Hey there, I’m Kelly: a recipe developer, food blogger, beekeeper, and homesteader. I started The Herbeevore to document my adventures in beekeeping, cooking, homesteading, and to share all the fantastic fresh & vibrant recipes we enjoy.
I love creating fresh and healthy recipes for everyone at the table! I love making healthier versions of traditional recipes for everyone at the table, so a lot of my food is plant-based, vegetarian, vegan, and high in fiber.
When we moved to our homestead 5 years ago, I found myself wanting to cook as much as I could from scratch – without going crazy spending all my time in the kitchen. I first started this site as a recipe archive to compile and write my favorite recipes that I created so I can make them again & again. This site has since evolved into a living cookbook, documenting all our tasty homecooked meals and sharing them with you to make your life a little bit easier!
Most recipes you see here I’ve created from scratch, and I also I’ve compiled some great Family Recipes too. My dad’s side of the family has a long history of owning restaurants/supper clubs in Chicago.
I’ve always been passionate about cooking and getting creative in the kitchen. I develop recipes with the fresh produce from our garden and with honey from our beehives. I also love cooking with pantry staple ingredients, and anything we pull from the garden (see below)! Most of my recipes are plant-based, as that is how we eat on a daily basis. Some are vegetarian, some are flexitarian, and some contain meat. I believe in balance and eating healthfully, enjoying as much local and homegrown produce as we can.
Our epic Blue Adirondack potato harvest we grew this year!
Living an Eco-Friendly Homestead Life
5 years ago when we were house-hunting, we stumbled on this wonderful slice of New England wilderness, and knew we belonged here. Our acreage is heavily forested, with huge boulders and old rustic rock walls lining the property. We have fully embraced living the rugged homestead lifestyle, and we get “farm-ier” every year:
- We grow our own food in our outdoor gardens in the summer and fall, and turned our garage into a greenhouse for the winter months
- We compost all kitchen scraps to reduce food waste
- Chop, haul, split, stack all our own firewood to heat our home in the winter
- Tap our maple trees to make maple syrup in the spring
- Hike on the winding trails we built throughout our property
- And started beekeeping with a nice little apiary
Each year we work towards becoming more sustainable, eco friendly, low waste, and self-sufficient as possible on our land.
How I Began Beekeeping
5 years ago we decided to give beekeeping a try. It was a totally new journey for us and felt great to do something to help our little ecosystem. We have anywhere between 1-5 hives at a time… and each has between 20,000 – 50,000 bees! We’re just hobbyist/backyard beekeepers, we don’t do it professionally. But I love tending to our well-established colonies and see our bees happily foraging around the homestead in the summer. I even caught a swarm of bees on our property too, which was one of the wildest experiences of my life.
I worked with a local business last year to relocate and re-house a honeybee colony… and that was an experience we’re still buzzing about (sorry, SO many bee puns)!
I absolutely love spending time outdoors on the land, indoors in the kitchen, and everywhere in between. I love the process of creating and sharing fun new recipes, so please subscribe for monthly updates on what’s new!
I want to encourage everyone to eat more locally and sustainably, enjoy the land, and have fun in the kitchen using whole ingredients to make something fantastic. Please reach out with any questions on homesteading or beekeeping, or just let me know more of what you’d like to see on this site.
If you are curious about any of the ingredients I use in my recipes, I try to link to the exact products that I use. You can also check out my Amazon Storefront to browse some lists I’ve built for our favorite pantry staple ingredients, tools we use for composting, a collection of products for beginner beekeepers, and of course some favorite plant based snacks!