, poultry and eggs, we have local honey, handcrafted natural soaps and now our beloved Whisky Hollow maple syrup. It’ll be worth your drive!
WHAT ELSE?
What to fill your man’s Easter basket? Why – biltong, droewors and South African chili bites (new!). These zesty beef snacks feature coriander, cumin, paprika and turmeric – and a dash of chili powder.
Want to enjoy a true South African Easter? We’ll have fresh Boerewors to couple with your South African treats, and grab some British back bacon to feel like you’re back in the Southern Hemisphere. For those that don’t know, back bacon (shown below) is a staple in Europe but is simply thin sliced boneless pork loin that you can pan fry to be a more meaty option for bacon. And we have it!
Ordering & Cooking Guidance:
BRISKET: I have to start with brisket, because most people don’t really want a 12 – 16 lb piece of meat, so you’re going to get a cut from somewhere along the roast. The brisket has two distinct “regions”: the POINT (round cut, fattier) and the “1st cut” or the “flat part”, which makes up roughly 60% of the brisket. If you’re smoking the brisket, you NEED the point. That keeps the meat tender and flavorful. If you’re slow cooking it in a crock pot, ask for the 1st cut. That way you won’t have to skim so much fat off your braising liquid. Next, trimmed or untrimmed – or somewhere in between? A truly untrimmed brisket has A LOT of fat. If you’re smoking it, you probably want to start with untrimmed and carve off as much as you feel comfortable with. You can’t really mess up a very fatty brisket in a smoker – it just melts away. But in a crock pot? You probably don’t want to have to deal with as much fat (or pay for it), so focus on the 1st cut, which just has a small fat cap (kind of like a boneless pork loin roast) that is delicious when you pre-sear it with some seasoning before dropping it into the crock pot. We have our butchers trim the obvious, substantial fat away from the cut so that you’re not paying for pounds of fat. But because some people are buying to smoke and others to braise, we don’t have every stitch of fat trimmed off. Your best bet is to give us some guidance, so we can pick one that aligns with your cooking plans. Tell us if you want little to no fat – we want you to get what you want 😊
HAM: Every year, I get at least 10 emails asking: “is the ham cooked”? The ham is SMOKED, but it is cold smoked. It has not been cooked. In colonial times, smoking was enough to feel like food was ready to eat. These days, we’re a little more cautious. You should FULLY WARM your ham before serving. How? Place the ham in a pyrex dish and either tent it with tin foil or first pack it with some brown sugar or a few dollops of your favorite jam. Once tented, put the ham in a 325 degree oven to warm. Once you see JUICES through the side of your pyrex and coming up the side of the pyrex, you know your ham is warmed through. It typically takes an hour for a 7 – 8 lb ham for me, and I like to pull it and keep it tented so that I can raise the oven temp to cook other things, and then return it to the oven about 10 min before we’re eating to be sure it’s toasty warm. We have HALF HAMS (7 – 9 lbs), QUARTER HAMS (3 – 5 lbs) and HAM SLICES (0.75 – 1 lb). All are $13 / lb, bone-in and delicious.
LAMB RACKS & LEGS: Our grass-fed lamb is mild in flavor, so I simply pierce 10 – 12 spots and wedge a slice of garlic or some fresh thyme in the space, and rub the lamb with salt and pepper and roast. Since the leg is too big to pan sear, I always like an oven sear by setting the oven for 425 – 450 and cooking for just 10 minutes and then turning the heat down to 325 for a slow cook until the temperature reaches 130 degrees (for medium) – it will rise to 135 when it rests.
Remember that bone in lamb legs lose about 1/3 – ¼ of their weight to the bone, so we using the “pound per person” rule, remember to subtract the bone weight from your equation.
PLEASE order ahead (particularly for the markets, and definitely for Media and Kennett, since we’re meeting up with you!) Send an email to canterhillfarm@yahoo.com with a list of what you want and where you want to get it.
And HAPPY EASTER!
Our Mission:
We founded the farm on a simple premise:
Before chemicals, labs and factory farms got involved, God had created a perfect, workable system. We will learn about it, respect it, and we will naturally and successfully be able to be "beyond-organic" in our food supply.
New to farming, we had no pre-conceived ideas about raising animals or vegetables, and sought out farmers across the globe to learn what we did and didn't want to do. We quickly saw that most food systems raising just one type of offering needed external inputs - fertilizers, corn and sadly - sometimes chemicals and antibiotics. That's why we raise a variety of animals. Each has been chosen to serve a function for the others.
Over the last 10 years, we have grown and in addition to our home-base farm in Malvern, we lease 180 acres of grazing land from old family friends in Lancaster County. During the summer, we rotate half of our sheep flock through this land, and most of our steers call this land home. All of the land we graze is 100% free of any chemicals or sprays and we re-plant every other year to manage soil compression, erosion and to preserve a diversity of forage.
Canter Hill's beef and lamb is 100% grass (or hay) feed, and supplemented only with salt licks. We de-worm our sheep flock once annually, after lambing season (at the same time as sheering - typically the first week of June) and do not introduce any other chemicals or antibiotics. We have not experienced the same need to de-worm our steers. We have been migrating our sheep flock from Dorset to Katahdin, and therefore most of our sheep are now 50% or more Katahdin (a hair sheep), because we believe the meat tastes nicer! Our beef is both Black and Lowline Angus. We are shifting towards Lowline Angus which is more tolerant of 100% grass feeding and generally very hardy.
Canter Hill's poultry and pork is either pasture (for poultry) or forage fed (our pigs dig in the forest, and our turkeys also tend to roam!). They are supplemented with organic, soy-free feed. How much feed vs. forage do they consume? It depends on the weather. If it's raining or cold, more feed than forage. On warm days that aren't drenching, almost entirely forage. This is why we raise from March - November.
We STRONGLY encourage you to open your minds to frozen meat. If you're committed to pasture raising, recognize that you can't have fresh meat in the dead of winter, and purchase a great freezer!
We are committed to pasture-raised, antibiotic-free and chemical-free poultry, lamb and produce.