Hammiehoeve – a local egg producer and so much more!

Food Heroes of Enschede #1

This Food Heroes series is looking to highlight all those food producers who have worked tirelessly (and are still working today!) through Covid-19 to produce fantastic quality food at very competitive prices; and also to say a big THANK YOU! Your work and devotion are really appreciated.

So, my first Food Hero is my local egg supplier, Hammiehoeve, a wonderful small holding in the suburbs of Enschede, run by the lovely Leonie and Chielant, (with the occasional help of her mother-in-law, Akkebouk), and home to many beautiful free-range chickens, two pigs and two peacocks. A rustic little shop sells Bildstar potatoes – a red-skinned variety with a firm texture, a good all-round potato; and local Stanislaus Brewskovitch beer brewed in the Menistenkerk off the Oude Market in Enschede. Eggs can be purchased at any time of the day from a vending machine also laden with local honey and jam. Quality eggs really are worth the effort.

Leonie, who spent time in England in a previous life, has very good English and is quite often seen chatting to loyal customers who return week after week, returning their used egg boxes and jam jars for recycling once again! Young children can feed the animals after filling a little brown paper bag with animal feed and can play in the small playground, or even take a peek at the little chicks who may just be hiding in the raised hatches under the watchful eye of a pair of doves.

Hammiehoeve is also part of a relatively new initiative Rustpunt.nu, which highlights locations where passing cyclists can stop for a coffee and fill up their water bottle. With the current development of an adjoining field ready to accept up to 10 caravans, this really does make Hammiehoeve a most sociable little place. Long may it continue!

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