Eemlandhoeve

Eemlandhoeve Moestuin is a market garden on the Eemlandhoeve between Amersfoort and Bunschoten, where vegetables, herbs and flowers are grown largely by hand for weekly pick-up orders and restaurants in Amersfoort and Spakenburg.

Nothing is ever sprayed on the garden, not even the products organic rules allow, and no synthetic fertiliser is used; the soil is fed with compost and composted deep-litter manure (potstalmest). Almost every seedling is raised in the glasshouse in the middle of the garden from late January into October. Flower strips, flowering green manures and hedges are kept for wildlife. The garden is a separate business from the farm; the organic certificate we found at this address is registered to Eemlandhoeve BV. The farm's cattle side also sells beef, bones and organ meat, not yet confirmed; their website says the cows eat only grass from their own land and that the calves stay with their mothers and drink their milk.

Vegetables are harvested in the morning on Wednesdays and Fridays and set out in the barn for collection from 14:00. Orders go through the webshop, which needs an account, by Tuesday evening for Wednesday and Thursday evening for Friday, and the first vegetables of each season are expected in April.

Half the garden is worked without tillage, and no machine ever goes on that ground.