“They can do anything organic: raw meat, fish heads, fish tails . . . we can even grind down bones and shells,” explains farmer John Rowlands, standing near several enormous composting systems that were designed by a former Formula 1 engineer, while the rest of us, positioned a safe distance from the odour, sip glasses of cold cordial. I didn’t expect manure to kick off a supper club, but am keenly attentive. “We are zero food waste to landfill — it all comes back here,” Rowlands says.
This is Our Farm, the 12-acre farmstead run by the trailblazing British chef Simon Rogan, located at the southern edge of the Lake District. It is the heart of the Rogan empire, providing (and recycling) the majority of the produce used in his UK restaurants, including the three-Michelin-star L’Enclume. Over the summer, it is welcoming visitors for a series of events called “A Day at Our Farm,” each beginning with a guided tour led by Rowlands, the farm’s manager, and its head chef Liam Fitzpatrick, for an exclusive peek behind the scenes of the group’s pioneering approach to sustainable dining. Visitors enjoy delicate seasonal snacks along the way, tasting ingredients among the plots in which they are grown and finishing with an alfresco feasting-style meal.
The farm is about a mile from Cartmel, a tiny village set in the patchwork hills of rural Cumbria, known for its racecourse, 12th-century priory, sticky toffee pudding — and, for the past two decades, L’Enclume. When Rogan opened the restaurant more than 20 years ago, emerging as one of the leaders of the UK’s farm-to-fork movement, he initially sourced ingredients from a local organic producer but eventually outgrew its capacity. Alongside a growing interest in environmental issues, in 2011 he started leasing farmland in the Cartmel Valley and established Our Farm in hopes of building a sustainable operation that could supply top quality fruit, vegetables, herbs and flowers across the restaurant group. “There was a lot of time spent thinking about the farm but not enough time on the name,” jokes Sam Ward, the group’s managing director.
Our Farm’s proximity to L’Enclume, as well as Rogan’s other Lake District restaurants, allows for the produce to be harvested each day before service, imparting greater flavour on the plate (Aulis, Rogan’s one-star London outpost, receives a delivery a couple times a week). The chefs work closely with farmers to determine what is grown, how to grow it and develop dishes around the farm’s yields.
The site is a wonderland of ingredients, with abundant banks of rosemary, thyme and chives, a kaleidoscopic range of currants, and an education in the diversity of mint varieties, colourful cabbages and kales. There are tunnels of different types of cucumbers, cherry tomatoes, flowers, herbs and much more, along with a slew of other plants aimed at attracting pollinators and beneficial insects, part of the farm’s biodynamic, regenerative ethos. Fitzpatrick, who, before joining the farm, helped to lead nearby Rogan & Co to its Michelin star, was keen to host this series of guest events on the site to showcase their work; the rest of his time is spent helping chefs choose ingredients and preserving, pickling and fermenting surplus produce. “It’s my job to make sure we have things on the menu all year round,” he says. His colleagues affectionately refer to him as the “Pickle Prince”.
Before arriving at Our Farm, visitors are politely reminded to dress appropriately; this is not the sort of manicured kitchen garden one might find at a country-house hotel, but a working farm, with sweaty polytunnels, mud and manure. After our introduction to the latter, we head to an allium patch, where, as a ginger farm cat swirls around his ankles, Rowlands explains the fiddliness of growing red spring varieties, and a tray of delicate Red Baron onion and Old Winchester cheese tarts arrives — sweet, piquant and a fine tribute to the farmer’s efforts.
Aside from pernickety veg, there are myriad other challenges faced by farmers, though it is the erratic and unseasonable weather that is increasingly worrying. This year has been particularly difficult: by now, some crops, such as chard and onion, should be moved from beds into fields, but the nights have been too cold, Rowlands says. Courgettes and cucumbers should be ripe for picking, but appear to have just reached adolescence.
Sometimes plants flourish well beyond expectation, presenting a test for the chefs. “We still have 130 kilos of broad beans in the freezer from last year,” Fitzpatrick says, as we try some that have been fermented, diced and presented on a leaf to be wolfed down like a one-bite taco.
The educational epicurean tour continues through tunnels and plots, with apple and elderflower kombucha, crackers topped with punchy pickled cucumber and crudités of baby carrots and radishes, sweetly presented in a terracotta pot with “soil” (seasoning) and green onion dip.
Dinner, served family-style on long tables set up next to a simple outdoor kitchen and grill, is a celebration of what’s growing around us or has been lovingly preserved from last year. Buttery Charlotte potatoes with rosemary and thyme, salt-baked kohlrabi cooked in beef dripping, charred crispy kale — I could go on — come alongside a show-stopping beef short rib, glazed in fermented runner-bean sauce, that is soft enough to eat with a spoon. We finish with Basque-style cheesecake flavoured with woodruff, a herb used for its vanilla- or tonka-like taste, Fitzpatrick says — one of many plants used to infuse puddings with specific characteristics instead of sourcing produce they are not able to grow. “It’s so easy to order a lemon or orange or lime, but this is what I find more exciting: making those flavours happen with plants I didn’t even know existed,” he says.
The events, which run until early September, take place from 4pm on Mondays and include a night’s stay at one of Rogan’s 16 rooms in Cartmel (Tuesday lunch services were initially available too, but are sold out at the time of publication). If time and finances permit, it’s worth extending the stay to dine at L’Enclume, where the produce reaches the pinnacle of haute cuisine in an extraordinary 15-course menu (£250pp) that has earned the restaurant its claim as one of the world’s best. The whole experience, from the gastronomy to the slickly choreographed service, is akin to witnessing Roger Federer on grass or Lewis Hamilton win at Silverstone — an expertly performed ballet, seemingly effortless but anchored by a tremendous amount of care and hard work. It all starts from the ground up.
How to get there: the village of Cartmel is a just over five minutes by car from Cark & Cartmel train station, or a 10-minute drive from Grange-over-Sands
Niki Blasina was a guest of the Simon Rogan hospitality group. A Day at Our Farm costs £150pp excluding accommodation or £500 for two including an overnight stay in Cartmel with breakfast the following morning
Do you have a green getaway from London to recommend? Tell us about it in the comments below. And follow FT Globetrotter on Instagram at @FTGlobetrotter
Read the full article here