Food in North Cornwall

As the North Cornwall coast is now well known for it’s great choice of eateries….abundant with good quality local produce…no longer a region just of pasties, fish and chips and cream teas (although I still wouldn’t miss out on them during a visit)!!  And as we love recommending places to you during your stay at Tredarrup.  Here are a few new discoveries and offers that come around at this time of year…

FIFTEEN CORNWALL
Enjoy the fantastic view across Watergate Bay…a great place for a leisurely lunch and a walk along the beach and from now until 21st October enjoy their Totally Cornish menu celebrating the very best of Cornish seasonal produce this autumn.  Three course lunch for just £19.95. 

ODDS
Not one we have got to just yet but apparently it is a beautiful restaurant overlooking wild dunes and clifftops, with views out to the Atlantic ocean – not far from Newquay. A lot of the produce comes directly from their fields (so not many food miles here) and all looks delicious.

The farm boasts 8km of grass resting strips where voles, butterflies, nesting and feeding birds are able to thrive – in fact over 80 species of bird, indigenous and visiting, have been recorded on the farm. Arable crops are protected using nature friendly treatments which allow non-evasive plants to grow, which in turn encourages insects that birds can feed their chicks with. The restaurant and its building design echoes the farm’s conservation theme. The building uses top soil and grass on the roof to increase the insulation and reduce heat loss; a ground source heat pump utilises energy from the soil outside to provide the under floor heating and hot water; the purposefully designed kitchen incorporates energy saving appliances such as an induction hob that heats by magnetism – so reducing power consumption by up to 65% – and, as much of the organic kitchen waste as possible is recycled back into the farm.

THE FIRE CAFE
A Cornish gem that we are looking forward to visiting soon. A cafe, bar and grill that at this time of year is not as rammed as in the summer months. Does great weekend breakfasts  such as the Big Kahuna for £6.75, either as a good hangover cure or a way to well and truly fill you up…I’d be going for the buttermilk pancakes with maple syrup and bacon.  Also open for lunch and dinner and in a great position overlooking the beach at Mawgan Porth.

The Lost Gardens of Heligan

The Lost Gardens of Heligan are always a recommend to anyone staying with us here at Tredarrup…so worth a look at tonight if you have been or are thinking of a visit whilst visiting Cornwall.  8pm BBC2 – Natural World-Secrets of The Lost Gardens…or of course can watch again on the i-Player..

Giant's head...

Living Seas Cornwall

Living Seas Cornwall is home to some of the richest marine wildlife from tiny rare colourful corals to giant basking sharks, but our seas urgently need protecting. Cornwall Wildlife Trust runs an extensive marine conservation programme known as ‘Living Seas’. They work to protect Cornwall’s seas in three ways: collect data on marine wildlife, create awareness of the threats to marine life they campaign for better protection for our marine species and habitats. Living Seas Programme projects The Trust’s innovative Seaquest Netsafe Project is gathering data on cetaceans (whales, dolphins and porpoises) which will help develop strategies to protect them. The Trust gathers data on the marine seabed and species through Seasearch diving surveys. The Trust collects sightings of larger marine animals that visit our waters, such as dolphins, turtle and whales through the Seaquest Southwest project. As Cornwall is a renowned hot-spot for basking sharks, Cornwall Wildlife Trust’s ongoing Seaquest Basking Shark Project, is helping them to monitor and protect these wonderful sharks for the future. Cornwall sadly receives the highest numbers of dead dolphin strandings each year. In response to this they have established the Marine Strandings Network to record these animals and retrieve them for post mortem examination. The data collected through all of these projects is shared with the Finding Sanctuary project which is developing a network of Marine Protected Areas in the south west. The data is also used to create awareness about the threats to marine wildlife and to campaign for better protection. Our seas lack the legislation they need to adequately protect them. The Cornwall Wildlife Trust continue to put pressure on the Government to ensure the new Marine Act provides the necessary protection to give our marine wildlife the chance to recover and thrive. 

Polzeath Beach wins Blue Flag

Tucked inside the Camel Estuary, Polzeath is our main local beach and as one of the finest surfing beaches in Cornwall it is popular with both locals and holidaymakers. Visitors will often see dolphins and seals swimming alongside the surfers!
Just recently it was awarded a Blue Flag.  Blue Flag is a prestigious, international award scheme which acts as a guarantee to tourists that a beach or marina they are visiting is one of the best in the world.  It is awarded to coastal destinations which have achieved the highest quality in water, facilities, safety, environmental education and management.  Over the years it has acted as an incentive to many beach managers to improve the quality of the coast and their hard work has led to a revival of the UK coastline and beaches around the world.  The number of beaches and marinas gaining Blue Flag status increases every year – with 3,450 now displaying the quality indicator in 41 countries.  The Blue Flag Programme is administered in England by Keep Britain Tidy and is managed internationally by the Foundation for Environmental Education (FEE)
Four of the main criteria to qualify are:
ENVIRONMENTAL EDUCATION AND INFORMATION – has a brilliant shore marine events programme with Cornwall Wildlife Trust  
WATER QUALITY – closely monitored by Surfers Against Sewage
ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT
SAFETY AND SERVICES  – lifeguards during our main summer months 

Polzeath was always been in a good position to pick up a Blue Flag  as many of the needed criteria where already in place, such as  amenities, lifeguard service etc.
So if you are off to check out the surf, go visit Polzeath and you can always look ahead at the surf and weather conditions on a new website in association with Surfers Against Sewage.

Cornwall’s Own – Port Issac’s Fisherman’s Friends

Port Issac’s Fisherman’s Friends are ten close friends who grew up in the same remote north Cornwall village – our nearby Port Issac – who have been singing sea shanties as a hobby for over 20 years. After being spotted singing  one summer  they were signed up for a big recording contract.  Despite never seeking out stardom, the group now find themselves performing at festivals, TV shows and radio concerts across the country in the hot glare of a summer music tour. But as their fame grows, they often find themselves travelling hundreds of miles a day. As the tour intensifies with more dates and new recording sessions, the band face a crisis which could affect their future – and their friendship.  
Check out the ITV documentary tonight Wednesday 15th June at 10:35pm (or repeats/itv player).
Then if you are in North Cornwall in August every Friday night  they perform on Port Issac’s platt

 

Encouraging Barn Owls

When we did the renovation to our barn and stable here at Tredarrup we happily had to put up an owl box to create a possible habitat for barn owls.  It was built to spec as supplied but the Barn Owl Trust and we added a camera but over the years we sadly still as yet have had no occupants !!! 
 We have  enjoyed barn owls taking flight across our field at dusk but nesting elsewhere and the hoots of Tawny Owls in the lane   are very common.
 So this year we are working more on our field to try and encourage more food sources for them.  Their food of choice is voles,   mice and rats but they may also take birds and bats.  So where we have planted up young trees we are leaving the grass areas around which apparently is ideal for field voles.
 Owls have good stereoscopic vision allowing them to judge distances accurately , which helps them to hunt.  They have very sensitive hearing which enables them to pick up the slightest rustle in the grass…which is why they rely more on sound at night to pinpoint creatures…
The population of the barn owl is only a third of what it was in the early parts of the 20th century the decline is due to loss of prey-rich habitats and reduction in the amount of nesting space.  managed hay meadows were a boon for barn owls but now farmers have largely changed from hay to silage this had meant a loss of 90% of our meadows since th 60s which means less mammals for them to feed on…  wildlife friendly farming methods numbers are increasing…
So why not  Take a look at Heligan’s Barn Owl webcam…

Wild Garlic…..

With so much great weather and a few drops of rain our Cornish hedgerows are really coming alive.  The daffodils have now been replaced by bluebells – our woodland is fantastic this year – but it  is also the time for wild garlic (ramsons).  The banks in our parish lane near Tredarrup are full of the fragrant leaves and pretty flower heads….so what better than to use nature’s harvest in the kitchen and put to use a Riverford recipe of Wild Garlic + parsley pesto……it is really easy, delicious and great to keep in the fridge and freeze until homegrown basil is in abundance…

Nature's harvest - wild garlic

Cornwall Spring Feast

Well spring has well and truly sprung here in North Cornwall, four weeks now of the most amazing weather, daffodils in abundance, birds singing their song, wild garlic raising its first leaves and the grass ready for its first cut !!!
And whilst the weather is so great, its best to make the most of it…so this week we decided to have lunch out and enjoy the bursting fresh flavours of the new season with one of Cornwall’s Spring Feast menus at award-winning chef Nathan Outlaw’s Seafood and Grill….and it could not have been better a stunning view out across the estuary, the sun shimmering on the water, blistering sunshine…and great food. 
And apparently in the new edition of the Lonely Planet guide innovative cooking plus organic, locally sourced and ethically produced food put the south-west well ahead of anywhere else in the UK, including London.  So check our availability and get yourself a top table before the summer rush and enjoy a culinary tour of Cornish food…..

Enjoy some of Cornwall's great restaurants and produce!!!!

Saying goodbye to our Dexter Cattle

Our life before Tredarrup was one far removed from holiday cottages and cattle ownership.    When we moved here we decided that with the land we really could do ‘meat with a conscience’ and therefore decided to take on cattle ownership and started with our own herd of Dexters. 

Our Dexter herd

 Over five years we breed our own animals, reared our own meat and as well as the births we also had the deaths…as the expression goes – “If you have Livestock you have dead stock”.  A phrase that every farmer tells you however hard it is to understand and one that never got any easier whenever we had to deal with it over our years of cattle ownership.
But after five years we made the tough decision to let our beloved Dexters go..  Our herd was getting to the size where we needed to raise the animals with a more commercial aim in mind and that was never our intention as it never gets any easier when you send an animal off to its end, however good a life you know it has had, and ours did.  With just the one field we were short on winter feed and separating animals when they needed to be weaned or out of reach of the visiting bull was not easy other than relying on good neighbours and the use of their fields.  So our lovely herd have moved not far down the road and have a great range of fields, a woodland and stream to enjoy and we get to see them.
If anyone had ever told me that one day I would own cattle and deal with all that it entails, I could never of imagined it, and I can say my life has been better for it yes…I have a far greater understanding of what is involved with what animals have to go through to put meat on our plate, milk in the fridge and eggs in the pan… and that now shapes how and what we buy and eat. 
As animal owners we are strong believers that farm animals are sentient beings: Capable of emotion, of learning from experience, and aware of their relations with others both animal and human.  An emotion that for us becomes part of our buying decision when it comes to milk, meat and eggs…..and a message that is being echoed more and more these days…..and the importance of the welfare of animals…
So when you buy meat, drink milk, have a boiled egg (make it free range) just think what it takes to make that possible… Like humans, cows are pregnant for nine months, I’m not sure on sheep and pigs, and for dairy cattle to keep producing milk they have to calve ever year and all animals have to breed to supply us with the meat we eat so spare a thought for what some of those animals have to go through for us…it is our responsibility as both meat eaters and milk drinkers…

Our Tredarrup Starlings taking a bath !!!!!

 Every year we are visited from November onwards by roosts of thousands of starlings that come across from Europe…  They chatter in our trees, give great aerial performances and swoop around the place…but in the last few days they have been busy in the muddy puddles in our lane, playing and bathing…so we thought you might like to share them to…