Hidden Creek Farm Market opens in Hillsboro

Suzanne Stewart
Staff Writer

An Amish community has been established in Hillsboro and the families have opened Hidden Creek Farm Market where they sell fresh produce, baked goods and more.

Elam Lapp explained that families like to work together in small communities and find a common goal to work toward – in this case, the market.

“They usually decide what they want to do as a community,” he said. “Like here, this is grown by numerous different farmers, and it’s a way for them to focus on producing a good product and having just a couple people manage the store so that the others can be out there doing what they are best at.”

After perusing the market, it is clear, they are good at growing and baking. The fresh produce is vibrant and plentiful, with varieties of tomatoes, peppers, corn, beans, potatoes and season specific fruits such as blueberries, raspberries and sugar plums. 

Then there’s the baked goods – fresh bread, rolls, cinnamon rolls, pies and cookies galore.

The market opened June 28 and had a surge of customers who had anxiously waited to see the new store.

Lapp said he has been pleased to see the community’s reaction and hopes customers take advantage of the surplus of fresh produce the market provides.

“August – they might have a ton of tomatoes – they’re just flushing out,” he said. “I wish the consumer could be aware that it would be a good time to can tomatoes and make sauce and all that, because a month later, they might have none.”

In addition to the produce, baked goods and other cooking supplies, Lapp said they hope to have fresh dairy products soon.

“There’s a lot of requests by the locals for that,” he said. “West Virginia is passing that new law about allowing direct sales of raw milk. They were very excited about that here, about that opportunity, because where I come from in Pennsylvania, it’s illegal for me to sell raw milk to you unless I fill out all this paperwork. It’s a challenge. It would be very, very exciting for them down here to be able to sell raw dairy products.”

Lapp said several of the families already have diary cows and would be able to start bottling milk if and when it becomes legal in West Virginia. If it does happen, there is also a plan to add homemade yogurt to the market, as well.

There are currently six families living in the community, but Lapp said several more are in the process of moving to Hillsboro to join the community and market.

Lapp shared that the community plans to stay small and harvest the fruits of their labor.

“Keep the vision of a Godly community together in a small setting like this, rather than having hundreds of families,” he said. “That’s definitely the driving intention behind just getting one tract of land, filling it up, taking care of God’s creation the way He intended, and then branching out and starting a new one, and kind of growing from there.”

Hidden Creek Farm Market is open Mondays, Thursdays and Fridays from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., and Saturdays, 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. It is located on Lobelia Road, just one and a half miles from Rt. 219 in Hillsboro.