Everyone should have a taste of ham on New Year’s Day. It is an American tradition. Ham is for luck.
So, why is pork the lucky delectable? Why not beef or lamb or chicken?
Pork is lucky because pigs root forward. We eat pork to move forward into the New Year. Cows and sheep stand still when they eat; that is not lucky. Chickens scratch backward, and that is unlucky, so never eat a chicken on New Year’s.
But there is more than simply “rooting forward” to elevate pork to the national dish of New Year’s.
A Medieval Boar Hunt
The tradition for lucky pork was born in Europe hundreds of years ago. The village elders of medieval hamlets organized a wild boar hunt each New Year’s Eve. The New Year’s celebration featured the fruit of the hunt. A ham was cause for great revelry on New Year’s Day.
If the hunting party failed to produce a boar, it meant the meager forest was hunted out, and the villagers would suffer a year of hunger and want.
A delicious ham was about more than luck–it was about nutrition. Food was scarce; desperately so in the dead of winter. A good source of protein, even a small amount of pork, was vital to the health of the villagers. The New Year’s ham helped nutrient-starved peasants withstand sickness and survive the cold winter.
It is no wonder medieval diners believed pork to be lucky. Ham is for health. A healthy person is lucky indeed.
Did the Pork Root Forward?
You may ask yourself, “Why do I keep eating ham on New Year’s, but still have bad luck?” In fact, our nation eats plenty of ham, but is having a crisis of rotten luck.
Remember the tradition: Pork is lucky because pigs root forward.
If you buy a grocery store ham, you are eating pork that has never rooted forward. Agri-business porkers are raised on cement. Porkers can’t root forward on cement.
Agri-business porkers are raised in factories on cement floors under artificial lights. They are packed shoulder to shoulder against a feed trough, day and night, and can hardly turn around. Their refuse is hosed into sump drains that flow into tremendous fecal lakes.
They are fed growth hormones and injected with antibiotics to fight the diseases that plague these miserable beasts. They live short brutal lives in pestilence and filth. The story of conventional pork is simply heartbreaking.
How can we eat a ham from one of these pitiful creatures and hope to find good luck?
It is not karma that punishes us. The hormones, antibiotics, disease, and stress–all of the misery and filth–are distilled in the industrial ham. When you eat this ham, you take these things into your body.
Unfortunately, industrial ham contains little of the nutritional value that your body craves from good pork. It is a terrible irony that America has such an over-abundance of cheap food, but a lack of good nutrition.
Rooting Forward in Rockport
You have a choice for your New Year’s ham. Your lucky porker rooted forward in the forest of your own town.
Our heritage breed hogs roam the forest and fields of our farm in moveable pens. They languish in the sunshine and shade of oak trees. They root and wallow with joy every day in the rich soil.
A substantial part of their diet is natural forage: acorns, weeds, grass, shrubs, and roots. They have continual access to a custom grain ration. Our porkers are never given steroids, antibiotics, or hormones–ever. Healthy animals don’t need them.
Our lucky porkers are routinely rotated to spent vegetable gardens. The process of rooting forward cleanses our gardens, conditions the soil, adds magnificent fertilizer, and prepares the soil for the next planting. Our porkers help us grow incredibly delicious vegetables. In the process, they become very delicious themselves.
Ham is for luck, yes. Ham is for health, yes. But ham is also for taste.
Pastured pork is absolutely delicious. The fresh air and sunshine, the acorns and vegetables, the joy of rooting forward every day in the blessed soil–are distilled into our delicious ham.
Our pork is so delicious that you will forget it is healthy. The good luck is merely a bonus.
A Modern-Day Boar Hunt
Unless the village elders of Rockport organize a boar hunt, there is only one place in town to find pork that has ever rooted forward.
Your Four String farmer will deliver your lucky pork to your door. We even deliver New Year’s Eve.
Change your luck this year. Move forward with your health. Good pork is cause for celebration.
Ham is for taste. Ham is for health. Ham is for luck.
We deliver our farm fresh food to your door in Rockport. Minimum $20 order. Please call 361-688-3802, or e-mail us at justinbutts@clearwire.net, to place your order.