Our Story

Shedhouse Farm is a place where we create with time and nature; growing, preserving and storing the Sun’s energy in small batch seasonal condiments.

Crafting funky condiments using natural preservation techniques and sourcing our ingredients from our land and direct from other farms in Northern NSW. We create relationships with farmers that are about growing with natural and organic methods. We use zero ingredients that are artificial, processed or imported and strive to source from as close to our farm as possible.

Every product contains the life that was grown into the produce that we use. The natural process helps convert compounds and adds beneficial microbes. We minimise waste by using as much as possible to create a range of products and use the rest to create garden inputs.

Our aim is to produce food products that represent real food and have super low travel, low waste and high nutritional value from seed to seal.

The product range consists of smoked, fermented, pickled & dried condiments. Made with seasonal, fresh produce, these are foods that we not only enjoy eating ourselves but also love sharing with others. They are shelf stable and last for long periods, great for having on hand. They’re good for you too!

Located just outside Kyogle on Bundjalung country, Northern Rivers NSW, we keep as much in-house as possible and work with local businesses for supplies and packaging. All of the labeling, packaging design and other elements such as website, social media and signage are done in-house. This keeps things low travel and means we can keep consistency across all parts.

The Shedhouse

The name came about long before we had even moved in. Spending the odd weekend on the farm, with the swag rolled out in the main bedroom of the twice renovated old horse shed, there were plenty of moments to sit back, take in the view and think about what we’d be doing here in the not too distant future. Many ideas sprung up while thinking “How’s the serenity?”.

You may still be wondering why it is called Shedhouse Farm? Well the reason is simple. The house that is on the property started life as a horse shed, that was then enclosed and renovated into a house and renovated once more to extend it, some time before we bought the place. So it was a “shed house”.

As the idea was to farm produce for the products, so it made sense to throw that on the end as part of the evolution of the place - Shedhouse Farm was born. And if it doesn’t end up working it is similar enough to something else…

The Farm

Located on a ridge and somewhat of a blank canvas, mostly grass and some different areas to work with - a couple of dams, a bush area, a small seasonal creek with a mix of slope and flat land.

The progress so far has mostly been starting smaller spaces and getting an understanding of what is going to grow good here without killing us or the soil.

In the early stages as we have been getting things going, a good chunk of the work so far has been around observing and interacting, researching, trying things, doing things super small scale, planning, design and getting the products and customer base going and keeping the grass down with cows, goats and brush cutters.

With a new swale series system installed late 2023, named “The Food Bank”. This area is setup to provide some amount of seasonal product input in the short term while growing out larger fruit trees that will succeed through mid to longer term output. It’ll feed us too!

Gradually as the smaller areas get turned into intensively productive output spaces, the larger paddocks and bush zones will also get some regenerative design solutions applied to provide a diverse range of produce year round and give the local ecosystem a bit more to work with than the current grassy field.

The Food

It’s gotta feel alive and make you feel alive, lighting up all your senses. When you eat food that is alive you will feel alive too.

When it has what it was made to give us, it’s got a different rhythm. The frequencies of flavour come together, harmonising within us as we become part of it, it becomes part of us. This is really important to have in our food.

The ingredients have to come from a good home, loved throughout the process of their creation and their ultimate destiny, which is to become something that represents their values, qualities and what they are capable of providing us as tasty things to eat and enjoy. We want you to know the truth about what’s in it.

Filling our beings with food that is really about being enjoyable and built on a foundation of good values and conscious design. Our process is all about designing flavours that can be enjoyed with many things or on their own.

How the food is grown really makes a difference in terms of what vitamins, minerals and other compounds are available to work with during the preservation phase. Doing it as fresh as possible also makes a difference. These are driving forces behind how we like to source ingredients.

Once we are able to go about processing, things are done simply and without too many modifying factors. Using time as a main ingredient to work with the microbes and other natural factors that enable this process of preservation to take place. It’s a partnership with a microbial party.

Everything is done by hand or with simple equipment, each product requires its own treatment in how it gets from start to finish and one of the most important tests we put our products through is the taste test.

Once we are happy and know it’s a good batch, we plan the packaging.

Mick worked as a digital designer and Cassie a medical practice admin. Together we spent a good bit of time doing plenty of camping, holidays in nature and watching a heap of shows about living in the country, being self sufficient and making tasty things with fresh ingredients.

We landed on the farm in late 2020. Moving from the city, having both grown up in and around Brisbane with a long held dream of one day moving to a country property to grow our own food and do something broader with the ability to grow and process fresh produce.

It was quite the tree change and something that took a while to really sink in and for us to feel like we were here. Our trusty dog Cooper was a new dog, loving the space to run around. By the time mid-2022 came around we were joined by our baby boy Marley, who’s been growing up strong, eating good food and recently running around himself.

As of January 2024, we have been at the farm for just over 3 years and in that time created the Shedhouse Farm brand, designed and delivered over 30 new products to a growing customer base at local markets, retail outlets and online. We’ve also planted around 100 fruit and nut trees, grown and enjoyed a range of seasonal fruit and veg, bred a bunch of chickens, a couple of goats and filled the big freezer with whole beasts from beef cattle agisted in our paddocks.

Our Mission

The mission is to create enjoyable food products that are based on local, seasonal and whole produce. Ingredients that are real and go through slow and natural processes to achieve their outcome.

It’s also important to have transparency around where the inputs are sourced and a bit of a story around how we got them and how things are grown.

Sourcing from farms that are working with quality seed, natural inputs and doing things in sustainable and regenerative ways. We want to store these qualities in portable and long lasting ways for many to enjoy.

Supporting as much local business as we can in what else we need to provide our products and service to the local community and beyond.

We proudly state that our products are Made in Kyogle because we believe this region offers a lot of what we aim to represent in our products.

For more information about what we value, check out our articles below:

Food for Thought