September 2008

The road to self sufficiency edged ever closer in the last couple of weeks. We are now delighted to announce that we are self sufficient in pork, duck, chicken & quail in our restaurant food. The feedback from customers has been tremendous and the hard work of the last few months has definitely been worthwhile. Our menu now features such dishes as “Fallowfields free range confit chicken & organic mushroom terrine with an orchard apple jelly”, “Poached orchard pear, local blue cheese & just picked garden salad” & “Fallowfields pan roasted breast of duck with a juniper infused sauce on creamed kitchen garden spinach”.

Our most recent purchase was an apple press; the chefs aided by the restaurant staff are busily making juice from our orchard including pear and apple. The juice is available at breakfast and also as a dinner aperitif where Fabrice the Restaurant has created some signature cocktails.

As usual, on the farm things are progressing very quickly. We hatched a further 40 quail, purchased some day old Black Rock chickens and we continue with a fortnightly purchase of 20 day old Cotswolds Whites. As you can imagine the hatchery is full with all the little birds happily co-habitating.

Our adult chicken flock now contains layers such as Black Rocks, White Stars & Isa Warrens, whilst our table birds are divided between Cotswolds Whites & various Sussex breeds. The chickens all roam freely in the orchard. The duck pond is now a heady mix of Aylesbury duck, geese & a couple of turkeys.