Watauga Flats Farm

02/16/2025

02/15/2025

Babies everywhere on the farm.

02/12/2025

11/12/2024

The old ways are probably still the best ways.

“With no supermarkets and almost no money back in the day, it was "root hog or die" if we liked to eat. Food? We grew most everything we ate. For instance, sausage, ham, tenderloin and fatback? (bacon to us moderns) Yep! Along with all the other foods we grew, we grew those too and never ever did we go hungry, come winter time.

Come spring of the year, Pa bought a small pig; we fed it well all summer and by fall of the year, it had grown quite big. On a frosty November morning, Pa built a fire under the scalding vat, shot the hog, (right between the eyes with a .22,) we hauled it to the scalding vat on the sled and rolled it into the hot water to loosen the hair so we could scrape it off. We then hung it upside down from a tree limb, Pa cleaned it out, cleaned it up and lowered it to some planks he had laid on the ground.

What did he do then? With a butcher knife and axe, he made magic right there on the spot: ham, shoulders, side meat, tenderloin and other good things. (He was mighty good at doing that.) Meanwhile inside the house, we ground up meat in the meat grinder, Mama mixed in red-hot pepper and other stuff, we rolled it into balls, she canned it in fruit jars and stored it in the cellar. (Come breakfast time on cold winter mornings, home canned sausage was the best stuff on God’s Green Earth, bar none.)

Meanwhile, the whole house smelled of raw meat and by the end of hog-killing day, fresh meat was the last thing I wanted to eat. BUT, come next morning, Mama fried a stack of buckwheat pancakes that reached the sky, made white-sop gravy, (sauce, you all) home-made biscuits, perked coffee on top of the wood stove, and best of all, fried up a whole bowl of fresh tenderloin. Was it good? Best stuff I ever seen; bar none.

After hog-killing day was done, it was comforting to know, that (with firewood piled high, the cellar and meat box full to the brim) no matter how rough the coming winter, we would be warm and fed.”

By Wayne Easter resident of the Appalachian mountains

Not my story but we can relate. Our kitchen is busy this time of year. Raising and providing our own food is unbelievably hard but rewarding in countless ways ❤️👩‍🌾👨‍🌾

11/02/2024

Who wants some fresh sausage?

We will have breakfast and sweet Italian sausage available in the first week of December for $6.00 per lb.

If you wish to be put on the list, please email [email protected] or message this page.

09/26/2024

Some new residents at Watauga Flats.

03/24/2024

East Tennessee people. Watagua Flats Farms fresh eggs for sale. $5.00 per dozen. Can be picked up at the farm or in Johnson City.

12/02/2023

Watauga Flats Farm will be planting heavily in the Three Sisters method this spring. We will be focusing on corn, bean and squash varieties that are historically grown in the Southeast and Southwest US.

Bon Appetit has a nice collection of recipes that focus on these three historically significant food groups. We are very excited to offer some value add meals and regenerative organic veggie combinations to our customers this summer.

You can learn more about this important indigenous farming method at the link below in the comments.

Stay tuned for more details....

From pickled corn to garlicky runner beans to squash tart, here are our favorite ways to cook with the "three sisters."

11/30/2023

November was a whirlwind month at Watauga Flats. Lots of beginnings, middles and endings. Everyday on the land is an honor and an adventure.

11/15/2023

Some fall updates...

10/04/2023

Hay Day.