De Hommelhoeve

De Hommelhoeve is a small biodynamic mixed farm in Empe, raising Brandrode cattle, Duroc pigs and hens alongside a self-harvest vegetable garden.

The cattle are Brandrode, a rare dual-purpose breed, and keep their horns. They graze the home meadows in summer and are housed in winter, when the land is waterlogged, eating hay from their own herb-rich grassland and no maize or silage; their website says the animals have never had antibiotics. The beef is sold frozen in portions for two, with bone packs of about 2.5 kg for broth. The Duroc pigs have their own plot beside the garden to root and wallow in, and eat farm surpluses such as whey, grain, roots and pumpkins. Since 2025 about 30 hens have lived in a mobile coop moved across the meadows behind the cows, where they forage and also get organic feed, their website says; roasting cockerels and boiling hens are sold too. Their website mentions a Demeter recognition through a Stichting Demeter pilot, which is not an entry in the Demeter register.

Meat, bones and eggs are sold self-service from the farm's milk room, and 4 kg beef packages are made up on request. The self-harvest subscription runs from April or May until the winter crops run out, and a seasonal vegetable box can replace it.

The manure is composted with straw from their own land and home-made biodynamic preparations and goes back onto the garden and fields.