So I was walking down Ditmars Boulevard in Astoria, Queens on my way to a coffee shop to meet some friends, and I glance inside a store front called “Natures Taste” which had lots of words such as “Organic,” “Grass-Fed,” and other words/phrases of interest to a guy like me.

I stop inside and ask a few questions, all of whose answers made me very happy.  This store has lots of frozen meats, and traditional Greek food such as Gyro’s, souvlakia and sheftalia (traditional Cypriot sausage).  They told me that all of their meat comes from their farm which is out in Long Island.  I asked them what the name of the farm is and they said “L.I. Ranch.”  I told them I would google it and come back after Greek Easter to try some of their excellent food.

Now, Greek’s celebrate Easter this year on Sunday, April 12th (2015), so tomorrow or some time next week I will stop in, take some pictures and buy some excellent meat and report on the quality!

In the meantime, see how they are listed on LocalHarvest:

http://www.localharvest.org/l-i-ranch-corp-M59300

and take a look at their Satellite photo on Google Maps here:

Now from that photo this place looks like an actual farm and not one of those CAFO operations.  For the newly educated people on health food, CAFO stands for Concentrated Animal Feedlot Operation.  Notice how the Google satellite has some animals clearly shown walking around and grazing.  Also notice how the grass is not a “perfect green” that happens because animals actual walk around on graze on that grass.  Contrast this to Industrial Farms where the animals aren’t allowed to graze on the grass, but instead are kept inside a big hen house.

I honestly don’t know if this Bell & Evans video is intended to make one want to buy their food or not, but take a look at this video, although Bell & Evans is doing a much better job than the conventional Chicken farm, watching this video should serve as a warning as to what happens in places worse than Bell & Evans!

Last weekend I went to Philadelphia, good raw milk was the only food product that I enjoyed.  What was I to do, since all I wanted to eat was a never-before eaten cheesesteak? Well this Sunday I went to Queens Farm (aka Queens County Farm Museum) and purchased a dozen of real cage-free chicken eggs for $6 per dozen and some okra for $4 per pound.  The eggs were from truly cage-free chickens that live on the farm and produce a limited supply.  These eggs are bright orange and have the strongset egg whtie and yolk that you have ever seen in your entire life.  No, these chickens do not take hormones or antibiotics, their bodies are too strong to require such poisonous medicines.  The okra was also grown on the farm and on my way home I decided to stop in at Whole Foods in Manhasset of Nassau County, NY.  I also shy away from the produce section of Whole Foods, which usually carries “fresh” and “organic” produce from South America.  Now I seriously doubt that they flew in those bananas from Ecuador, or the “organic” garlic from China.  And those tomatoes, wow, how can organic tomatoes have such a perfect shape and color?  Anyway, I skipped through that section and went straight to the meat section.  I skipped the “organic” farm-raised seafood, and grabbed some “Local” Sirloin Steak Tips.

After, I grabbed some Irish Kerrygold Butter, and some milk from Ronnybrook Farms. Whenever I am low on raw goats milk, the only milk that I trust is from Ronnybrook Farms, which pasteurizes its milk at the lowest possible temperature. Now speaking of pasteurization, do you heat your tangeray and tonic to 270 degrees Fahrenheit and then quickly cool it before drinking it? Do you shake your wine vigorously before pouring it into a glass? No… that’s right, well, guess what ultra-pasteurization is? And guess what homogenization is? Heat the milk to 270 for 30 seconds and then cool it as quickly as possible, and when you are finished, shake the milk vigorously, so that all of the fat globules lose their final natural properties and distribute evenly throughout the rest of the milk.

Now, when I was a student in Philadelphia, I loved eating my cheesesteak with mushrooms and fried onions. Surely they fried those in vegetable oil that was processed heavily before it came to Philadelphia. And I love garlic and onions, so I took 7 shittake mushrooms, 3 red onions, 2 shallots, and 3 garlic heads, peeled, chopped and grinded them in the food processor, otherwise known in Greek as the “diabolaki”

I poured from Greek Olive Oil into the pan, some Celtic Sea Salt and freshly ground pepper along with the mixture from the prior paragraph and turned on the heat. I always turn the heat on to a low temperature, because I do not want to burn the items on the bottom of the pan and because I believe that cooking at lower temperatures is more in line with nature, and subsequently better and healthier for you.

After the onions/shallots/garlic/mushrooms started to caramelize, I threw in the meat, here is what it looks like, nothing close to the grill in the back of a Philadelphia Pizzeria:

Now, what about the cheese? for the cheese I decided to grab some raw milk aged for a minimum of 60-days from Wisconsin.

After I took the meat out of the pot, I put some of this raw milk cheese, thinly sliced on top of the meat and waited for it to melt a little bit.

Now that was a tasty Philly Cheesesteak!

Where is the bread you may ask… Well, I avoid bread and grains unless they are prepared in a special way, to make sure that the phytates have not been destroyed, read more about this here:

http://www.westonaprice.org/food-features/living-with-phytic-acid