March at The Small Holding
Green Michelin star restaurant in Kent
Chef owner Will Devlin
Ranters Lane, Kilndown, Kent
www.thesmallholding.restaurant
@the_small_holding_
Green Michelin Star 2021/22 | Number 25 in Harden’s Top 100 UK Restaurants, 2022 | Number 10 in Square Meal’s UK’s Top 100, 2022 | Good Food Guide 2023 | Kent Chef of the Year 2022 | Best Restaurant in Taste of Kent Awards 2022
”Will Devlin’s restaurant shows no sign of slowing down, ‘a truly sensational experience’ is one fan’s heartfelt comment. The level of ingenuity generated by a kitchen on turbo drive, fuelled by its own small holding, hen coop and piggery is prodigious.” The Good Food Guide
The March menu
Snacks
Parsnip, Cured Egg Yolk, Nasturtium
Cheese & Onion Tart
Rosti, 100-day-old aged Beef Tartare
Bread & Broth
Sourdough bread and butter
Potato, asparagus, wild garlic
Farm
Beetroot, kohlrabi, sumac
Fish
Squid, seaweed, lemongrass
Monkfish, rhubarb, spring onion
Meat
Hogget, tomato, sea radish
Sweet
Barley, plum, milk
Chocolate, Mushroom, Caramel
Cheese
Cornish Yarg, Eccles Cake, Chutney
Sweet Treat
Apple and Cobnut Cake
Named ‘Chef to Watch’ in The Good Food Guide 2020 and awarded a Green Michelin Star in 2021 and 2022, Will Devlin, is chef owner of The Small Holding, a kitchen and farm on a country lane in the village of Kilndown on the Kent and East Sussex borders. The Small Holding is part of the Acre Group including Birchwood in Flimwell. The Small Holding opened in April 2018. As a former pub, the site had been run down and neglected, before being transformed into an open kitchen and bar with a large-decked terrace looking out over the farm and views of the Weald of Kent.
The 36-cover restaurant was voted the best restaurant in Kent at the Taste of Kent Awards and is set in one acre of land, permitting a unique connection between farm and table. Growing, foraging and cooking the best ingredients is at the core of The Small Holding, with daily changing menus, using home-reared and home-grown ingredients from the farm, which is less than 10ft from the kitchen.
Over 180 varieties of vegetables and fruits are grown including Broccoli ‘Red Blaze’, Cauliflower ‘Graffiti’, Cucumber ‘Passandra’, Radish ‘Viola’, Runner Beans ‘Scarlet Emperor’ and Courgette ‘Midnight’. Native breed Large Black pigs, chickens and ducks roam the farm and sheep for hogget and mutton graze less than half a mile away.
The menu is defined by hyper-seasonal ingredients with a focus on the farm’s own produce, but undefined by the number of courses or choice. There is no formal menu at The Small Holding. Instead, guests are offered a multi-taste dining experience featuring the best ingredients on that day from the farm and local suppliers. Vegetables and fruits from the farm, harvested within hours of guests arriving, homemade charcuterie and zero waste animal cookery from the farm’s own livestock is the focus. The Small Holding works directly with growers, farmers and fishermen and the kitchen team forage in the nearby hedgerows and woodland.
The Michelin Green Star for sustainable gastronomy recognises restaurants with a focus on environmental practices. The Green Star encompasses everything about The Small Holding and the teams’ drive for sustainability.
The restaurant is open Wednesday to Saturday for dinner costing £85 per head and for lunch, with a shorter menu, on Saturday and Sunday, costing £65 per head.
Eating at The Small Holding
Everything is home-made at The Small Holding, or sourced hyper-locally, except fish and seafood which comes from the South Coast or Scotland. Ingredients are picked less than 10ft from the kitchen and when there’s a glut, the kitchen preserves, pickles and jars.
The menu starts with home-made kombucha or broth and breads and sourdough and fresh butter, made on site with the rich yellow cream from a local herd of pedigree Guernsey and Holstein Friesian cows in nearby Benenden.
-ends-