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Your Field Guide

News, Explainers, and Articles About Food, Farming, and the Politics of Land

Here you'll find big and small picture info on all things related to food and farming - terminology, definitions, and the intricacies of raising pigs and the challenges of producing lab grown meat.

If you're interested in the more personal side of Cairncrest Farm, head over to the How We Farm page.

From the Ground Up

  • Terminology

    A useful guide to words commonly used in pasture based farming.

    Pasture Terminology

  • Grass Fed Basics

    If you're new to the world of grass fed and pastured meat, this is a great place to start.

    Grass Fed Basics

  • Grass Fed vs. Pastured

    Two common terms with important differences.

    Grass Fed vs. Pastured

Deep Dives

  • Grass Fed Chicken

    If someone claims to raise grass fed chicken, you should be skeptical.

    Grass Fed Chicken

  • Reasons to Doubt Lab Grown Meat

    In the past decade there's been immense hype about lab grown meat. So why isn't it in stores yet?

    Lab Grown Meat

The Latest From the Farm

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  • Beginnings and Endings and Beginnings

    Beginnings and Endings and Beginnings

    In business, success and growth are generally synonymous. There’s a generalized feeling that if something isn’t growing it is dying. Think of Amazon, which lost money for nine consecutive years...

    Garth Brown |

  • The Bright Side of Everything

    The Bright Side of Everything

    With each passing year on the farm I grow less certain about how to fix the food system. I don’t mean this in the sense of what foods we should...

    Garth Brown |

  • Halfcocked Turkey Recipe

    Halfcocked Turkey Recipe

    Halfcocked Turkey Recipe An Unconventional Approach for Perfect Turkey: Pretend It’s a Chicken One thing that always strikes me about turkey recipes is their assumption that there will be at...

    Garth Brown |

  • A Few Thoughts on Boredom

    A Few Thoughts on Boredom

    I have a vivid recollection from childhood. I lay beside a rhombus of sunlight on the living room floor of the house in which I grew up. The scratchy wool...

    Garth Brown |

  • Farm Beauty Standards

    Farm Beauty Standards

    People have written endlessly about beauty standards and the malign influence of advertising, Instagram, and fashion magazines on our collective idea of what a healthy, attractive human looks like. But...

    Garth Brown |

  • Why We're Getting Worse at Thinking

    Why We're Getting Worse at Thinking

    Thinking about thoughts is tricky, and writing about thinking about thoughts is trickier still. There are endless very interesting discussions to be had about just what a thought is: completely...

    Garth Brown |

  • Plastic Brains and Hard Choices

    Plastic Brains and Hard Choices

    It seems like a day can’t go past without microplastics turning up in some new part of the human body. Recent studies have claimed to find them in lungs, livers,...

    Garth Brown |

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