How to Raise and Roast a Goat (in 10 Quick and Easy Steps!)

1. Acquire some goats. (Remember: The cuter the animal, the tastier the meat.)

Meet Winston and Walter, our protagonists today. My husband Colin and I procured these lovely little fellows in May. We live on a small farm in Shoreham, just down the road from Twig Farm in West Cornwall. Cheesemaker Michael Lee makes a mean tomme, and it turns out that one of the biological imperatives of milking goats is … baby goats. Most cheesemakers face a glut every spring of young male goats, called bucklings.

We approached the business of raising goats not unlike the way we approached the business of raising cows, and raising a puppy: Acquire the animal, then figure it out. Our delightful friends Lucas Farrell and Louisa Conrad (of Townshend-based Big Picture Farm, purveyors of award-winning goat-milk caramels) convinced us that goats were a piece of cake and no trouble at all and super cute (admittedly, my words, not theirs — although if that blog isn’t goat propaganda, I don’t know what is).

So we paid Lee $25 apiece of two mostly weaned wethers (castrated males) and piled Walter and Winston into a large dog crate for the short drive home.