Why Has America Stopped Growing Garlic? @ Cottage Pastures | #119

Matthew runs Cottage Pastures on 26 acres in Switzerland County, Indiana, raising pigs, chickens, cattle, and sheep alongside garlic and herbs - everything sold under the name is raised on the farm itself. He and his wife bought the property in 2022 and built it up from a homesteading project into a full working farm.

Our conversation centers on garlic: despite ideal growing conditions across the Midwest, most garlic sold in the U.S. is imported, and a soil-borne fungal disease can make land unable to grow garlic for 20 to 40 years once it takes hold. This is a risk Cottage Pastures is now soil-testing to get ahead of. We talk through how the farm accidentally ended up growing 20-plus garlic varieties, why the economics of commodity crops crowd out specialty ones like garlic, and what it costs to raise and ship chicken nationwide as a direct-to-consumer farm.

Matthew also gets into why pre-orders rather than outside financing keep the farm's cash flow working, how he decides what to raise or cut as the operation grows, and what it looks like to raise kids alongside farm work without compelling them to help.

Key topics:

- Why most U.S. garlic and herbs are imported despite favorable growing conditions

- A soil-borne fungal disease that can end garlic production on a piece of land for decades

- How Cottage Pastures accidentally became a 20-plus variety garlic farm

- The real cost of raising and processing chicken for direct-to-consumer sale

- Grass-fed and grass-finished labeling: domestic vs. imported

- Deciding what to raise, expand, or cut as the farm scales

- Raising kids on the farm without compelling their help

- Plans for a 2027 regional farm-share model in Cincinnati/Louisville