Ooni x Alex Pole Ironwork #100axes

Axe designed by Alex Pole for Ooni Pizza

OONI PIZZA OVENS LAUNCHES OONI AXE IN COLLABORATION WITH BRITISH BLACKSMITH ALEX POLE

Ooni Pizza Ovens, the world’s number one pizza oven company, has launched a limited-edition Ooni Axe in collaboration with British blacksmith Alex Pole Ironwork.

A first for the brand, the Ooni Axe is a unique, original piece forged by hand, heat, and hammer.

The Ooni Axe is the result of a distinctive partnership with Master Blacksmith Alex Pole and his assistant Joe Garnett, who share the same passion for craft and fire as the pizza oven brand. With nearly 30 years’ experience, Alex Pole Ironwork was established in 2006 and delivers high-quality, hand-forged kitchenware, utensils and tools.

The Ooni Axe is forged from top quality Swedish steel where every stroke is unique to that individual product and offers a blend of cutting-edge modern design principles and the most ancient of crafts.

Alex Pole, Founder of Alex Pole Ironwork, said: ‘It has been a fantastic opportunity for all of us at The Forge to work with Ooni on this very special collaboration. The axes that we have forged embrace the values of simplicity, function and traditional craftsmanship - a tool to last a lifetime.’

The handle is crafted from only the finest cuts of exquisite Ash, hand-selected by Sam Morris at the Axe & Edge Tool Co. They are hand-sanded and stained with an ebony wood stain and coated with a protective linseed oil to provide a premium, smooth finish. 

Kristian Tapaninaho, Ooni CEO and founder, said: “ When we decided to create a new axe to capture our love of fire-building, we knew we wanted to make something different and unique, and we needed a partner with that same passion to help deliver our vision. Master Blacksmith Alex Pole is that man. We recognised the same shared passion for craft and fire. And so - the Ooni Axe was born.”

The Ooni Axe is now available for $299 / £249 / €299 from uk.ooni.com. To explore the full Ooni product range, visit uk.ooni.com.

About Alex Pole Ironwork

Alex Pole Ironwork was established in 2006 to deliver high-quality, functional products for the home and garden. The business has slowly evolved over the years and now specialises in hand-forged kitchenware and utensils. 

Only traditional techniques are used at the forge and all work is forged by hand and, wherever possible, materials are sourced from the local area. One of the brand’s primary aims is to promote blacksmithing, and the makers movement, across the UK and to showcase its relevance in the 21st century.

Alex Pole started Art college in 1991 where he first studied jewellery making, then architectural ironwork. In 2013, Alex travelled to Sweden to attend a course at Gransfors Bruks, the world-renowned axe-making centre, and discovered a great love of toolmaking. From this point on, he moved his work in a new direction and included knife and axe-making, as well as developing a wide range of kitchenware.

Alex’s main role today is to design and prototype new products, often assisted by the whole team, and to develop the Forge Kitchenware brand.

Green Michelin Star for Will Devlin at The Small Holding

Will Devlin at The Small Holdinh

The Small Holding, Kent has been awarded a Michelin Green Star in the Michelin Guide 2021.

The new star was given to chef Will Devlin via a digital awards ceremony on Monday 25 January, presented by Kent based TV presenter Davina McCall.

This is the first year Michelin has awarded its green star for sustainable gastronomy to 23 restaurants in the Great Britain and Ireland guide 2021, after debuting in the French 2020 guide.

The award recognises restaurants with a focus on environmental practices and is only awarded to those which hold a Plate, Bib or Star distinction. Many, like Will Devlin at The Small Holding work directly with growers, farmers and fishermen, forage in hedgerows and woodlands and grow their vegetables and rear animals. Other recipients of this year’s Green Star include Black Swan, York; Coombeshead Farm, Launceston; L’Enclume, Cumbria; Restaurant Sat Bains, Nottingham and Silo, London.

Will Devlin, chef owner of The Small Holding, commented, “What an incredible feeling! This Green Star encompasses everything about The Small Holding and our drive for sustainability. This award is for everyone on the team, in the kitchen, on the floor and on the farm who all work so hard and really deserve this, I’m so proud.”

Gwendal Poullennec, international director of the Michelin guides commented, ‘These restaurants are not only an inspiration for the industry but also for all the readers and users of the Michelin Guide.”

www.thesmallholding.restaurant
@the_small_holding_

Ranters Lane | Kilndown | Kent | TN17 2SG

About The Small Holding

Will Devlin, 32, is the 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 26-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.

Will’s second site, The Curlew, a former 17th century coaching inn in Bodiam, East Sussex opened in February 2020 and is 8 miles from The Small Holding. www.thecurlew.restaurant

For more information, images, interview or to visit The Small Holding, please contact Hannah Blake hannah@thediningroompr.co.uk | 07730 039361

Praise for The Small Holding
A group of folk growing amazing things, then pulling them out of the ground, sometimes knobbly and lumpy, then cooking and serving them. It’s perfectly imperfect and I wouldn’t change a thing.” Grace Dent, The Guardian

“The menu reads like a list of all that is good in a British Larder. Self-sufficiency, careful sourcing, purity of intent and an absolute focus on flavour. It’s easy to fall in love with The Small Holding for the warmth of the staff, its good intent and deft execution.” Tony Turnbull, The Times

“Striding confidently into its second year, 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.” Will Devlin was named ‘Chef to Watch’ in The Good Food Guide 2020

The Forge Kitchen cookbook

The Forge Kitchen cookbook by Alex Pole and Pooch Horsburgh (£25)

The Forge Kitchen Cookbook
Alex Pole, £25

The Forge Kitchen is a collaboration between Alex Pole and co-author Pooch Horsburgh and 21 chefs including Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, Gill Meller, Anja Dunk, Valentine Warner and Olia Hercules. Each of The Forge chefs has taken their inspiration from cookware made in the fires of Alex Pole’s Somerset forge. The pans we cook in, the utensils we serve with, and the cutlery we use, are as important to any meal as the ingredients, it’s all part of the flavour, and the pleasure of cooking.

Blacksmiths have been forging iron for many thousands of years and a staple of their craft has been the production of kitchenware and cooking implements. The hearth has always been the centre of family life - providing both warmth and sustenance by means of a heat source - and that is still the case today. In fact, it seems to be becoming more and more popular to cook on an open fire, either indoors or out, and the best way to do this is by using iron utensils.

The Forge Kitchen fuses traditionally made kitchenware with contemporary chefs and the very best ingredients to create a unique set of ingredients. Recipes include scallops with brown shrimp and sorrel butter by Olia Hercules; hogget with salsa verde by Gill Meller; chilli squid with ginger, basil yoghurt and sweetcorn chutney by Nathan Outlaw; beetroot tatin with roasted garlic, thyme and goat’s cheese; and piperade with baked eggs and crispy pancetta by Thomasina Miers.

“The Forge Kitchen celebrates the vital energy between great kitchen tools, great ingredients and great cooking - and the results are beautiful, satisfying and delicious.” Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, River Cottage

The Forge Kitchen is £25 and is available from the online shop on www.alexpoleironwork.

Alex Pole Ironwork at The Forge

Alex Pole Ironwork kitchenware

The Forge Kitchenware

Alex Pole is a British blacksmith making traditionally hand-forged kitchenware and cooking utensils, made in the fires of his Somerset workshop. Forging is the ancient art of shaping metal by heating it in a fire and hammering. It is an art that is full of tradition and folklore but with many modern applications.

Alex has been working as a blacksmith for over 25 years and founded The Forge Kitchenware in 2015. He makes pieces for home kitchens, outdoor cooking and bespoke pieces for cooks, chefs and restaurants including Nathan Outlaw, Christian Stevenson aka DJ BBQ, Gill Meller, Mark Hix and Thomasina Miers. Each piece is individually forged, using local materials, wherever possible, by a small team of skilled craftsmen dedicated to producing the highest quality work. One of Alex’s primary aims is to promote blacksmithing, and the makers movement, across the UK and to show its relevance in the 21st century.

Every piece of Forge Kitchenware, be it a skillet, knife, coffee scoop or an axe, starts as a simple bar of steel, which is heated ad repeatedly hit on the anvil until it is the correct size, shape and style. Heat, strike, repeat! The Forge Kitchenware takes the everyday and redefines it to create beautiful and tactical, yet wholly functional, pieces of work. Each piece is designed with simple form, clean lines and functionality and are made to last a lifetime.

Blacksmith courses and Forge and Feast events will resume in 2021.

Alex Pole is founder of The Forge Kitchenware.

Day to day, Alex’s main role is designing new products, often assisted by the whole team and developing the Forge Kitchenware brand.

“I have always had a fascination with metals for as long as I can remember. From sitting with my mum watching her make jewellery as a four-year-old to casting lead soldiers in my pre-teens, it feels like I've always been drawn to this material.

I started back in 1991 with attendance to art college to first study jewellery making, then architectural ironwork. After that came the wandering years - filled with travel, training, exploration, experimentation and a beer or two.

In 2013 I travelled to Sweden to attend a course at Gransfors Bruks, the world renowned axe making centre, and discovered a great love of tool making.  From then on I moved my work in a new direction - this included knife and axe making, as well as developing a wide range of kitchenware. Blacksmithing is not just a craft to me , but a way of life, and one that gives great satisfaction not only to me but, I hope, others as well.”

Valentine's Day from Will Devlin at The Small Holding and The Curlew

Barbecued lobster, fermented tomatoes, sea buckthorn & chervil butter (Key & Quill)

Valentine’s Day from chef Will Devlin at The Small Holding, Kent and The Curlew, Sussex

Chef Will Devlin has created two special Valentine’s Day menus from his restaurants The Small Holding in Kilndown, Kent and The Curlew in Bodiam, Sussex. Both menus are exceptional dining experiences safely delivered to your doorstep while all the prep and hard work has been done, meaning all that is needed is to add the finishing touches, plate up, and enjoy.

Using the best from the farm, land and sea starting with a bottle of English sparkling the menus include home-cured trout, pickled oysters, lobster and venison and of course, chocolate. Each of these elements come with full and easy instructions from chef Will Devlin.

Each menu is available to pre-order now on The Small Holding’s website, until 5pm on 10 February, for local delivery on 13 February.

Valentine’s Menu from The Small Holding

Bottle of Squerryes 2016
Bacon & onion brioche, cultured butter
Oysters pickled in wild garlic vinegar
Wild venison, salt baked celeriac, preserved vegetables
Barbecued lobster, fermented tomatoes, sea buckthorn & chervil butter
Creedy Carver duck breast, slow cooked leg, roasted squash, seaweed sauce
Miso & chocolate pudding, blackcurrant jam
Arthur Allsop’s Winter Truffle Camembert
£180 for two

Valentine’s Menu from The Curlew

Bottle of Oastbrook Sparkling Rose
Gin cured trout, fennel salami from The Small Holding, kimchi squash dumplings
45-day aged rib of beef, triple cooked chips with smoked rosemary salt, winter salad & Sussex Blue cheese sauce
Double chocolate & salted caramel shortbread, preserved cherries, meadowsweet cream 
£120 for two

About The Small Holding

Will Devlin, 32, is the 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 26-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.

www.thesmallholding.restaurant
@the_small_holding_
Ranters Lane | Kilndown | Kent | TN17 2SG 

 For more information, images, interview or to visit The Small Holding, please contact Hannah Blake hannah@thediningroompr.co.uk | 07730 039361

Praise for The Small Holding
A group of folk growing amazing things, then pulling them out of the ground, sometimes knobbly and lumpy, then cooking and serving them. It’s perfectly imperfect and I wouldn’t change a thing.” Grace Dent, The Guardian

“The menu reads like a list of all that is good in a British Larder. Self-sufficiency, careful sourcing, purity of intent and an absolute focus on flavour. It’s easy to fall in love with The Small Holding for the warmth of the staff, its good intent and deft execution.” Tony Turnbull, The Times

Cooking on the Big Green Egg

Cooking on the Big Green Egg by James Whetlor, Quadrille, April 2021

Cooking on the Big Green Egg
Everything You Need to Know from Set-Up to Cooking Techniques, with 70 Recipes

By James Whetlor, published by Quadrille, foreword by Tom Kerridge
1st April 2021, Hardback, £25

Big Green Egg is the pioneer redefining British Barbecue. With a cult following amongst BBQ experts around the world, Big Green Egg has been helping people discover the true meaning of flavour for over 40 years. Rapidly gaining favour amongst keen home cooks who want to cook restaurant quality food, the EGG is a favourite of celebrities such as David Beckham, Holly Willoughby, James Martin and Meghan Markle, and loved by some of the UK’s best chefs including Tom Kerridge, Gordon Ramsay and Daniel Clifford.

The EGG is a kamado-style grill that heats up to 1,000°C using NASA inspired ceramics to hold the temperature rock steady, with a burn time of 18 hours of cooking time, meaning anything from slow-smoked brisket to roast chicken, pizza or even smoked oysters are now easy to achieve. As more and more enthusiasts realise what a versatile and practical piece of cooking hardware the EGG is, experts and amateurs alike are looking for recipes to test out their skills and maximise the EGG's capabilities.

Cooking on the Big Green Egg introduces a new range of techniques previously never possible on the traditional barbecue and gives instructions and recipes for everything you'd ever want to cook on it. Award-winning author of Goat: Cooking and Eating, James Whetlor, guides the reader through the basics of using a Big Green Egg, with a full explanation of how to maxmise its cooking potential, including: How does it work? How do I get started? How do I grill, smoke, pan-cook, cook on direct or indirect heat?

With James's advice, tricks, tips and methods, you're ready to cook your way through 70 original recipes including meat and joints, whole fish, vegetables and jaw-dropping BBQ feasts. With this book by your side, you’ll go from beginner to EGGspert in no time, and be cooking, eating and enjoying delicious food with unparalleled flavour.

About the Author

Winner of a James Beard award for his first book Goat: Cooking and Eating (Quadrille, £20) James Whetlor is the founder of ethical meat business Cabrito Goat Meat. He worked as a chef for 12 years in London, before moving back to his hometown in Devon and working at River Cottage. His award-winning business Cabrito now sells goat meat to restaurants, catering businesses and supermarkets, from a network of farms across the country, as well as his own online shop. Goat also won the Guild of Food Writers Best Single Subject Food Book of 2019.

Feature Ideas

-   Things You Never Knew You Could BBQ: From curries to Christmas dinner, keep grilling all year round

-   Playing with Fire: You’ve invested in a BBQ, now here are the 12 essential recipes you need to become a true grill-master

-  Summer Sizzlers: Menu ideas for BBQ season that will please the whole family 

-   Green Grilling: Barbecuing isn’t just about meat, learn the best ways to barbecue vegetables and even puddings

-   The Heat is On: A guide to charcoal, how it affects the grill and where to buy the best coals

Big Green EGG

The Big Green Egg is the choice of top restaurant chefs and enables home cooks to achieve restaurant quality food at home. The charcoal-fuelled, ceramic Big Green Egg uses state-of-the-art patented technology that is ready to cook on in 12 minutes and provides 80+ hours of cooking in one bag of charcoal. The advanced ceramic insulation and airflow vent accurately control the temperature to maximise cooking time for unprecedented ease of use and complex depth of flavour. Walk away for hours in the confidence the EGG’s temperature will remain rock solid and food is cooked to perfection.

For more information about the book, Big Green Egg or James Whetlor, please contact Hannah Blake at The Dining Room on hannah@thediningroompr.co.uk or 07730 039361

The Small Holding at Home

Duck leg, borlotti beans and chanterelles at The Small Holding, Kent

The Small Holding at Home

The Small Holding at Home is an exceptional dining experience safely delivered to your doorstep from Will Devlin and his chefs at The Small Holding in Kilndown, Kent. The Small Holding team have done all the prep and hard work meaning all that is needed is to add the finishing touches, plate up, and enjoy.

Creating a restaurant quality experience at home is now possible. Using fresh from the ground autumn and winter produce from the farm, The Small Holding team have created three different set menus, with additional bread, charcuterie, cheese plate, wines, beers and soft drinks to choose from, too. The menus will change each week so there will also be a new dining experience from The Small Holding to try at home. Custom from the At Home meals are vitally important as Kent is in Tier 3.

Each menu includes several ready to serve dishes such as home smoked salmon, slow cooked goat terrine or apple and cobnut cake. The main course for each menu has a few elements to be finished at home such as bone in pork chops from The Small Holding’s own rare breed Large Black pigs, hand-dived scallops from Orkney and pan roast venison loin. Each of these elements come with full and easy instructions from chef Will Devlin.

Each menu is available to pre-order for local delivery or collection on Friday or Saturday night and costs from £35 per person.

Will Devlin says, “Our At Home boxes will help us survive this second lockdown but it’s more than that, it’s also about telling a story through the ingredients we grow on the farm and championing the community of incredible suppliers who work with us, such as cheese from Alsop & Walker, cream from Hinxden Dairy, English sparkling wine from Squerryes and craft beers from Cellar Head. We can only get through this if we work together as a community because, together is stronger.”

For Friday and Saturday dinner, orders are available for delivery and collection via pre-booked time slots. Order by 12pm for dinner on Friday or by 12pm on Thursday for dinner on Saturday. Diners are also welcome to collect between 12pm-4pm on their chosen day.

The Small Holding at Home

Menu one                                                          
Home smoked salmon, pickled cucumber, fennel & radish salad
Creedy Carver duck leg, bean stew, chanterelles
Apple & cobnut cake, cream cheese icing

Collection £35pp and delivery £45pp.      

Menu two
Slow cooked goat terrine, preserved vegetables & truffled cheese
Tamworth pork chop, potato & sage terrine, red cabbage, cider sauce
Miso mousse and pine marshmallow

Collection £45pp and delivery £55pp.

Menu three
Grilled Orkney scallop, pumpkin, Exmoor caviar
Wild venison, smoked potatoes, swede fondant, salted baked beetroot, bacon & chestnuts  
Sea buckthorn & dark chocolate tart, meadowsweet cream

Collection £50pp and delivery £60pp.      

-ends-

About The Small Holding

Will Devlin, 32, is the 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 26-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.

Praise for The Small Holding
A group of folk growing amazing things, then pulling them out of the ground, sometimes knobbly and lumpy, then cooking and serving them. It’s perfectly imperfect and I wouldn’t change a thing.” Grace Dent, The Guardian

“The menu reads like a list of all that is good in a British Larder. Self-sufficiency, careful sourcing, purity of intent and an absolute focus on flavour. It’s easy to fall in love with The Small Holding for the warmth of the staff, its good intent and deft execution.” Tony Turnbull, The Times

The New Meat Project launches

Sushila Moles from The New Meat Project

The New Meat Project is a new online butchery launched by Cabrito Goat Meat co-founder and ex-River Cottage events director, Sushila Moles.

From field to fork, ordering fresh meat online from independent farmers reared in the traditional way, has never been simpler. The New Meat Project is an online butchery service delivering native breed, free-range and grass-fed meat from small farms in the Malvern Hills which have been slow-grown to the highest welfare standard. Delivery is convenient and environmentally conscious from farm to doorstep and is fairly priced for both the customer and the farmer.

Founder Sushilia Moles says, “Our mission is to encourage people to change the way they buy meat, to no longer accept the disappointing industrialised food from supermarkets and instead make the choice to support small-scale, family-run farms. Buying meat online, which is farmed using traditional and high welfare, sustainable practices is often too expensive, which is why we focus on offering a fair price to our customers and the farmers we work with, without ever compromising on the provenance of the meat or our environmental policy. I believe good food should be for everyone and we promise the best quality meat at fair prices for both the customer and farmer, which is better for the health of your family and the health of the planet.”

The New Meat Project only works with small farms in the Malvern Hills which are within 75 miles of each other, and with farmers who rear their native breed animals outdoors and to the highest possible welfare standards. The stretch of land between the Wye Valley and the Cotswolds, taking in the River Severn and the Malvern Hills, provides some of the best farmland in the UK, rich in space and fertile soil and grass. All animals travel no more than an hour from the farm to a local, small and family-run slaughter house.

Pigs
The New Meat Project pigs are traditional native breeds including Hampshire, Large Black and a few Welsh sows that lead a properly free-range life on the farm. The sows and boars all live together, mainly living in wooded and scrub areas where their favourite natural behaviour is to root and forage, which in turn gives life to new grasses and wildflowers the following year. They have a happy life and slowly reach maturity for a superior, deep flavour with excellent texture and covering of fat.  

Cows
The New Meat Project heritage breed beef is 100% grass-fed. The calves are born in the field and live outside with their mothers, all year round, only coming in if the weather is so wet that they can't find enough grazing. The Hereford and Aberdeen Angus are two of the best native breeds in Britain, both with rich, beefy flavour, good marbling and layer of fat. All beef is dry-aged for a minimum of 28 days to develop an extra layer of  flavour.

Lamb
The New Meat Project lamb comes from one farmer who grazes his sheep on pasture at the foot of the Malvern Hills. It has won best in show at the Three Counties Show many times over the years. The lamb is 100% grass-fed and hormone and antibiotic-free and the animals spend their entire lives outside. The meat is hung for 10 days to develop flavour and texture.

Chickens
The New Meat Project chickens are fully free-range and slowly grown to the high standards of the Soil Association. The birds are free to roam from dawn to dusk, scratching, pecking and spreading their wings, while at night they come inside to bed in their sheds. With over 50 years of farming experience, the high-welfare calm lifestyle of these chickens is evident in the taste of the meat. 

Founder
The New Meat Project is founded by Sushila Moles. Having gained a Masters in Food Anthropology and worked in food related businesses all of her life, Sushila has first-hand experience that farming is a force for good in society. Her working life has taken her from Michelin-starred restaurant, Rhodes 24 as head waiter to La Fromagerie in Marylebone, where she could indulge her love of cheese and to River Cottage, where she played a lead role in promoting one of the country’s best known sustainable and ethics driven businesses. Sushila is also co-owner of Cabrito, the multi award-winning goat meat business, run by her partner James Whetlor, that has been at the forefront of changing the UK goat dairy practice of euthanizing unwanted male kids and rearing them for meat instead. These experiences combined have convinced her of the importance of high welfare, low impact meat in our food system, both for our own health, the health of our communities and for the health of the planet.

For more information about The New Meat Project or founder Sushila Moles, please contact Hannah Blake at The Dining Room on 07730 039361 or hannah@thediningroompr.co.uk

The Christmas Box

The Christmas Box from The Small Holding and The Pure Meat Company

A collaboration between The Small Holding and The Pure Meat Company

This Christmas order a restaurant quality dinner box from The Small Holding, Kent. Chef Will Devlin from The Small Holding and farmer Tom Cunningham from The Pure Meat Company have created The Christmas Box, filled with everything needed for the main eating event on Christmas Day. This unique partnership sees Kent’s best farm-to-table chef collaborate with a first-generation farmer, who is committed to rearing meat that is ethical and sustainable.

Filled with farm-fresh and restaurant quality ingredients, The Christmas Box centerpiece is a fully free-range bronze turkey, naturally reared on Tom’s farm in Shadoxhurst, Kent, alongside pigs in blankets and stuffing balls from the farm’s free-range Tamworth pigs.

The Christmas Box starts at £130 serving 2-3 people with a boned turkey breast and a boned and stuffed turkey leg, sausage stuffing balls, pigs in blankets, roast potatoes, honey roast parsnips, glazed butter and thyme carrots, braised red cabbage, buttered leeks, redcurrant sauce, bread sauce and roast turkey gravy. All the vegetables are home-grown on the farm at The Small Holding. Diners can choose a larger turkey (up to 8-9 kg) and the option of the bird being whole or having the legs taken off the crown and stuffed and rolled. The medium Christmas Box serves 4-5 people and costs £200 and the large box, serving 6-8 people costs £250.

Each Christmas Box, whether small, medium or large also includes a bottle of award-winning Squerryes Brut 2016 Vintage Reserve, with spiced baked pears on the nose and on the palette an abundance of rich, ripe fruit and a hint of brioche. A perfect bottle of English sparkling wine from Kent to start the Christmas celebrations.

The Christmas Box collaboration between The Small Holding and The Pure Meat Company began in May, when 180 bronze turkey poults were hatched at the farm. From the moment they were born they were nurtured. For the first six weeks of their lives they were nestled up in a warm cosy barn under heaters. Once they have feathered up and can face the weather at around 6 weeks old, they are ready to be properly free-range out in the wildflower meadows. The birds spent their days running, flapping, chasing bugs and pecking grass, slowly growing to full natural maturity at about 7 months. They were fed on a locally milled grain feed with no antibiotics, exactly as nature intended.

The Christmas Box is available to order online from www.exploretock.com/thesmallholding and is to be collected from The Small Holding on Tuesday 22nd or Wednesday 23rd December.

-ends-

For more information, images or interview please contact Hannah Blake hannah@thediningroompr.co.uk | 07730 039361

About The Small Holding
Will Devlin, 32, is the 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 26-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.

Praise for The Small Holding

“A group of folk growing amazing things, then pulling them out of the ground, sometimes knobbly and lumpy, then cooking and serving them. It’s perfectly imperfect and I wouldn’t change a thing.” Grace Dent, The Guardian

 About The Pure Meat Company

The Pure Meat Company is a first-generation family farm run by two brothers, Tom and Sam Cunningham with a clear purpose; to tread a little more lightly upon the planet.

Tom, aged 22, founded the farm in 2017, with a passionate belief that farming could - and should - be done differently. Frustrated by the fast-and-forced farming methods widely employed by the industry, the brothers knew that there is a better way to produce meat.

The Pure Meat Company farms three hundred acres across the Weald of Kent stitched together by dense hedgerows, deep-rooted trees and a network of pure water courses for properly free-range, native breed cows, pigs and sheep to graze, root and forage. The farmland is made up of permanent pasture, 100 acres of wildflower meadows and ancient woodlands, most of which have never been ploughed. Tom and Sam farm ethically and sustainably and the result is slow-raised meat, reared gently and sustainably in the heart of Kent. www.puremeatcompany.co.uk/shop

The Small Holding at Home

Produce from the farm for The Small Holding at Home

The Small Holding at Home

Ranters Lane | Kilndown | Kent | TN17 2SG

#thesmallholdingathome

The Small Holding at Home is an exceptional dining experience safely delivered to your doorstep from Will Devlin and his chefs at The Small Holding in Kilndown, Kent. The Small Holding team have done all the prep and hard work meaning all that is needed is to add the finishing touches, plate up, and enjoy.

Creating a restaurant quality experience at home is now possible. Using fresh from the ground autumn and winter produce from the farm, The Small Holding team have created three different set menus, with additional bread, charcuterie, cheese, wines, beers and soft drinks to choose from, too. The menus will change each week so there will also be a new dining experience from The Small Holding to try at home.

Each menu includes several ready to serve dishes such as hot smoked trout, slow cooked goat terrine or apple and cobnut cake. The main course for each menu has a few elements to be finished at home such as bone in pork chops from The Small Holding’s own rare breed Large Black pigs, hand-dived scallops from Orkney and pan roast duck breast. Each of these elements come with full and easy instructions from chef Will Devlin.

Each menu is available to pre-order for local delivery or collection on Friday or Saturday night and costs from £35 per person.

Will Devlin says, “Our At Home boxes will help us survive this second lockdown but it’s more than that, it’s also about telling a story through the ingredients we grow on the farm and championing the community of incredible suppliers who work with us, such as cheese from Alsop & Walker, cream from Hinxden Dairy, English sparkling wine from Squerryes and craft beers from Cellar Head. We can only get through this if we work together as a community because, together is stronger.”

For Friday and Saturday dinner, orders are available for delivery and collection via pre-booked time slots. Order by 12pm for dinner on Friday or by 12pm on Thursday for dinner on Saturday. Diners are also welcome to collect between 12pm-4pm on their chosen day.

The Small Holding at Home

Menu one
Hot smoked trout, pickled cucumber & fennel
Large Black pork chop, potato & sage terrine, red cabbage, cider sauce
Apple & cobnut cake, cream cheese icing

Collection £35pp and delivery £45pp.

Menu two
Slow cooked goat terrine, preserved vegetables & truffled cheese
Marinated cod, seaweed mashed potato, broccoli and pickled chilli, lovage & wild garlic sauce
Miso mousse and pine marshmallow

Collection £45pp and delivery £55pp.

Menu three
Grilled Orkney scallop, pumpkin, Exmoor caviar
Creedy Carver duck, smoked potatoes, winter truffle sauce
Sea buckthorn & dark chocolate tart, meadowsweet cream

Collection £50pp and delivery £60pp.

About The Small Holding

Will Devlin, 32, is the 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 26-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.

For more information, images, interview or to visit The Small Holding, please contact Hannah Blake hannah@thediningroompr.co.uk | 07730 039361

Praise for The Small Holding

A group of folk growing amazing things, then pulling them out of the ground, sometimes knobbly and lumpy, then cooking and serving them. It’s perfectly imperfect and I wouldn’t change a thing.” Grace Dent, The Guardian

“The menu reads like a list of all that is good in a British Larder. Self-sufficiency, careful sourcing, purity of intent and an absolute focus on flavour. It’s easy to fall in love with The Small Holding for the warmth of the staff, its good intent and deft execution.” Tony Turnbull, The Times

Big Green Egg launch heritage breeds steak box

Farmison Picanha steak on the Big Green Egg

Big Green Egg and Farmison & Co launch limited edition Heritage Breeds Steak Tasting Box

Limited quantities only. Exclusively available to buy online, pre-register here

Images here

Big Green Egg has been championing quality artisan food producers and helping people to discover the true meaning of flavour for over 40 years. Eating grass-fed, dry-aged beef is one of the finest eating experiences a diner can have, which is why Big Green Egg has partnered with Yorkshire Dales master butchers Farmison & Co to launch an exclusive Heritage Breeds Steak Tasting Box. 

Costing £100, including p&p, the limited-edition box contains three fabulous, but very different, cuts of heritage breed beef, dry-aged for prime flavour and texture. The meat comes exclusively from Heritage Breeds including Angus, Shorthorn and Hereford. For the ultimate steak experience at home, the box also includes bone marrow melt and Droitwich beech smoked salt. 

Each box comes with an expert tutorial and recipe card from EGG’s head chef Luke Vandore-Mackay, who recommends different cooking techniques on the Big Green Egg, including reverse sear and cooking ‘dirty’, directly on the hot coals. 

The Big Green Egg is the choice of top restaurant chefs and enables home cooks to achieve restaurant quality food at home. The charcoal-fuelled, ceramic Big Green Egg uses state-of-the-art patented technology that is ready to cook on in 12 minutes and provides 80+ hours of cooking in one bag of charcoal. The advanced ceramic insulation and airflow vent accurately control the temperature to maximise cooking time for unprecedented ease of use and complex depth of flavour. Walk away for hours in the confidence the EGG’s temperature will remain rock solid and food is cooked to perfection.

The Big Green Egg x Farmison & Co Heritage Breeds Steak Tasting Box includes: 

SIRLOIN CHOP ON THE BONE, 60 day dry-aged Angus: This unique steak is BIG. Cut extra thick on the bone for big, beefy flavour, the sirloin chop is a Big Green Egg exclusive in collaboration with Farmison & Co. 

PICANHA, 32 day-aged Angus: Also known as the Rump Cap Joint, the Picanha is the prime cut in Argentina and fast becoming the new must-try steak in the UK. The thick fat covering is left on, giving incredible succulence, flavour, and tenderness. 

FLANK, 14-day-aged Shorthorn/Hereford/Angus: Long, flat, and prized for its incredible beefy flavour, this lean cut is seeing a revival. It features delicate marbling throughout, which gently melts away during your cook.

Two packs of Kettyle Bone Marrow Melt: Added to steak in the final 2 minutes of cooking, this bone marrow from Kettyle Irish Foods, takes an already impressive piece of meat to the next level. 

One pack of Droitwich Beech Smoked Salt: Harvested by hand from some of the oldest and purest salt springs in the world and crystallised using renewable energy, this salt is hard to beat. 

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For more information please contact:
Hannah Blake at hannah@thediningroompr.co.uk or 07730 039361

Notes to editors 

About Big Green Egg 

Big Green Egg® is the pioneer redefining British Barbecue. Established 40 years ago in the USA, the Big Green Egg is a charcoal based ceramic cooker that offers a wide range of precise cooking modes. It can grill, roast, smoke or bake in temperatures ranging from 80 to 400C. 

The EGG uses state-of-the-art NASA inspired ceramics and patented technology to provide advanced insulation, meaning the EGG’s temperature can be precisely controlled, for searing direct heat for pizzas and bread or low and slow for pulled meat. The EGG is fuel efficient and can be used to cook large pieces of meat with confidence. 

The EGG introduces a whole new range of techniques previously never possible on the traditional British BBQ. Rapidly gaining favour amongst keen home cooks, the EGG is also used by some of the UK’s best chefs in gastro pubs and Michelin starred restaurants. 

The Big Green Egg is available in five sizes and can be customised to suit individual configurations and garden spaces. A variety of nest stands, side shelves, and tables are available. Lifetime warranty.

Alfresco Concepts is the exclusive distributor of the Big Green Egg in the UK, Ireland and Channel Islands. 

www.biggreenegg.co.uk 

Autumnal comfort and Sunday lunch at Wild Flor, Hove

Rare roast beef, horseradish and Yorkshire puddings at Wild Flor, Hove (Roarke Pearce)

Autumnal comfort and Sunday lunch at Wild Flor, Hove

It is the most sudden and contrasting change of the entire year. Falling asleep at the end of the August bank holiday, full of rosé wine and summer salads and waking up on the first of September fiercely craving game, pies, red wine, roast potatoes and rice pudding. Most dishes on the menu at Wild Flor are beginning to turn away from the vibrancy of summer colour to crimson and brown, a most welcome change, as the leaves start to turn.

The first grouse of the season has been served with celeriac and pickled elderberries. Rice pudding, served cold, but with the warmth and spice of fig or blackberry nudging through the creamy comfort. Crushed celeriac and hazelnut butter as a side dish, a gratin of Cornish mussels, farfalle pasta and girolle mushrooms, the menu is a feast of Autumnal delights.

Thoughts also turn to a proper Sunday lunch. Rare roast beef with horseradish and Yorkshire puddings calls for savoury class and a classic claret. Something like Chateau des Annereaux 2007, from the underdog Lalande-De-Pomerol. Just enough fruit wrapped up in the graphite and cigar box, properly decanted and showing its silky nature.

For roast chicken stuffed with pistachio and brioche a bottle of good white Burgundy is gospel. Head for the Macconais for a bottle of Viré-Clessé from Les Heritiers Du Comtes Lafon or the spectacular Macon-Fuisse from Jules Desjourneys, both open, showy and potent wines with good structure and ideal for quaffing.

The last of the late summer glut of courgettes and green tomatoes are partnered with roast saddle of lamb and is delicious paired with Dalamara Estate’s Xinomavro ’Naoussa’ from the mountainous north of Greece. A spectacular and self-assured wine with the aroma and palate of black olive, tomato stalks, wild mint and thyme. It echoes the elegance of Burgundy, the attitude of Barolo with an intense and beguiling fruit that is perfect with Autumn lamb.

A fitting finale to Sunday lunch is a proper pudding such as a fruity Bakewell tart and custard and a glass of Vin Doux Naturel, a Rasteau from Domaine Des Trapadis. Gently fortified, not so much as a port, there’s a lively crunch. Teenage port for the excitable diner to round things off nicely.

Reservations can be made for the ground floor restaurant on tables tucked into banquettes or in the airy, light filled first floor dining room, which is ideal for families and larger groups.

About Wild Flor

Wild Flor is a neighbourhood restaurant on Hove’s Church Road, serving classic British and European cooking alongside world-class wines. The menu has a strong focus on locally sourced and hyper-seasonal ingredients while a fantastic wine list mirrors the menu in balancing quality and value. The beautifully pared back interior evokes the ambiance of rustic French elegance.

New head chef Chris Trundle boasts an incredible CV, having held head chef positions at the Michelin-starred Manfred’s in Copenhagen and Lyle’s in Shoreditch, London. His style of food favours honest and uncomplicated dishes using hyper-seasonal ingredients that makes people happy, using classic cookery techniques.

Robert Maynard, Faye Hudson and James Thomson run front of house operations as co-owners with many years’ experience at some of Brighton’s best restaurants. All three have known each other for years and share an immense enthusiasm and commitment to delivering a first-class dining experience and bringing all that they love about food and wine to Hove. In Wild Flor they have created a relaxed comfortable setting for diners to enjoy some of the best food and drink the city has to offer.

A bustling and residential area, Church Road is lined with artisan shops, wine bars and restaurants, where Regency houses back on to the seafront, only a few minutes’ from Wild Flor and fifteen minutes’ walk from the centre of Brighton.

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Opening Hours

The times are for first and last reservations, but the restaurant stays open until midnight or until the last table is ready to leave.

Monday to Wednesday - Closed
Thursday to Saturday - Midday-3pm and 6pm-9pm

Sunday – Midday-4pm

Wild Flor
42 Church Road | Hove | BN3 2FN
Book a table online for either the ground floor or first floor dining room

www.wildflor.com
info@wildflor.com

Telephone: 01273 329111
Instagram: @wildflorhove

Chris Trundle's late summer menu at Wild Flor

A full table at Wild Flor, Hove (picture Roarke Pearce)

New head chef Chris Trundle has joined the original Wild Flor team. Chris boasts an incredible CV, having held head chef positions at the Michelin-starred Manfred’s in Copenhagen and Lyle’s in London. His style of food favours honest and uncomplicated dishes using hyper-seasonal ingredients that makes people happy, using classic cookery techniques.

Late August dishes on Chris’ new menu include sweetcorn soup and nduja focaccia; Rebel Jambon Noix, pink peppercorn and peach; salt cod brandade, marjoram and tomato; hake, braised courgette, aioli and chorizo; roast chicken, braised runner beans and salad cream; pommes anna with lemon and black pepper aioli and for pudding, gooseberry and rose fool; Bakewell tart and crème fraiche; apricot jellies; chocolate and sherry truffles or a plate of fine British cheeses.

The wine list is short with intelligent and interesting choices with lesser known varieties sitting alongside the finest examples of grapes and blends from around the world. Where the list stands out is providing elegance and diversity and aged wines at good value such as Pinot Noir 'Dundee Hills’ from the Willamette Valley; Savagnin ‘Sous Voile’ by Daniel Dugois in the Arbois; Olga Raffault ‘Les Picasses’ 2009 or Bereche & Fils Brut Reserve.

On Sunday there is rare roast beef, horseradish and Yorkshire puddings; pistachio and brioche stuffed chicken; courgette and green tomato stuffed lamb saddle with a variety of sides to share including carrot purée, NamaYasai leaves, tomato salad, braised courgettes, greens and roast potatoes.

Wild Flor is a neighbourhood restaurant on Hove’s Church Road, serving classic British and European cooking alongside world-class wines. The menu has a strong focus on locally sourced and hyper-seasonal ingredients while a fantastic wine list mirrors the menu in balancing quality and value. With a beautifully pared back interior evoking the ambience of rustic French elegance, diners are as welcome to stop by for a plate of Ortiz anchovies, olives and almonds and a glass of Fino on the way home, as they are for three courses with paired wines and to stay past midnight.

For more information please contact Hannah at The Dining Room on 07730 039361 or hannah@thediningroompr.co.uk

Wild Flor, Hove

Wild Flor on Church Street, Hove (credit Roarke Pearce)

“Well priced, excellent modern European cooking with the most generous of hearts. Lucky, lucky Hove.” Tom Parker Bowles, Mail on Sunday

Wild Flor is a neighbourhood restaurant on Hove’s Church Road, serving classic British and European cooking alongside world-class wines. The menu has a strong focus on locally sourced and hyper-seasonal ingredients while a fantastic wine list mirrors the menu in balancing quality and value. With a beautifully pared back interior evoking the ambience of rustic French elegance, diners are as welcome to stop by for a plate of Ortiz anchovies, olives and almonds and a glass of Fino on the way home, as they are for three courses with paired wines and to stay past midnight.

A bustling and residential area, Church Road is lined with artisan shops, wine bars and restaurants, where Regency houses back on to the seafront, only a few minutes from Wild Flor and fifteen minutes from the centre of Brighton.

The restaurant offers an à la carte menu from which guests can order familiar plates of comfort food alongside more luxury items. Dishes might include roast courgette, romesco and goat cheese; Iberico ham; veal sweetbreads, almonds, peas and sherry sauce; lamb rump with chard and salsa verde and for pudding, pistachio éclair, black cherry and marjoram; apple and thyme jellies and a plate of fine British cheeses.

Inside, teal leather banquettes and bistro wooden tables are laid simply with glassware, exposed red brick walls are lined with bottles and hung with wine prints. A large blackboard is chalked with that day’s lunch and dinner menus. The wine list is short with intelligent and interesting choices with lesser known varieties sitting alongside the finest examples of grapes and blends from around the world. Where the list stands out is providing elegance and diversity and aged wines at good value such as Pinot Noir 'Dundee Hills’ from the Willamette Valley or Savagnin ‘Sous Voile’ by Daniel Dugois in the Arbois.

Robert Maynard, Faye Hudson and James Thomson run front of house operations as co-owners with many years’ experience at some of Brighton’s best restaurants. All three have known each other for years and share an immense enthusiasm and commitment to delivering a first-class dining experience and bringing all that they love about food and wine to Hove. In Wild Flor they have created a relaxed comfortable setting for diners to enjoy some of the best food and drink the city has to offer.

New head chef Chris Trundle joins the original team at a really exciting time, as Wild Flor continues to evolve and adapt. Chris boasts an incredible CV, having held head chef positions at the Michelin-starred Manfred’s in Copenhagen and Lyle’s in Shoreditch, London which was ranked 33 in The World's Best Restaurants in 2019. His style of food favours honest and uncomplicated dishes using hyper-seasonal ingredients that makes people happy, using classic cookery techniques.

Chris heads up the kitchen team with sous chef Laurence Kinghorn-East who began his career at acclaimed Gingerman Group in Brighton, before taking positions at the Michelin-starred kitchens of Matt Gillan at The Pass and with Merlin Labron-Johnson at Portland in London and latterly at Osip in Bruton, Somerset.

The Team

Faye Hudson, Director
Faye spent 8 years at The Gingerman in Brighton, the majority of which as assistant manager, before opening Wild Flor. She specifically looks after front of house and all aspects of customer service at Wild Flor and loves nothing more than working the floor. She and James met while working for the Gingerman group and are now husband and wife.

Robert Maynard, Director

Rob has seen all sides of the wine and restaurant trade with his two most prominent positions being his time as Gingerman Group Bar Manager and a year working with Butler’s Wine Cellar in Brighton. After spells working in various bars across Brighton, James and Rob started working together again at Hove’s Ginger Pig in 2014.

James Thomson, Director

James has worked in hospitality since he was 15, starting in pubs and bars before working in a fine dining restaurant in New Zealand, aged 19. On returning home, James had management roles before taking on the role of General Manager at the Ginger Pig in Hove. It was working for the Gingerman group that James met his now wife and business partner, Faye, as well as developing a great working relationship with Robert before joining forces to open Wild Flor together.

For more information please contact Hannah Blake at The Dining Room on hannah@thediningroompr.co.uk or 07730 039361

New hotel and spa at The Beacon, Kent

The Beacon, Tunbridge Wells

Development and proposed restoration of Tunbridge Wells Cold Bath
at The Beacon

• Wellness centre, with hot and cold baths and yoga studio

• Six ensuite hotel rooms and three two-bedroom timber lodges

A planning application for the development and restoration of the Tunbridge Wells Cold Bath is in progress. Pete Cornwell, owner and director of The Beacon, part of the I’ll be Mother hospitality and events group in Tunbridge Wells, Kent is working with local environmental consultants Studio Engleback and Tate Harmer, one of the UK’s leading architects for sustainability and natural environments.

The current planning application is for a low-impact development while respecting the environmental sensitivity of the site. The design works within the existing constraints and topography of the site to create a picturesque garden route, with new function spaces and accommodation carefully integrated into the landscape. The proposal consists of restoration of historic use of the site as a pleasure garden and cold bath by introducing The Cold Bath, which is a wellness centre incorporating a cold bath and a hot bath, The Hide which is half-buried into the landscape housing six accommodation units, and three timber lodges, designed by Wadhurst treehouse design studio, Blue Forest.

The restoration and new development will generate 20 new jobs, while additional training and new hours will be given to many of the current 60 members of staff at The Beacon.

Pete Cornwell from I’ll be Mother comments, “As an early 18th century pleasure garden, including three ponds, one of The Beacon’s surviving features into the 19th century was a spring fed cold bath. This proposed development is an opportunity to re-establish the enchanting and historic character of the site while introducing new hotel accommodation and economic benefit to Tunbridge Wells and Kent.”

The Cold Bath will house a health and wellness centre and spa together with a cold bath and a hot bath to continue the historic tradition of bathing on the site. This is accompanied by a studio which will be used for yoga and classes.

The Hide has six ensuite hotel rooms. Tucked within the sloping landscape and with a green sedum roof, there is minimal visual impact, while keeping the historical vista from Rusthall Common through the site.

The Lodges are located at the lower side of the slope east of the site. Clad in natural timber, shingle roof tiles, timber decking and slightly raised above the ground on silts, the individual lodges, each with two bedrooms, will minimise environmental impact and blend seamlessly into the woodland area.

Despite being set on a steep sided ghyll, typical of the High Weald, most pathways in the site are step-free and accessible for buggies and wheelchairs. The step-free pathway network provides an accessible route to the Cold Bath, The Hide, The Lodges, and the landscape generally. A series of steps through the steep central path provides a short-cut for some guests, but a longer route gives a more compliant approach and buggy access will give an alternative for those guests less able to walk distances. One hotel room in The Hide is also made accessible by its entrance route and its bathroom compliant to accessibility requirements and the correct space specifications in the main bedroom.

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For more information please contact Hannah Blake at The Dining Room on Hannah@thediningroompr.co.uk or 07730 039361

History of The Beacon

The Chalybeate springs were discovered in the area in 1609 and in its heyday, in the Georgian era, Tunbridge Wells was one of the top ten spas in the country. The proposed cold bath at The Beacon will be close to the historic site where the first cold bath in Tunbridge Wells was built in 1708.

Walter Harris, a Lord Mayor of London acquired the land in the 1890s and built The Beacon as a private house designed by the Arts and Crafts architect Robert Edis in 1894. Built on a sandstone outcrop, the house was originally known as Rusthall Towers, set in 17 acres of wooded grounds with three lakes, fringed by rhododendrons. In more recent history, Colonel Sladen, a prominent figure in Tunbridge Wells, who owned The Beacon as a private residence, laid 23 acres of pleasure gardens on top of the original 1708 grounds. Sladen’s ornamental gardens were legendary and hosted many civic events. He stocked the lakes with Loch Leven trout and built an aviary. Close to the Beacon itself, Sladen installed the huge Burmese Bell that his father had brought back from his time in the Diplomatic Service. The bell itself was suspended by cross-beams of Burmese teak and was believed to have come from a Buddhist temple. When he died of pneumonia in 1921, it was bequeathed to the Council and then went to the Calverley Grounds.

Following Sladen’s death, his gardens fell into a period of neglect that was to last many years. Paths became overgrown and impassable; the rhododendrons rambled away unchecked. Sladen’s legacy was fading away, but these wilderness years helped create a haven for wildlife like dragonflies, frogs, badgers and, more recently, populations of bee fly and hoverfly, which are still there today.

After World War Two the house was rented by a Refugee Committee and was home to Jewish refugee children. For some years in the 1960s the house was a small hotel and by the late sixties even had a time as a disco.

The house and garden had been neglected for many years until brought under new ownership in 1990 and was run successfully as a pub and hotel for years until retirement. In 2015, Pete and Viv bought the property and began the hard work of transforming The Beacon into what it is today.

New sense of ‘focus and purpose’ at The Small Holding as the award-winning restaurant re-opens on 17 July

The Small Holding (Image Food Story Media)

New sense of ‘focus and purpose’ at The Small Holding as the award-winning restaurant re-opens on 17 July

www.thesmallholding.restaurant
@the_small_holding_
The Small Holding | Ranters Lane | Kilndown | Kent | TN17 2SG

After three months of lock down, The Small Holding in Kilndown, Kent will reopen its doors, large terrace and garden on 17 July with reservations open for July, August and September.

Named ‘Chef to Watch’ in the Good Food Guide 2020, chef owner Will Devlin says, “As with all restaurants, especially independents with no financial backing, the last three months have been tough. However, it’s given me the opportunity to focus on our purpose and reason and to remember what The Small Holding is about, which is the deep connection between the farm and kitchen and a sense of place. We nearly lost it all and we need to remember what we’re fighting for. Lockdown has been a massive opportunity to realise that.”

From 17 July, the new menu will be defined by hyper-seasonal ingredients with a focus on the farm’s own produce, but undefined by the number of courses or choice. There will be no formal menu at The Small Holding. Instead, guests will be 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, foraged ingredients, homemade charcuterie and zero waste animal cookery from the farm’s own livestock will be the main focus.

The restaurant will be open Thursday to Saturday for dinner costing £75 per head and for lunch, with a shorter menu, on Saturday and Sunday, costing £55 per head. A drinks flight including juices, shrubs, wines, beers and kombucha will also be available.

On Wednesday’s the whole team will work on the farm and on research and development.

The Small Holding will continue to sell BBQ and breakfast hampers, vegetable and cheese boxes and the new Wine Club offering which were all launched online during lockdown.

About The Small Holding

Will Devlin, 31, is the 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 26-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. There are two poly tunnels, 15 raised beds, pigs, chickens, ducks, beehives and wild flower beds. On site is also the farm’s own alcohol sill, mushroom shed and shipping container with ageing chamber and butchery block.

Will’s second site, The Curlew, a former 17th century coaching inn in Bodiam, East Sussex launched in February 2020 and will reopen on 10 July. www.thecurlew.restaurant.

For more information, images, interview or to visit The Small Holding, please contact Hannah Blake hannah@thediningroompr.co.uk | 07730 039361

Praise for The Small Holding

A group of folk growing amazing things, then pulling them out of the ground, sometimes knobbly and lumpy, then cooking and serving them. It’s perfectly imperfect and I wouldn’t change a thing.” Grace Dent, The Guardian

“The menu reads like a list of all that is good in a British Larder. Self-sufficiency, careful sourcing, purity of intent and an absolute focus on flavour. It’s easy to fall in love with The Small Holding for the warmth of the staff, its good intent and deft execution.” Tony Turnbull, The Times

“Striding confidently into its second year, 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.” Will Devlin was named ‘Chef to Watch’ in The Good Food Guide 2020

BBQ boxes, hampers and home-grown vegetable boxes from The Small Holding

BBQ Box at The Small Holding, Kent (credit Key & Quill)

BBQ boxes, hampers and home-grown vegetable boxes from The Small Holding

www.thesmallholding.restaurant/shop/

The Small Holding in Kilndown, Kent has launched a new BBQ box for local delivery, in addition to its home-grown and organic vegetable boxes and stay at home picnic hampers.

Just in time for the May bank holiday, The Small Holding BBQ box is suitable for 2-4 people sharing and includes two of each beef burgers, chicken kebabs, pork sausages and pulled pork plus buns, flat breads and burger garnish. Also included are tubs of coleslaw, BBQ beans, wild garlic pasta salad and pickled red cabbage. This fantastic feast of a box costs £55 while also for sale on the online shop are beers and wines from local Kent and Sussex producers including Squerryes, Greensand Ridge, Chapel Down and Long Man Brewery.

The new BBQ box is the newest offering from The Small Holding team who are also selling weekly vegetable boxes (£35) with produce grown on site at The Small Holding and from local farms. Celebrating the best of the season with local asparagus, strawberries, beetroot, new potatoes, rainbow chard, carrots, herbs, garlic and more.

The BBQ boxes, vegetable boxes and hampers should be ordered by 5pm each Wednesday for delivery on Friday or Saturday depending on delivery postcode.

For more information, images or to speak with chef owner Will Devlin please contact Hannah Blake at The Dining Room on 07730 039361 or hannah@thediningroompr.co.uk

Notes to editors:

- Orders can be made online at www.thesmallholding.restaurant/shop/

- Image credited to Key & Quill

About The Small Holding

Will Devlin, 31, is the 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 26-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.

Will’s second site, The Curlew, a former 17th century coaching inn in Bodiam, East Sussex opened in February 2020 www.thecurlew.restaurant.

A group of folk growing amazing things, then pulling them out of the ground, sometimes knobbly and lumpy, then cooking and serving them. It’s perfectly imperfect and I wouldn’t change a thing.” Grace Dent, The Guardian

Delamere is now supporting a fully sustainable cycle from food to leather

Jack and Rory from Billy Tannery

Delamere Dairy Invests in ‘Pioneering’ Billy Tannery

Delamere is now supporting a fully sustainable cycle from food to leather.

Delamere Dairy, the UK supplier of speciality, award-winning fresh and long-life goats’ products (milk, butter, cheeses and yogurts) has acquired a share in Billy Tannery, which produces a range of leather goods from goat hides in its pioneering microtannery.

Billy Tannery was founded by Jack Millington who set up the company, based in the Midlands, after discovering that not one goat hide left over from the food industry was being tanned in the UK. 

The tannery was set up by Jack after helping his dad, a dairy farmer, to try and find a market for his goat meat. Tapping into local leather knowledge it built a pioneering microtannery - the first tannery to be built in the UK in over 50 years. 

After enlisting the help of experts at the University of Northampton, they developed a bespoke tanning recipe to produce a sustainable, bark-tanned goat leather which celebrates the natural markings in the hide. The business then uses purposeful design to produce accessories including bags, sneakers and aprons in small workshops in the UK.

Cheshire-based Delamere Dairy, which is responsible for a third of the UK’s goats’ milk, now has shares in both Billy Tannery and also goat meat supplier Cabrito. Cabrito Goat Meat was founded in 2012 by British chef James Whetlor and sources its farm assured goat’ meat from Delamere Dairy farms across the UK, to supply restaurants, butchers and catering companies, as well as delivering directly to families across the UK. 

The interest and appetite for goats’ meat is growing in the UK. Previously billy goats were a bi-product to the 30,000 female nanny goats producing milk for the UK market. Supplying goat meat to restaurants and caterers and sending hides to the tannery, completes the sustainable cycle from milk to meat to leather in this small but dynamic sector of the UK dairy industry. 

Ed Salt, MD at Delamere comments: “We have developed a unique model for how dairy businesses should look in the future - honest, transparent, ethical and continually pushing for sustainability.  I genuinely feel we can create a model partnership with each aspect of these three businesses enhancing the other and reducing unnecessary wastage.” 

Jack Millington at Billy Tannery comments, "Our new partnership with Delamere cements the natural links with Billy Tannery and also Cabrito. The increased transparency between the three businesses is exactly what consumers are looking for these days and this is only going to increase in the future. I'm really looking forward to working more closely with the wider Delamere team."

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For more information about Cabrito Goat Meat please contact Hannah Blake on hannah@thediningroompr.co.uk or 07730 039361

For more information about Billy Tannery please contact Jack Millington on jack@billytannery.co.uk or 07958 001987

Notes to editor:

Delamere Dairy

Delamere Dairy was founded in 1985 in Cheshire’s beautiful Delamere Forest, when Liz & Roger Sutton bought their first three goats. They began by selling the fresh goats’ milk and soft cheese they made in their kitchen to local health food stores. Such was the interest in their products, that only a couple of years later they were supplying milk to major UK retailers. 

Today, Delamere Dairy sells an award-winning range of fresh and long life goats’ products (cheeses, yogurts, butters, milks and powder), plain and flavoured cows’ milks, a range of sheep cheese and yogurt, and a growing portfolio of milks for the pet industry.

More recent developments build on the company’s experience of supplying dairy alternative ‘milks’ as own label brands. In 2018 the company launched its branded range of Planted drinks, a planted based range of oat, almond and coconut drinks.

Celebrating more than 35 years in business, the company has an annual turnover in excess of £29M, with products sold throughout the UK and in over 20 markets around the world.

Delamere Dairy has collected several accolades over the years including Farm Business of the Year at the Farm Business Food & Farming Industry, the Sunday Times SME Export Track 100, as the UK’s fastest growing food & drink exporter, and UK’s most prestigious business award – The Queen’s Award for Enterprise, for its International Trade achievements.

Cabrito Goat Meat was founded by James Whetlor in 2012. Cabrito won an Observer Food Monthly Award (2014) for Best Ethical Producer, Good Housekeeping’s Champion Meat Producer (2016) and the Young British Foodies Meat Award (2016) and is a finalist in the Radio 4 Food Programme Food and Farming Awards 2017. www.cabrito.co.uk

Billy Tannery was founded by childhood friends Jack Millington and Rory Harker, both from the Midlands. Billy Tannery is a goat leather micro tannery that has tapped into local leather knowledge and built a pioneering micro-tannery with its sustainable, bark-tanned goat leather using the hides left over from the UK food industry to produce a range of premium leather goods and accessories. www.billytannery.co.uk

Your Local Delivered

Your Local Delivered

 - A free-to-use online community, set up with one goal – to connect local, independent businesses with those at home during Covid-19

- Set up by Charlotte Spencer in Tonbridge, Kent

Stay Home – Protect Local Businesses – Save Lives

On 23 March 2020, Boris Johnson issued a nationwide lockdown due to COVID-19 and ordered all non-essential businesses to shut.

One of the key messages from this was to use delivery services to reduce footfall in supermarkets – and just as importantly – support those businesses that had to close their doors.

From this pivotal moment, Your Local Delivered was born. Pioneered by Charlotte Spencer, aged 28 from Tonbridge, Kent, Charlotte works full time as a Social Media Strategist at London based agency, Bridge & Tunnel. Developed with the help of friends, Chris Rogers and James Rutter, they all share a passion for championing local businesses and wanted to do something to help - so they rallied together to create the website in just shy of a week.

Your Local Delivered is a free-to-use online community, set up with one goal – to connect local, independent businesses with those at home during this global crisis. Why? Because we all have a responsibility. We are responsible for staying at home and keeping those around us safe. We also have a responsibility to support each other on a global scale, and this starts with helping local communities not only to continue to operate, but to thrive under these circumstances.

Forget queueing, forget stockpiling, but don’t forget about the businesses that define your local area. They connect you with your favourite locals, who are set up and able to deliver to your door.

Businesses and consumers can help spread the word by:

- Adding listings - pubs, restaurants, grocers and more can be added to site by anyone free of charge

- Sharing the website - through social channels, Facebook groups and by word of mouth

Founder Charlotte Spencer comments, “My brother’s lovely country pub (The Hopbine, Matfield, Kent) was included in the list of businesses that were forced to close last week. So needless to say, it felt pretty close to home. Like him and many local independents businesses, they've now turned to deliveries as a means of surviving this crisis that we’re all facing.  Having worked in the hospitality industry for some years, I wanted to do my bit to help and I hope Your Local Delivered will do just that. But we now need the help of the Great British public to spread the word and get local businesses of all shapes and sizes from across the UK, listed on the site. COVID-19 might have taken us all by surprise, but we will get through this, together. Keep calm and get Your Local Delivered.”

www.yourlocaldelivered.co.uk | @YourLocalDelivered

Farm shop and hampers launch at The Small Holding, Kent

Fresh vegetable boxes from the farm at The Small Holding, Kent (image Key & Quill)

Farm shop and hampers launch at The Small Holding, Kent

#HelpKentBuyLocal

www.thesmallholding.restaurant
@the_small_holding_

Ranters Lane | Kilndown | Kent | TN17 2SG

The Small Holding at Home and farm pop up shop has launched for business today, Monday 23 March.

Guests can experience a taste of The Small Holding from their own home after collecting a ready-made hamper of local Kent and Sussex cheese, chutney and crackers, house made charcuterie, freshly made bread and local wines and beers. Or take away a restaurant standard three-course meal, including fish pie and ginger cake with rhubarb and cream cheese. Collection of hampers and meals are from 12-9pm.

The Farm shop will be open Monday-Sunday from 8am-8pm and selling a wide variety of home-grown vegetables from the small holding plot including chard, purple sprouting, radishes and leeks and dairy such as cream, milk, eggs and cheese. Fresh meat and fish such as pork shops, sausages, whole chickens, mackerel and cod are also for sale.

All produce and hampers will be sold with zero contact.

Named ‘Chef to Watch’ in the Good Food Guide 2020, Will Devlin says, “We’ve had to reinvent ourselves in this last week and are working exceptionally hard during this unprecedented situation to keep tasty food and drink on the table of our valued guests. There are going to be more challenges and uncertainty over the next few months but we’re lucky that the weather is warming up and the farm will soon be in full production. It’s been brilliant so see everyone in our teams and local producers and suppliers such as Hinxden Dairy and The Pure Meat Company really rallying together through this tough time.”

About The Small Holding

Will Devlin, 31, is the 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 26-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.

Will’s second site, The Curlew, a former 17th century coaching inn in Bodiam, East Sussex opened in February. www.thecurlew.restaurant.

For more information, images, interview or recipes from The Small Holding, please contact Hannah Blake hannah@thediningroompr.co.uk | 07730 039361

Praise for The Small Holding

A group of folk growing amazing things, then pulling them out of the ground, sometimes knobbly and lumpy, then cooking and serving them. It’s perfectly imperfect and I wouldn’t change a thing.” Grace Dent, The Guardian