Embracing Sustainable Heritage: A Week on a Homestead in Eastern Poland

The Homestead Horizon team recently spent a week on a family homestead nestled in the suburbs of eastern Poland. Contributor member Kaja guided us through her family’s smallhold, owned by successive generations and now maintained with full self-sufficiency. We arrived with notebooks and cameras and left with renewed respect for rural ingenuity and the restorative power of living close to the land. This article captures our experience, the lessons we learned and the recipes we savoured along the way.

At the time of writing, this plot ranks among the most diverse and well-maintained homesteads we have had the pleasure of visiting. Our hosts generate their electricity from solar panels, store various foods in a cool basement and harvest fresh fruit from their orchard. The gardens sprawl across a single acre, yet yield enough vegetables, soft fruits and herbs to feed the whole family. An electric automated lawnmower (a family favourite affectionately named Trevor) helps them maintain a grassy area and does so on full batteries from the solar farm. The land also features a glorious natural pond with no artificial lining, stretching across 1/4 of the smallhold, helping to support dozens of wildlife species as well as keeping trout for the family.

The homestead’s commitment to sustainability extends beyond produce and power. No-dig gardening has been practised here for more than a decade, reducing soil disturbance and increasing yields each season. Compost is applied just once or twice annually, while fallen wood and autumn leaves are left as mulch on-site. Flowers and wind-break trees surround the crops, diversifying habitats for pollinators and natural predators of pests. This approach echoes the philosophy popularised by Charles Dowding in the United Kingdom, which reports higher productivity and healthier soil through minimal intervention.

Kaja describes how she grew up tending these beds with her wider family, and recounts the annual cycle of planting veg, pruning trees and harvesting an array of delicious food.

Hear from Kaja, a Contributor member and our host for the week.

When I visit my family’s smallholding in eastern Poland, city noise disappears the moment we turn onto the driveway. Dewy meadows stretch out opposite the house, and I often spot green woodpeckers dart across the grass or herons poised by the pond. On misty mornings, storks lumber through fields on long legs.

My favourite spot is the pond, alive with the croaks of dozens of frogs. Keeping it in shape now is a real family effort, they haul out clumps of algae, trim tangled reeds, and check on the integrity of the ponds structure after heavy rains. It’s muddy work, but clearing this a couple of times a year helps flood sunlight into the surface and opens space for the spectacular waterlilies.

More from Kaja

In early summer, the family used reclaimed timber to erect a new barn structure for their land. Fitting with the rest of the property's structure and style, the outbuilding now shelters wheelbarrows heaped with compost, sacks of horticultural gravel, neatly split firewood and mounds of bark mulch destined for the no-dig beds. This sheltered workspace also doubles as an undercover potting bench when sudden downpours interrupt planting, a simple example of how thoughtful reuse can streamline the busiest seasons without sacrificing aesthetics.

Just a few paces away, a cool, half-sunken cellar brims with summer’s bounty in glass jars: crisp, homemade gherkin pickles cured with dill sprigs from the garden, and racks of root veg rest in the constant hush. Storing root vegetables on slatted shelves preserves their earthy flavour through the darkest months, while each jar becomes both a pantry staple and talisman of the harvest. Above and below ground, the family's approach is the same: honour what you grow, waste nothing and trust that every season’s labour will sustain the next.

Eastern Poland has long been a bastion of self-reliant living. From medieval times through the 19th century, smallholders cultivated plot allotments called dymki, often subsisting entirely on homegrown produce. Although industrial agriculture swept across Europe in the 20th century, the tradition of family farms endured here, especially in the more rural regions. Visitors can still experience this heritage first-hand in local fairs, folk festivals and open-farm events.

During our stay, we were delighted by a surprise visit from a dear family friend who arrived bearing armfuls of produce from her allotment, everything from cooking apples to radiant yellow beans. No money exchanged hands; it was simply an act of generosity rooted in friendship and goodwill. These moments embody the spirit of living with the land, where care, abundance, and community flow freely. There’s much to learn from such expressions of mutual support, and its one of the key traits we wish to uphold for our community at Homestead Horizon in both now and in the future.

Our stay at the homestead reminded us how screen-free days and organic meals can enhance both mental and physical wellbeing. We noticed lower levels of anxiety, slept more soundly and even noticed that lingering aches seemed to ease after consecutive days of a much more natural and varied diet. Participants in a 2020 British Medical Journal study reported similar improvements in mood when reducing digital screen time and increasing contact with nature.

Every meal felt like a celebration of place. We were so fortunate to savour many traditional Polish dishes including:

• Cebularz: a regional flatbread topped with sweet caramelised onion and poppy seeds, baked until golden and crisp
• Pierogi z mięsem: dumplings filled with seasoned minced meat, sealed and boiled to tender perfection, then served with a spoonful of broth or fried onion
• Kotlety schabowy: tender pork cutlets coated in homemade breadcrumbs, lightly fried in sunflower oil from last season’s crop

Between meals, a table of fresh berries, cherries and currants offered sweet snacks far better than packaged sweets. We still find ourselves amazed that so much of what we ate was rooted in the very same soil we stood on.

Recipes shared by Kaja's family are simple yet delicious. For pierogi, combine mashed potatoes with cheese, salt and chopped onion. Roll the dough thinly, fill with the mixture and boil until they float. Serve with melted butter and a sprinkle of fresh herbs to taste. Their kotlety involve pounding pork cutlets, dipping them in beaten egg, coating with breadcrumbs mixed with dill, then frying in a small amount of oil.

The kitchen has always been the heart of the homestead. Its sturdy oak and mahogany furnishings dating back decades, lovingly polished by generations of hands. Aside from some small electric appliances, every tool here is analog or manual, preserving both self-reliance and good old fashioned elbow grease. Here, the family swap stories and recipes while a gas-lit kettle hisses on the stove, each of them mindful of the land that feeds them so generously.

As our week drew to a close, farewells were tinged with both gratitude and sadness. On the journey home, we resolved to replicate elements of their approach in our own gardens. Soil health, solar power and community strength. And should Kaja's family travel westward, we look forward to hosting them for a homegrown feast of our own.

We extend a warm invitation to our members, let us know your thoughts on this location feature in the comments below and what you may have taken away from this truly magical place.