Beckie’s Background
I grew up in the country in Grand Junction, Colorado, where my family raised cows and sometimes pigs. We had a big corn field, a large garden, and a beautiful green house with ornamentals and vegetables. We always had fresh meats (and sometimes strange animal parts in the refrigerator crisper!) and in the summer fresh fruit and vegetables. Growing up in this environment led to my interest in pursuing a degree related to plants and agriculture.
I earned a B.S. from Middle Tennessee State University, with a major in Plant and Soil Science in the Department of Agri-business and Agri-science. During my time there, I was fortunate to have a fellowship at the Smithsonian Institute working in the Orchid Collection. I also worked with native and invasive plants as a Biological Science Technician with the National Park Service at Stones River National Battlefield in Murfreesboro, TN. In 2002, I moved back to Colorado and began pursuing a M.S. in Rangeland Ecosystem Science from the Department of Natural Resources at CSU. As it turned out, this was not the program for me and I did not finish it. I accepted a job with the U.S. Forest Service, working as a botanist studying the great Hayman Fire burn of 2002.
In early 2005, Toby and I went on our great life changing cleanse and totally changed our eating habits. We felt great and we wanted other people to feel it too. Without having any professional culinary background, we decided to embark on an adventure to take our healthy and delicious home cooking to another level. We both took random cooking classes and a business was born. We love to cook and to eat and to share that with you. Thank you for your interest in The Organic Dish!
