Photo courtesy of Kyle Hennen Ghent pork farmer Kyle Hennen is doing what he loves to do — working in the farrowing barn making sure the newborn pigs get off to a good start in growing up.

October is traditionally National Pork Month. For this year’s pork edition, the Independent reached out to Pork Board President Brad Hennen to give our readers a snapshot of the hog producing situation in not only in southwest Minnesota, but the rest of the state, the nation and the world. Not only did Hennen offer good information, but he also wanted to remind readers that the vast majority of hog farmers love what they do.

“It’s always a pleasure to know you’re feeding people,” Hennen said. “We feel very positive, very honored to be able to say that we provide a nutritious, wholesome product that tastes good. One of the wonderful things about our industry is that we provide a source of protein that present itself in different ways that people want. If you don’t want bacon, you’re obviously in the small minority of people, but there are a lot of other things out there that people find very, very tasty. There’s ribs, there’s sausage, there’s ham, there’s pork loin, there’s roast, there’s pulled pork. All of that comes from the same animal.”

Hennen encourages our readers to find some recipes, but make sure you don’t cook the pork more than necessary.

“The recommended safety margin for cooking pork is 145 degrees. If you don’t go too much beyond that you’ll probably have a pretty good eating experience,” he said. “Look up recipes up recipes for pork or pork chops or roast. There’s a lot of wonderful things out there that we encourage you to try.

Besides Brad Hennen’s perspective on the hog industry, the Independent special section inside today’s edition also profiles Ghent farmer Kyle Hennen who has grown up helping his family raise pigs and is now making that his profession.