Wordless Wednesday Twisted Carrots

Zari found this fun twisted carrot from the large bag of juicing carrots we get for our horses to eat.

Zaycon Fresh Is Looking For Influencers! Also A Chance To Save!

I am working as an influencer for Zaycon Fresh! They have a brand new affiliate program! If you are interested in working with them, please use my referral link they gave me to pass on to other influencers! I love their fresh, all natural meat!!!!

Link for New Influencers/Bloggers:
https://www.zayconfresh.com/influencer/finamoon

If you are not a blogger/influencer and you want to get in on a great deal on meat I have something for you too! New customers use code: BL20 code (offer only valid from 1/2/2017 - 3/31/2017) for 20% off the first order for new customers.

Link for New Customers:
https://www.zayconfresh.com/refer/finamoon



They are having a big ground beef sale right now!

Sales Going On Now:

• From 2/21/2017 - 2/25/2017 you can use code: GBDEAL and receive 22% off your order of Fresh 93/7 Super Lean Ground Beef and/or Fresh 80/20 Ground Beef.
• From 2/21/2017 - 2/23/2017 you can use code: DOGDEAL and receive 12% off your order of All-Beef Hot Dogs!

About Zaycon Fresh:


DISCLOSURE/DISCLAIMER: I wrote this post to let my readers know about this great opportunity and deal. My thoughts are mine and my family's own opinion and have not been altered by anyone else. Affiliate links may be in this posting. Thanks for supporting my blog.

Zaycon Foods Chicken Breast Review

I had heard very good things about Zaycon Foods, but had never tried them out before. They have fresh: meats, produce, and sometimes even milk in bulk at rock bottom prices because they cut out the middle men. These are all natural, fresh, and better for you than the usual store bought.

USFamilyGuide gave me the opportunity to experience them for my first time and get 40 pounds of chicken for free. These were their 100% natural, additive-free, hormone-free, minimally processed, USDA inspected, boneless, skinless chicken breast for about $1.84/lb. These go straight from the farm to the refrigerated truck and then to you. They do not take the long journey that regular store bought chicken does.

I ordered the chicken early on July 29th just to be sure that I would get my order in. These events sell out fast! The ordering process was easy on their website and they sent us reminder emails about the event a few days before so that we wouldn't miss it.

Zaycon Foods refrigerated truck.

On the morning of October 11th my husband and I headed over to the Elks Lodge in Kelso Washington to pick up the chicken. We pulled into the parking lot and followed the signs to the refrigerated truck. We drove up and volunteers checked our information and loaded the box of chicken into our van. We didn't even have to get out or load the chicken ourselves. They even laid some plastic down before putting the box in just in case there was leakage.

The box of chicken in our van.

Zaycon Foods chicken being separated out into freezer bags.

When we got home we unloaded the box and pulled out huge bags of chicken breasts. These were giant boneless skinless chicken butterfly breast with rib meat and came from Wayne Farms. We were very happy with the size of them. We unpacked them and repacked them in freezer bags with about 3-4 of them separated out per bag. It was a cold slimy process, but well worth it because it was a lot of chicken. You could go in first and trim off the fat and separate the chicken breasts further if needed, but I was kind of feeling lazy.

We now have a freezer full of chicken and they are so yummy cooked up in all kinds of recipes!


To Get Started Click on this link https://www.zayconfoods.com/refer/zf141740

DISCLOSURE/DISCLAIMER: I received 40 lbs FREE Chicken from Zaycon Foods through USFamilyGuide to facilitate this review. My thoughts are mine and my family's own opinion and have not been altered by anyone else. I did not receive any other compensation for posting this review. There is also affiliate links in this post. Thank you for supporting my blog.

Safeway Fresh and Local Produce Tour with Ron Rivers Pear Orchards and Duckwall Fruit

Me at the Pear Orchard (photo
credit: Safeway)

This free trip was sponsored by Safeway. I also received free swag for going, but I was not obligated to write up this post. My thoughts are mine and my family's own opinion and have not been altered by anyone else. I did not receive any other compensation for posting.

On August 22nd I was whisked away to a gorgeous pear orchard nestled in the Hood River Oregon Valley. This is one of many farms and orchards that supplies Safeway stores with fresh produce locally. This particular pear orchard is owned by a 5th generation grower and farmer named Ron Rivers and Duckwall Fruit. They have been producing and perfecting pears since 1919.

I carpooled with a local blogger, Maryann Collier and her colleague Dawn from Coupon Savvy. We headed to Portland to meet the other bloggers, media and Safeway representatives, etc. at the Hawthorne Boulevard Safeway. When we arrived we were greeted warmly by the Safeway representatives and put on a very large tour/shuttle bus complete with its own bathroom for the journey to Hood River. They also had made us each a large gift basket filled with goodies to sit next to. I felt very spoiled ;)

When we got to the Hood River Safeway we picked up some other Safeway representatives along with Fred Duckwall (President of Duckwall Fruit), Ed Weathers (VP and Sales Manager of Duckwall Fruit) and Scott Bradley (VP of Safeway produce). They answered some of our questions as we were transported to the farm. When we got to the orchard we all got out, took in the gorgeous scenery and had a lesson on pears from the experts. We met Farmer Ron Rivers and his wife. They told us the ins and outs of having a pear orchard.

Ron Rivers has over 200 acres of pear orchard located in the foothills of Mt. Hood outside of Parkdale Oregon. We learned that because of the micro-climate and fertile soil that is rich with vitamins, minerals, and nutrients from the volcano, Hood River Valley is one of the best places to grow pears and other fruit. A single pear tree can produce pears for over 100 years and some of the trees we saw while we were there were over 50 years old! When frosts threaten the crop they turn on large fans and heaters called smudge pots to help the orchard warm up and create a smoke blanket to protect the fruit trees from radiative cooling. A pears skin is fairly delicate so the really cold moisture can damage it or the blossoms before fruition. On the Ron Rivers farm they have about 55 employees that work 10 months out of the year to prune the trees, thin the fruit, and hand pick the fruit. Hand picked fruit is in better condition with less bruising than fruit picked by machine. Duckwall Fruit gets over 2.5 million cartons (7000 bins) filled with pears annually that were picked in the 60 day long picking process. The pears are transferred from the farm to a ambient air cold storage or controlled atmosphere storage (CA) facility at Duckwall Fruit to be further hand sorted and graded. The CA storage suspends the normal ripening process and allows the fruit to be held up to eight months after harvest. You can read the complete process at Duckwall's website.

I told Mr. Rivers that I had a farm with a couple of pear trees on it and he told me that he would love to visit sometime and give me pointers on my small orchard. I thought that would be fantastic and told him I would like that very much. We then rode the tour bus to the next area where they had set up a yummy looking spread of food and some tables and chairs for us to sit at all under a canopy tent. We were welcomed at the entrance by a Safeway banner that said, "Welcome Have fun and enjoy the farm!" It started raining and we could hear thunder and see lightning in the distance. We hurried with our cameras and other blogging devices to the closest shelter. Mr. Rivers saw me trying to get photographs of the canopy with Mount Hood in the background and he personally invited me up to his covered upper deck that overlooked the valley. It was a breathtaking view!

Chef Ben from the Celilo Restaurant and Bar in Hood River prepared a feast that incorporated pears into everything we ate and drank. For the drink we had Sparkling Pear Soda with Honey Drinking Vinegar. It wasn't overly sweet with the honey and minced pear and it had mint or basil to bring out the flavor. Next on the table was Phyllo Wrapped Pears and Curry Butter. These were really good and I loved the interesting combination of sweet and spicy. Next was Pear Endive Spears with Walnut Vinaigrette. These were one of my favorites. They had a great crunch with the endive spears and the pear that was paired with the nuts and tangyness of the dressing was perfect. Next was Pear Jam and Crackers. I love the Open Nature Multi-Grain Cracker Crisps they picked for spreading the jam onto. I am definitely going to have to seek out a box of them at Safeway. The Grilled Prosciutto Wrapped Pears were so good with the salty and the sweet! I also loved the smokey flavor of the Cedar Planked Pears that were grilled to perfection. Then there was the Grilled Pear, Turkey, and Brie Sandwiches with Roasted Garlic Aioli. These were actually two sandwiches skewered together and since I love brie and garlic this was delicious!

Me dishing up the yummy food. (photo credit: Safeway)

I was getting a bit full when they brought out the desserts! There was a Thai Sweet Chili Glazed Pear Tartin which was something I wouldn't have thought of to put together, but it was really good and there was Roasted Pear Pie Butterscotch and Caramel Parfait which was, in my honest opinion, too sweet. I wanted to finish the parfait, but I just couldn't. While we ate under the canopy we listened to the rain and thunder. Wow so much yummy food! They also gave us some pears and large bags to bring home some extra food if we wanted to. How could I pass that up!?

Once the rain cleared we had pictures taken of everyone and headed back on the bus.

We stopped off at the Hood River Safeway again and got a first hand look at the display for the Duckwall Fruit pears with Ron Rivers' picture hanging over it. We then wrapped up the day with our last questions, headed back to Portland and then back home with our swag. Safeway is an awesome host! This was a very fun and productive day. I learned a whole lot and wouldn't mind visiting the pear orchard and Mr. Rivers and his wife again if they would have me.

You can go to Safeway's Website and see other fresh produce that is in season and in their stores now. You can also read and watch video clips about other farmers that harvest fresh produce for Safeway.

DISCLOSURE/DISCLAIMER: I went to this event because I was invited. I wanted to let you, my readers, know of the awesome farmers behind the scenes of Safeway's produce so I wrote this post. Thanks to Safeway and their representatives, Ron Rivers and family, and Duckwell Fruit for providing me with the information and inviting me to this event. I received free swag for attending. My thoughts are mine and my family's own opinion and have not been altered by anyone else. I did not receive any other compensation for posting.

Zaycon Foods

All information is provided by USFamilyGuide.com and Zaycon Foods. I will receive 40 lbs FREE Chicken for posting. There is also affiliate links in this post. Thank you for supporting my blog.

How does Zaycon Foods manage to provide such high quality super fresh meat and produce to its customers at such low prices? The answer is strength in numbers. And not our numbers, yours!

Zaycon Foods can sell its products at bulk rate prices to individual consumers and families because our unique sales event business model brings lots of people together, adding all their purchasing power into a combined bulk food purchase. And when you buy as part of a group that’s committing to such a large purchase, the power is in the hands of the purchaser! It’s the ultimate group buy in terms of both price and consumer empowerment.

You can pre-select exactly what you want to order from a given Zaycon sales event – sometimes you may want to stock up on our amazing meaty back ribs and sometimes it might be all about the Zaycon bacon – and then, on the day of the sales event, you and a whole big bunch of your neighbors will find yourselves in a nearby parking lot watching as an entire tractor trailer’s worth of high quality natural food is unloaded into all of your cars! You will be amazed at how quickly one of our refrigerated trucks goes from being filled with natural, fresh chicken or hundreds of gallons of grade A non-homogenized milk to being empty and back on its way to the farm!

A Zaycon Foods truck sales event often lasts less time than you would spend on a trip to the grocery store, yet you will leave with a whole lot more food than you’d get at the market, and for much better prices, too!

When you use the Zaycon Foods sales event as your preferred place to purchase meats, milk, and any of our other fine products, you get advantages even beyond the bulk pricing that comes with our special sales model. You also have the peace of mind of knowing exactly what you’re going to get! A trip to the grocery store can involve wasted time wandering around looking for various foods spread out across the store; at a Zaycon Foods parking lot meat truck delivery (or milk or berries or fish delivery, too!) you have pre-ordered your foods, so all you have to do is show up and wait for our friendly staffers and volunteers to load up your car.

Also, unlike in the grocery store, the prices you will pay for a Zaycon Foods product are locked in on our website, so you will know how much you are going to spend before you have committed to a purchase.

At a supermarket, you might pay one price for chicken on one day, and then a higher price on another day. With Zaycon, you decide that you want to order a case of our fresh boneless skinless chicken breasts, you check the price and then you commit to it, knowing that from that moment on, we are committed to getting you your fresh, natural food!

Watch this video to find out more:



To Get Started Click on this link https://www.zayconfoods.com/refer/zf141740

DISCLOSURE/DISCLAIMER: All information is provided by USFamilyGuide.com and Zaycon Foods. I will receive 40 lbs FREE Chicken for posting. There is also affiliate links in this post. Thank you for supporting my blog.