Mi Ae Lipe was born in South Korea and grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area, where she first became interested in food and gardening.

A self-taught illustrator, she lived and worked in Wisconsin and Minnesota for over a decade. During this time, she met Jack Hedin, owner of Featherstone Farm, one of the largest CSAs in southeastern Minnesota. After doing a logo project for the farm, she became one of its subscribers, and the idea for a cookbook that could help people figure out what to do with their CSA produce was born.

She self-published Tastes from Valley to Bluff: The Featherstone Farm Cookbook in 2007, which included 300 recipes and featured Featherstone exclusively. The book met with great regional success and acclaim.