A day at River Cottage HQ – Part 1 – the grounds and buildings
29th March 2016
Last week we were invited for a day of cooking and exploring at River Cottage HQ by our friends at Esse. Helen and I were the lucky ones who got to go, and what a cool place it was, we had such a great time. I took lots and lots of photos, a few too many for one blog I think, so I thought I’d do two instead. One showing you the beautiful grounds and buildings at the River Cottage, and one all about the food and showing you exactly what we got up to on the day.
I remember growing up watching the River Cottage programmes, my mum (Helen) absolutely loved them, and any other cooking programme for that matter. You know when you see something on the tele and you think it looks so lovely and peaceful and simple, and you hope that if you ever got to see it in real life, that it would be exactly how you imagined and remembered it? But in the back of your mind you’re thinking there’s just no way it can really, actually, truly be like that. Well the River Cottage was, it was everything we hoped it would be; so authentic and simple, nothing fancy or showy or false, just a beautiful place filled with cool and passionate people, the real deal.
River Cottage HQ is hidden away in a really rural spot in the Axminster countryside. Surrounded by nothing but green fields and trees and the odd farm animal, it was so peaceful and so far from the busy London life I’m used to, a lovely little getaway. The whole idea of the day was for us to learn how to use and cook on the beautiful Esse stoves, and Esse also treated us to a sneak peek of their brand new products. We are actually Esse’s main London dealer, so to learn a little more about these beautiful cookers was so interesting and helpful too. Esse and River Cottage have been partners for 10 years now, and throughout the cottage and barns they have installed a range of different Esse stoves which the chefs cook on every single day. They looked so at home there, the perfect match.
The first treat of the day was a hot cup of tea and freshly baked biscuit in the Yurt. It was so cosy in there, we sat on hay bales topped with sheepskin rugs and warmed our hands by the beautiful log fire.
The Yurt has been there ever since the River Cottage began, and often plays host to tea parties and wedding parties and festivals and Summer gatherings.
Such a beautiful and incredible structure, the way the pieces of wood wind themselves around each other so delicately, we kept finding ourselves gazing up in amazement. We need to get one of these for the Mill!
The best bit was that we were allowed to just wander about and explore the whole place to our heart’s content. It wasn’t busy or hectic, it was quite quiet actually, just every so often you’d see a chef nip out of the farmhouse to collect some fresh greens from the garden, or one of the lovely front of house staff prepping for the evening dinner service.
The River Cottage HQ reminded me of Cotes Mill in so many ways, especially when I saw these two chilling out on the barn steps, tucking into a big bowl of home cooked stew for their lunch.
There were rickety old walls and fences at every turn, nothing was over-done, or too perfect… and they even had my dream car sitting there on the stoney drive, an old pick-up Defender.
We got to meet the resident River Cottage HQ pets. This little guy only had one eye…
And this one looked like a little Lion! So pretty.
Next was the lovely big garden, something I really clearly remembered from the programme. How beautifully simple does it look? Everything they grow here is used for their cookery classes and daily meals and absolutely nothing is wasted.
The crops had already started to sprout, there was cabbage and spinach and kale and every kind of herb you could imagine.
And the farmhouse had the most dreamy front door.
There were lots of little outbuildings waiting to be explored.
And row after row of fresh produce.
And the prettiest views no matter which way you turned.
And when Andy the chef let us into a secret, and told us about these guys, it made our day…
The prettiest, most unusual little piglets I have ever seen, and not forgetting one very big and very proud mum. We couldn’t keep the smiles off our faces, and neither could they!
So that’s it for part 1 of our River Cottage adventure, I hope you’ve enjoyed having a little nosy around the grounds and buildings. In the next post I’ll tell you all about the yummy food we cooked and ate.
– For more information on Esse and their beautiful products please click here.
– If you’d like to know a little more about the River Cottage HQ, just click here.
