French Chef Alain Braux, a trained chef de patisserie and Executive Chef at People’s Pharmacy in Austin, Texas allowed us to watch him make his famous (and extremely delicious) Flour-Less Chocolate Cake. All three People’s Pharmacy locations (South Lamar, North Lamar and Westlake) now carry Vital Farms eggs to purchase, (they also bake with the eggs) and make their hearty chicken soups with Vital Farms chicken.

We have known Alain for years, and it was really enjoyable to catch up, talk about food and his new book, which will be a little more opinionated and political than the last two, How to Lower Your Cholesterol with French Gourmet Food and Living Gluten and Dairy-Free with French Gourmet Food. (Both books are available on Amazon, through his website, at Book People and at People’s Pharmacies). Braux plans to donate $2 of every sale of his new book to the Austin Sustainable Food Center.

“I’m telling people they have to fight for their food. It’s not just about saving money at the register, though most people are on a budget now. Basically, all you need to be healthy is to eat fresh food,” Braux said.

We only used 8 ounces of organic Turbinado sugar in our recipe for this cake, which is enough for 6 or 8 servings. On special order it can be made gluten and dairy-free. On a slow day at the Pharmacy, he makes about 2 cakes per day, but can make 4 or 5 on a busy day!

“I don’t want a stigma attached to gluten-free food,” he said. “I don’t want you to know it’s gluten-free unless I tell you.” (The full-recipe is on page 282 of Living Gluten and Dairy-Free).

Matt O'Hayer, (Left) Michael Cox, (Center) Jason Jones (Right)

Where did you grow up?

I grew up in living in Summers, AR. on the farm with my dad. I just turned 30 last week. Now it’s time to grow up! Currently my wife Courtney and our two boys Tate and Jax live on our Holcroft farm, which is where we have our Vital Farms production.
How did you start chicken farming? What did you do before this?

I was raised in the egg business. My grandfather oversaw Cargill’s egg operation until his retirement and my father began with a contract to produce for Cargill in 1981. My father broke from Cargill and produced as an independent farmer in 1984. From that he grew into a vertically integrated company with pullet production, laying production, feed mill, processing plant, and trucking. I grew up around the farm. I was often into trouble with my siblings and had to pack eggs for punishment! I still hate packing eggs to this day. I have never had a job off the farm. One year into college I dropped out to work full time on the farm. In 2001 I started Arkansas Egg. We were a caged egg producer.
Why do you think it’s important to raise animals using organic feed, an environmental consciousness and humane conditions?

At one time my father had 2.5 million hens. When I began I had around 800,000. That’s small stuff compared to the big guys in the industry. Today you have farms with 605,000 birds in a single barn and 6 million on a farm. To me, the number is for shock value. A small cage house with 30,000 birds has the same conditions as the largest of barns. We converted into organic production for several reasons. One, we had old, run down facilities which helped me see first hand the environmental and welfare issues that accompanied (a conventional) style of production. Second, the market for this production was stable compared to the conventional side. We could obtain the margins we needed to do a lot of things differently, the right way.

Conventional egg production is a great example of how over the last 50 years, the focus has been on cheap food at all cost. Most consumers demand it. Look at prop 2 in California. 60% of citizens voted for it. Only 5% of consumers support it at the store by buying a cage free egg. That’s an astounding voter disconnect. In 1950 it took Americans 2.5 hours of work on avg. to pay for 1 dozen eggs. Today it takes a fraction of that time. Americans spend less on food than any other nation and they get what they pay for.

We began transitioning to organic production in 2007. Today we are 100% organic, cage free and pasture roaming. For us its about two distinctly different advantages. One is the living conditions and overall welfare of the birds compared to traditional cage production. The second is that by being Certified Organic, our consumers can know with certainty they are getting a food that fits their lifestyle or diet needs. These two items are big issues to consumers today.

What do you see happening to family farms in your area and the U.S. in general?

As food production focus has been on cheap foods, there is a direct trend to what’s happening on the family farm. Farming in general has a grow or die mentality. Small farms are dying as new, larger ones take their place. In one generation, a family farm that made a living on a small dairy herd and a small barn of chickens is gone. Today’s family farms typically are sustained with a job in town. It takes hundreds of thousands of chickens or 100′s of cattle in a herd to make a living.

Our contract farms that produce for Vital Farms are making a better living raising a fraction of the birds they once did. We get over one hundred calls a year from producers wanting to know if we are looking for more contract production. A shift to sustainable farming practices (with a focus on animal welfare) is dependent on the consumers’ willingness to pay more for that item and understand why it costs more. Organic farming has been a breath of life into small farms across the country. It creates an environment where the focus is on doing the right thing, not the cheapest thing. As a result the products cost more to produce and net more income that sustain this method of production.
How did you meet Jason and Matt? What attracted you to Vital Farms?

How I met Matt and Jason is a funny story. I became interested in pasture egg production in 2009. After only a few weeks of thinking hard about how I would peruse this, Matt called me out of the blue about buying some feed from our mill. Before that, I had heard of Vital Farms but knew nothing of them. We talked for 30 minutes on our first call and it ended with a planned visit to Austin the next week. I have felt good about our relationship from the first call. We are very excited about the opportunities ahead.
What do you like to do besides farming?

Outside of working I enjoy hunting and fishing and spending every minute possible outside.

I often speak to customers wishing our eggs were from a farm that is closer to their home. The local food movement is fast growing and widespread. Organizations like Slow Food promote locally produced foods over of the purchase of products made or grown further away. So, what do we think about this?

All things being equal, it’s a great idea to buy your eggs locally. However, from what I’ve seen after visiting dozens of egg farms in the past 2 years, all things are not equal, nor are they what they seem.

Vital Farms Pasture Raised Eggs are from hens that are raised outdoors, on fresh native grasses that are Certified Organic. Our hens (also certified organic) are rotated routinely onto fresh pasture. They don’t touch a previously utilized area for at least 60 days (often a year or more), allowing the pathogens from their manure to run their life cycles, die off and turn into great natural fertilizer. Our birds’ diets are also supplemented with a USDA Certified Organic lay ration (hens need a certain amount of seeds and grain to lay about an egg a day). Our farms are all Certified Humane by Humane Farm Animal Care. We choose our family farms based upon many things, including their willingness to love and care for the ladies who will lay our eggs. In addition, we meet regularly with our family farms to review our standards and work on ideas to improve the lifestyle of our hens and the quality and flavor of our eggs.

While there are many small local farms that produce eggs that I’d eat, many more do not. Here’s what I need to see before I purchase and eat eggs from the farm down the road:

1. Certified Organic. Fact: It only costs $400 to get certified organic. Many local farmers tell us that they are “organic” but can’t afford the certification. Since being certified organic improves the sale price of their product and the value of the food they produce, I have to wonder if there is some other reason why they don’t make the effort and spend the minimal cost to get certified. If they are free ranging their birds, but feeding them non-organic feed, you could be eating eggs from hens fed blood, feather and bone meal, pesticide and herbicide laced- GMO corn and soy and other nasty stuff, all of which makes its way into your body after it passes through the hen’s. Today’s egg is made up mostly of what the hen ate yesterday.

2. Humanely Raised: I want to know that the birds are living outdoors (not indoors with “outdoor access”). I also want to know that the farmer rotates his flocks onto fresh pasture on a regular basis. Does he/she follow humane standards for their birds? Are they protected from predators, allowed to dust bathe, given proper roosting space, enough nesting boxes, summer shade and water access? Are they over or under fed? Too much grain can lead to overlarge eggs which can lead to physical problems for the layer. I have seen this on many small farms, where a farmer thinks he is being good to the birds by giving them all the feed they want. Too little feed and the girls stop laying.

3. Be Honest: It’s simply not possible to produce pasture raised eggs during the winter in many parts of the country. In states like Wisconsin and Minnesota, there is only green pasture a few months per year. If you want pasture raised eggs during the winter, you will need to get them from a farm in the South where there is green pasture year ‘round. A farm that claims that their eggs are pasture raised when the birds are indoors in barns or warehouses is not being truthful to his/her customer.

Finally, it’s difficult to compare the cost and carbon footprint of shipping a carton of eggs 1,000 miles in a truck with 25,000 other dozens vs. the cost of driving to a local farm to pick up 1-2 items. In this example, we don’t know how far the local farm is, how good your gas mileage is and how many items among which to divide the fuel cost. We do know the amount of fuel required to ship a carton of eggs on a full, refrigerated semi-truck: It’s 6/10 of one ounce of diesel, or 1/213 of a gallon – basically several large drops. My bet is that I’d use more just starting my car to drive to the farm down the road.

That being said, Vital Farms has grown to 12 family farms in states throughout the South including Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, and now Georgia. Soon we will also begin production on a farm in California. We are striving to bring our eggs closer to you so that you don’t have to drive all the way to Austin for a great breakfast.

Laura Sawicki, Pastry Chef at La Condesa, was kind enough to let us into her kitchen to show us the basics of one of Summer’s most classic and refreshing desserts: homemade ice cream made with Vital Farms eggs!

La Condesa’s Bourbon Vanilla Ice Cream (Yield: About 1 QT)

Ingredients: 1 ¼ c. Milk, 1 ¾ c. Cream, ¾ c. Sugar, 1 Vanilla Bean (Pop the bean and scrape out the pulp), 1 Pinch Salt, 7 Vital Farms egg yolks, (Finish with a splash of bourbon if you like).

You will also need: A stainless steel bowl. A whisk. A wooden spoon or rubber spatula. A strainer. A cooking or candy thermometer. A large bowl or bin to make an ice bath. An ice cream machine.

1. Scald milk and cream with half the sugar. 2. Whisk egg yolks in a stainless steel bowl. When dairy starts to bubble, add remaining sugar to yolks and whisk! 3. Temper (add) a portion of the dairy into the yolks, whisking. Be careful not to scramble the egg yolks. 4. Return all ingredients to a saucepan on the stove, stirring with a wooden spoon or rubber spatula. Cook on low to 160 degrees. Strain. 5. Cool in an ice bath. Taste and adjust seasoning if necessary. Add a splash of vanilla extract and bourbon, if using. 6. Store in a refrigerator overnight. 7. Spin according to your ice cream machine’s instructions.

(Tip from Laura: Ice cream requires lots of straining, especially if you have an infusion competing with the base. You want your base to be as smooth as possible. Laura recommends getting creative with infusions: nuts, herbs, liquors, whatever strikes your fancy.)

La Condesa changes their standard menu every few months, but specials change everyday or every few days. Sawicki says it can be difficult to plan pastry specials for a large restaurant when the seasons in Central Texas are so short. “If this were a 25 seat restaurant, a totally locally sourced menu would be no problem, but we have 150 seats,” Sawicki said.

Sweet potatoes and pecans are available year-round but berries, herbs and certain fruits can be harder to come by. However, the restaurant supports many local vegetable farmers, orchards and local meat producers; the fruit pie is always made from locally sourced ingredients, and the cheesecake is made with local Pure Luck Farms goat cheese. Sawicki says she really likes how golden, yummy and rich the Vital Farms egg yolks are. “You can tell the chickens ate well,” she said.

The restaurant also has a very strict composting system in place, as well as a water filtration system and pressurized water taps on all faucets. Sawicki says she doesn’t produce any waste besides egg flats and milk cartons. (She uses about 6 gallons of Organic Daily Harvest Milk a day). “On an emotional level we are practicing what we preach and encouraging other restaurants to do the same. I haven’t worked in a restaurant that wasn’t environmentally conscious in 6 years,” she said. “I am totally floored that there is still a lack of education.”

Sawicki and her team of cooks work extremely hard to produce food of the highest quality at one of Austin’s best restaurants. (She arrives every morning at 6am and will leave at 6pm on a good day, though usually closer to 8 or 9pm). Sawicki, Executive Chef Rene Ortiz and their fellow cooks’ dedication has paid off; since opening in 2009, the restaurant was nominated for the James Beard Award for Best New Restaurant in the US in 2010, arguably one of the most respected awards in the culinary world.

A year later, the main room still crackles with color, massive art sculptures and modern light fixtures (take a look at the American Institute of Architects’ nominated décor here) and the chefs all seem relaxed and happy to be at work.

“What’s a better way to build community than through food?” Sawicki said.