Meet the Farmer: Ivy of Manor Rock Farm on Lard Love, Ethical Meat, and Feeding the Hudson Valley

Next up: Ivy, former cofounder of Manor Rock Farm. Ivy started in fashion and beauty supply chains and somehow ended up co-founding a farm and one of Hudson’s dreamiest restaurants. We talk about pandemic pivots, raising heritage pigs, and the truth behind “farm-to-table.”

 Harri: Hey, I'm Harri, founder of My Neighbor’s. This is Meet the Farmer. So Ivy, what brought you to the Hudson Valley?

Ivy: Originally I was at Bard College and graduated ten years ago. Then I’d moved to the city, but during the pandemic, I had found this house and land that just kind of spoke to me. It was a little bit beaten down and hadn't been lived in for a few years, but it had these great bones and gardens.

 Harri: I love it! Sounds like a money pit, ha – just like ours, a 1770s farmhouse. So what got you interested in livestock and veggies? I know you mentioned WWOOFing before this.

Ivy: Yeah, it really started because I was interested in sourcing and knowing where things come from. Visiting greenmarkets in the city made me want to learn more about food systems—to know the soil, the water, everything from seed to harvest. I was in procurement in the fashion and beauty world, so thinking about supply chains and sourcing just translated into food for me. I was also studying Landscape Architecture at the time and the opportunity to master plan a farm was hard to pass up.

 Harri: So was it like a homestead vibe at first?

Ivy: Not quite. We weren’t trying to go off-grid or be fully self-sufficient. We revived an existing kitchen garden to start. We always knew we wanted to be sharing the produce out with friends and chefs, then ultimately have something hospitality or restaurant based.

Harri: Okay, let’s talk pigs. I know pigs are pretty fatty animals and you use a lot of the fat with charcuterie – just like I use a lot of the fat from the cow, at least the suet, for my tallow. What’s the fat-to-meat ratio you’re dealing with?

Ivy: Mangalitsa pigs are about 70% lard, 30% meat.

 Harri: That’s wild. Cows only give me about 18 pounds of fat for my tallow. Pigs are next-level!

Ivy: Totally. And the restaurant uses all of it—the leaf lard from around the organs, the back fat. They make sausages, pancetta, lardo, and render cooking lard. 

Harri: I mean, I've been to the restaurant and I literally licked the plate. It's amazing.

Ivy: We actually get that feedback a lot. People are like. . . “Can I just lick this???”

 Harri: You’ve talked about how you separate animals raised for meat from pets emotionally. How do you handle that?

Ivy: All animals deserve respect and consideration, whether they’re pets or livestock. People think farmers who raise animals for meat don’t care about animal welfare. . . but we spend all day with them, keeping records, making sure they’re healthy. Even when they don’t have “names”, they’re still known to us. In industrial livestock farming, I think there are only about five companies that own all of the genetics of pork, cattle, and chicken respectively. Raising these heritage breeds that almost went extinct ensures diversity in the livestock industry, even on the small scale. It’s stewardship for something that would otherwise be lost.

Harri: There’s so much greenwashing in meat. What advice would you give people trying to buy more ethically?

Ivy: Meet your farmer. Go to farmers markets, ask questions, follow those questions up with an informed purchase – DM farmers online if you are buying their products through a small store or co-op and are curious about their practices. There’s no excuse not to connect these days with all the touchpoints we have available. I’ve started to challenge myself that if I can’t find the source that the meat has come from, I won’t purchase it. That starts to really shift your mindset as a consumer and shift the way that you eat as well.

Harri: A lot of people really do care about what they’re consuming. I mean, there’s a whole seed oil revolution going on. And one of my things with my company is we have very, very few ingredients – you don't need 160 ingredients for your fucking moisturizer. Now, it seems like there's kind of a lack of community in terms of a network for farmers, thoughts? 

Ivy: There’s groups like the Hudson Valley Young Farmers Coalition trying to make that space, Cornell Extension, pop-up events, and open farm days. I’ve also found farmers are just generous with their time. They want each other to succeed. I think that there's this attitude of additive energy and trying to support people that are invested in creating a community around small farms, especially when farming can feel so isolating.

Harri: The Hudson Valley really feels like the mecca of regenerative farming right now.

 Ivy: It’s definitely becoming that. There’s definitely investment firms that are pushing to make the Hudson Valley into the “Silicon Valley” of regenerative agriculture. It’s exciting to have created something at the beginning.

Harri: Let’s talk about “farm-to-table.” Does it still mean anything to you?

Ivy: I actually really hate the term; it makes my skin crawl. It’s become so generic. All food technically goes from a farm to a table. I think that it's just lost. . . maybe the tenacity that it once had when Alice Waters first used it. Today there's a lot of farm-to-table restaurants in Hudson, but you're kind of like, what farms are you really working with and in what capacity? 

Harri: Yeah, it’s like they’re all just getting their ingredients from Baldor. 

Ivy: Baldor does try to support small farms — which is great — but scale is a huge challenge for small farms. We’re tiny. Like, when I cut a bed of mizuna, it would be gone for four weeks. The farm is growing first for the restaurant, then for a few markets and direct customers. It’s not big enough to supply much more than that, particularly at the price point the products are sold at. 

Harri: Speaking of Manor Rock, I've had the pleasure of eating there twice, and I'm actually going tomorrow night, so I'm really excited to lick my plate again. What’s your favorite kind of synergy between your relationship with the earth and with the pigs, and then also getting to enjoy a lovely cocktail at the restaurant for example?

Ivy: I think the synergy that you're speaking about comes from getting to work with such incredibly talented individuals from both the farm and restaurant teams. Growing something special and watching a kitchen team treat it with reverence is incredible. And then getting immediate feedback from guests—it’s a dream. I love introducing people to weird herbs or heirloom veggies they’ve never tried. It creates a conversation, which is what I am most interested in creating. 

Harri: The restaurant interior is gorgeous. Who did the design?

 Ivy: I worked with Adam Charlap Hyman of Charlap Hyman and Herrero and his team. They’re excellent.

Harri: I mean, it's like, literally, Chef's kiss. Even the red tile in the bathroom is next level. It’s so moody. I felt like a glamorous vampire in there.

 Ivy: That’s exactly the vibe we wanted!

 Harri: Thanks for chatting with me— let’s definitely make that lard soap sometime so you can give it to your friends if you have people over for dinner.

 Ivy: I think getting people excited about what's seen as a waste product is such a noble cause, and I'm really glad that you're working to make it luxurious.