Newsletter 18th November 2022

Good morning,

Our Festive Market is in two week’s time tomorrow and we cannot wait to see a full farmyard of merry making. Cold fingers clasped around cosy cups of something delicious, bopping bobble hats listening to the live music and people perusing the market stalls for something special to eat or take home.

Our lineup celebrates some of the best local chefs, distillers, chocolatiers, farmers, bakers and makers, and we are all excited to see you. Scoot down the page for a flavour of what’s to come.

You can pre-order cups of mulled cider or juice for £3 here, and all proceeds will be doubled by the Big Give campaign and then donated to Brighton based homeless charity, JustLife.

We’re open as usual this Saturday from 11am-4pm and the shop is stocked with beautifully marbled Sussex Wagyu beef, Trenchmore wheat, fresh eggs & cider.

shop

Barcombe Nurseries

Supplying organic produce from their Sussex farm along with locally & sustainably sourced fruit & veg, Barcombe will have plenty to stock up on and information about signing up to their local veg box scheme.

Slake Spirits

Winner of the highly coveted Great Taste Golden Fork Award, Tom’s spirits & aperitifs are made in Shoreham and would make an excellent gift for someone special, or maybe just find their way into your own drinks cabinet.

Cocoa Loco

Based up the lane from us, Sarah & Rory have been making their ethical & organic chocolate in West Sussex since 2005.

They work with farms in the Dominican Republic who are growing organic cacao in gaps in the rainforest canopy, not from clear-cut areas.

Properly fair trade & delicious.

Clare’s Chillis

A Trenchmore staple, Clare will be selling her plants, chillis and sauces at the market - all delicious and grown right next to our farm.

Plus, her husband Andy will have his 3ft-4ft Christmas trees for sale. Get in touch for more info.

Susana & Daughters Kefir

Based on the Cowdray Estate in the South Downs, Susana makes her kefir from a single, free-range dairy herd and sells it in glass bottles, which can be refilled. It is deliciously creamy and teaming with gut-healthy probiotics.

Gwyn’s Bakery

Set up & run by Ben Lines, who has worked in 1, 2 & 3 Michelin starred kitchens, Gwyn’s focuses on British ingredients, sourdoughs baked from scratch everyday and perfectly flakey pastries with seasonal fillings.

My Posy Neighbour

Charlotte is running a wreath workshop and selling pre-made wreaths for you to take home.

All the gorgeous foliage Charlotte uses is sourced from the UK and eco-friendly.

The workshop is pre-book only and will include a light lunch and welcome drink.

Book here

Tin Roof Pizza

When not doing the trade deliveries for Trenchmore Farm, Barny makes hand stretched, wood fired Neapolitan style pizzas from his 1956 Dodge pickup. He’s normally very busy with weddings & events, so we’re chuffed to have the Trenchmore X Tin Roof debut at this year’s Festive Market.

The Syndicate Kitchen

Michael & Jon will be cooking & serving up smokey BBQ sandwiches, using Trenchmore beef and locally sourced and seasonal ingredients.

Plus sides & something sweet to finish.

Newsletter 11th November 2022

Good afternoon,

We’ve had 7 inches of rain this month and the ground is holding up relatively well thanks to the dry summer. Even still, all the cattle are back at basecamp for the winter so we can save the soils and grow enough grass again next year.

Those who have been with Trenchmore for a while might recall the days of our heritage wheat, which we grew & sold for a few years pre-covid. Mum & I would spend our weekends sampling homemade sourdough bread and cooked wheat berries at various markets and events, so you may even have tried it or baked with it yourself.

After a couple of years of poor yields and, despite rave reviews on the flavour, not much traction on sales, we took our foot off the grain gas to focus on our silly moos.

And now, a few years on and with a better understanding of growing, something has led us back to bread. We have been developing a diverse population to better suit our soils, which means it can be grown with less intervention and is more resilient to disease. We harvested our first crop of the new Trenchmore Wheat this year and are going to start selling the cleaned wheat berries through the farm shop. We’ve borrowed a table-top mill so will be able mill a bag of wheat, if you’d like us to.

The shop is open tomorrow from 11am - 4pm, and well stocked with fresh beef, eggs, cider & a very limited amount of wheat.

shop

Festive Market

Our festive market on 3rd December is shaping up to be something pretty special. We will have two bands playing, a couple of hot food options, 5 or 6 market stalls and plenty of festive cheer to kick the month off with.

Plus, a very special wreath workshop and lunch with My Posy Neighbour on the day as well. More details and booking can be found here.

All proceeds for pre-sold hot drinks will be doubled and donated to JustLife, a Brighton based charity supporting homeless people, so please do order yourself a cup of something delicious to enjoy at the market here.

Newsletter 28th October 2022

Good afternoon,

It may be an unseasonal 18C outside but we are stepping into November next week and are looking forward to our festive plans.

Our Christmas beef boxes are now available to order online and will include a centrepiece joint for the big day, plus plenty of delicious treats to see your family through to the new year. Take a look and pre-order here.

And, we’re holding a festive market in the yard on the 3rd December with live music, food stalls and a wreath making workshop (pre-booking only). Entry to the market is free but we are pre-selling warming cups of mulled cider & mulled apple juice for £3 - all of which will be donated to a local charity that supports people who are homeless.

We hope you can join us.

Meanwhile, we’re open every Saturday 11-4pm for stocking up on Trenchmore provisions and have plenty of fresh Sussex Wagyu in the fridges.

Newsletter 20th October 2022

Good evening,

What a week it has been. The lettuce that outlasted the prime minister, talk of a second wave of Boris Johnson and now, a local flock-down.

We don’t need more bad news this week but unfortunately bad news is the flavour of the month and farming is no exception - avian flu has found its way to a large commercial flock in Billingshurst. The entire flock has been culled and there is a 10km surrounding surveillance zone set up, which includes our farm.

We have spoken to fellow flockstars and some understand that a case of avian flu would require the culling of your flock and also the shutting down of your farm for a period of time to disinfect. This would be dire for most farms as it would restrict other farming business and trading. I know local egg farmers that are already planning to cease producing eggs because of the increased cost of feed, and now the cost of required housing and risk to the rest of the farm business doesn’t make it viable. We are likely to see a reduction in the availability of free-range & organic eggs in the UK, and probably the price of good eggs to go up. Definitely not good news.

Nev & Finley finished reconstructing our hen house today and our girls are now reluctantly but safely back in the yard.

Meanwhile, apple pressing has been going well and we’ve almost filled two of our 8,000L tanks with fresh juice already.

We are serving organic pizza & mulled cider in the yard tomorrow from 1-4pm. The website is well stocked with Sussex Wagyu steaks, roasting joints & braising cuts, eggs and cider.

We hope to see you in the yard.

Newsletter 13th October 2022

Good morning,

Our cattle come home every winter when the ground is wet and susceptible to poaching from hefty hoofers. The duration of their stay indoors is determined by how wet the soil is and we’re slowly working to improve our ground’s rainfall retention by building its organic matter and structure. We hope our herd can stay in the fields a little longer this year, also in thanks to the drought.

To get things ready for the big move home, we are walking a 50 cow and 50 calf group back down the lane to fields adjacent to our yard today, and expect to bring them indoors in November.

The last calf of the season was born last week and is still too small to make the journey on foot, so Andrew & Nev spent the best part of an hour chasing her and the new mum around the field yesterday afternoon, trying to give them a lift home in the trailer - and making the whole exercise seem a little futile in the process.

We have also spent this week picking, sorting, scratting and pressing apples from our cider orchard and collections from the apple swap. The apples you have brought us this year have been lovely - clean, sweet and abundant. We’re expecting to fill a 5th bin this Saturday, which is the last day of the swap and we will be culminating with a yee-haw!

This Saturday

The shop is well stocked and the apple swap is running from 11am - 4pm.

We also have fantastic Sam Lambert in the kitchen, serving slow cooked wagyu shin and vegan local veg laksa from 1pm - 4pm.

And to top if all off, we have Square the Circle Band playing live folk music with a barn dance caller to lead us into foot-stomping formation in the rain-proof straw barn from 4pm - 6pm.

The Moo Tap will be serving Silly Moo Cider, Hand Brew beers & Bolney apple juice throughout, and we really hope you can join us this Saturday for any or all of the above to celebrate the harvest.

dance & eat

Our yard pop-ups

We think all the chefs we work with are doing something pretty special with local food, and you seem to think so too as we sometimes sell-out of what they’re serving before the end of the day.

We don’t want to send anyone home hungry so make a good amount for walk-ins, and also don’t want to waste good food so try not to over do it.

If you’d like to make sure we save you a portion, please pre-order online any time up until we start serving at 1pm. If you’d prefer to wing it and see what you fancy when you get to the yard, that’s very welcome too.

Newsletter 6th October 2022

Good afternoon,

Last week it was reported that the government was planning to abandon ELMS - the subsidy scheme proposed to replace the EU’s common agricultural policy by rewarding farmers who look after the land, rather than those who just own a lot of land.

This has subsequently been denied by DEFRA who insists they were instead looking at how the ELM schemes are to be delivered, with the hope of boosting food production and protecting the environment.

Phew. National sigh of relief ensues, the government have things in hand (…!)

Encouraging farmers to farm better, through subsidies or otherwise, has got me thinking about the rapid growth of regenerative agriculture, which apparently now includes 15% of UK farms and is the third most searched term on the Farmer’s Weekly website - a clue that the tide is turning.

The suggestion that farmers sell their plough, buy a direct drill and cut back on the fertiliser & sprays they have relied on for decades is a fairly big ask. It demands a complete shift in the way farmers approach the land and how they respect the soil. Farmers work long hours and make small margins so there isn’t much room for risk - and yet in order to live within our planet’s means it is imperative that they start to implement regenerative practices.

The good news is they are, regardless of what the government is doing.

One of the ways we’re noticing the change is seeing how people in our district treat their hedges. The obsession for tidy hedgerows and mowed verges is slowly being replaced by the understanding that leaving thing unkept and uncut allows the wildlife to thrive. After all, one man’s weed is another man’s flower.

Although some farms around us still insist on trimming everything from the 1st September, we are noticing more and more are leaving things to grow for another year. It’s a good indication of a changing mindset and it’s coming from the ground up.

In the fridge

As it is slow-cooking season, our osso bucco and braising diced beef is on offer this week - buy one and get the second half price.

We also have plenty of brilliantly marbled steak, with the return of some old favourites like flat iron, chuck rib eye & sirloin.

online shop

In the yard

It’s the 3rd of 4 apple swaps this Saturday and we’re doing in style - with our favourite flippers, the 3Bros.

We should have plenty for walk-ins but have been known to sell out on the day, so pre-booking is always advised.

pre-book burgers here

On the telly

I’m enjoying the pizza series of Chef’s Table on Netflix, which follows 6 of the world’s best pizza chefs. I’ve only watched the first two episodes, but both chefs attribute the power of their pizza to the quality of the ingredients they use, and credit good ingredients to good producers. After all, eating is an agricultural act.

Newsletter 29th September 2022

Good morning,

It has been a lovely start to autumn on the farm. There’s been enough rain for the grass to grow green and lush, and the leaves on the trees are yet to turn although I’m sure it’s only a matter of days before they start. The cows are looking cheerful with glossy coats and steady weight gain, and are certainly enjoying the abundant rich grass.

We’re starting to make plans for the cattle to move back inside in late October so have spent the week gently weaning our January & February calves from their mums. Doing it outside rather than back in the yard saves our neighbours from a couple of days of bellowing and seems to help the animals manage better.

Ours is a suckler herd, meaning the calves stay with their mums for most of the year before slowly being weaned with fencing and lots of nose scratching to avoid too much stress on either side. This time we left 3 mums in with the calves, who have kindly chaperoned the 8-9 month olds into independency.

We’re swapping apples 11am - 4pm on Saturday, and the yard shop is stocked with tomahawks, fillets and braising beef.

We’re serving wagyu hot dogs, Silly Moo Cider and Hand Brew Beer from 1-4pm.

online shop

Things to enjoy

Apple picking: a bit of rural cosplay

Good Ship BrewDog - a brand without integrity.

Andy Cato & Fearne Cotton - looking to bread for the answer

Newsletter 22nd September 2022

Good afternoon,

This Saturday is the first of our four swapping Saturdays and we’re really looking forward to kicking the apple season off.

Lots of you have been patiently waiting, watching as the fallen fruit carpets your gardens with greens & reds and the smell of soft apple draws in the fruit flies. Well, thank you for bearing with us. There are a few reasons we don’t start swapping until this point in the season, and mainly it is to do with the ripeness of the fruit and this year a lot of fruit has dropped before it is ripe.

In order to turn apple juice into cider, we ferment the fruit sugar into alcohol. If the fruit isn’t ripe, the starch won’t have turned into sugar and starch won’t ferment so, unripe fruit, cider will not make.

We’ve held on and we now hope the fruit that will come to us over the next four weeks will be delicious and perfect for Silly Moo Cider. We have iodine drops at the farm and you are welcome to test the ripeness of your apples to be sure.

We ask that you only bring us fruit that is good enough to eat - clean, unsprayed and without mould or broken skin. The odd bruise or blemish is fine. Anything other than this can be fed to the cows and chickens, but I’m afraid we won’t be able to pay for it with cider.

We’re looking forward to seeing you and your fruit on Saturday.

Lunch?

We’re serving 24-hour cooked brisket buns and mushroom buns for lunch on Saturday and booking is advised, although there will be some spare for walk-ins.

Newsletter 15th September 2022

Good afternoon,

We have lots of delicious things to look forward to in the coming weeks at Trenchmore, so I thought this email might serve as a prompt to get your diaries out…

Pizza - 17th September

Slowly fermented sourdough pizza, topped with local and seasonal ingredients and finished in a wood-fired oven - SoPi is back in the yard from 1-4pm and there is no need to pre-book.

We have fresh fillet, tomahawks & denver steaks back in the shop this week, too.

steak for the weekend

Pulled brisket - 24th September

It’s the first of four apple swapping days and we’re kicking things off with one of our most popular Trenchmore dishes - pulled brisket in buns.

The swap and shop is running from 11-4pm, and the brisket will be served 1-4pm.

book lunch

Wagyu hot dogs - 1st October

The second day of this year’s apple swap will feature our wonderful wagyu hot dogs, served in a soft roll with tasty toppings.

The swap, shop & bar are open from 11-4pm, and the hot dogs will be served 1-4pm.

book lunch

3Bros Burgers - 8th October

After selling out on both days at the Worthing Food & Drink festival, the boys are back in the yard on the 8th October with plenty of burgers to go round.

The apple swap, shop and tap are open from 11-4pm, and the burgers will be served 1-4pm.

book lunch

Harvest Party - 15th October

This is definitely one for your diaries.

The Trenchmore 2022 Harvest Party will celebrate the last day of the apple swap and the crop from our orchard with a barn dance & some excellent food from the ever epic Sam Lambert.

Live music, local tipples and lots of apple fun. More details and booking coming soon.

Newsletter 8th September 2022

Good afternoon,

We’ve had 52 calves so far this season, with 6 more to come.

For those who have been to the yard recently, you might have met young Bucko. Nev found him in the field shortly after he was born and he appeared to be paralysed. We worked out that he was one of a set of twins, and mum had hedged her bets with his healthier sister, leaving the poor lad to fend for himself.

Nev brought Bucko back to the yard and has been mothering him with bottle feeds and ear scratches for the last few weeks.

The improvements were slow at first, so Nev thought he’d try something called the ‘squeeze technique’ which uses rope to apply pressure to the torso for 20 minutes to mimic the compression the calf would feel during birth. When the pressure is released, a signal is sent to the brain to reset itself and wake up as if he had just been born. You can watch a video of it being done to a foal here.

Bucko picked himself off the floor for the first time after his re-birth, and Nev beamed with the relief and pride of a new mother. We’re hoping he’ll join a group of cows out in the field very soon.

This weekend in the yard

Clare & her chillis are with us this Saturday - pop by to sample her sauces and pick up some plants to take home.

Plus we have steaks, eggs & cider to grab whilst you’re here.

online shop

This weekend in Worthing

The 3Bros wagyu burgers & Silly Moo Tap are coming to Worthing this weekend.

We will be serving up our grass-fed beef & award-winning cider at the Worthing Food & Drink festival on Saturday & Sunday. It’s free to attend and there are lots of delicious things going on, so we hope to see you there.

Newsletter 25th August 2022

Good afternoon,

Time will tell what the impact the drought will have had on our apple harvest this year, but I suspect the juice yield will be low. We have unripe apples falling off the trees already, and the branches look a little light on the load so far.

I’m hoping the flavours might be more intense, much like anything dehydrated, which could make for some really delicious cider. We shall see.

This year we really want your, your mum’s & your neighbour’s garden apples. We are going to start the swap on 24th September and it will run for four Saturdays.

I know some of your garden trees will already be producing good fruit, but ideally cider making apples are the later ripening varieties and it’s really important that all the fruit it completely ripe otherwise it won’t ferment. Some fruit will fall off the tree and taste pretty good before it is totally ripe, and a good way to tell is to check the pip colour, which should have turned from white to brown.

More information about our swap can be found here.

Newsletter 18th August 2022

Good afternoon,

Thank you for all the rain dancing, it’s definitely helped. We have enjoyed a good downpour over the last couple of days, which is injecting some life back into our land. Without wanting to sound ungrateful, we would ideally have more gentle and sustained rainfall so maybe you could try slowing down your choreography to see if it correlates. Thank you kindly.

This Saturday we are welcoming Sarah Langford & the 3Bros burger boys back to the yard. The boys are serving up their sensational Trenchmore wagyu burgers from 1-4pm, and Sarah will be talking with Andrew from 2-3pm.

There is no entry fee and you are welcome to join just for the chat or just for the food, but I expect the experience of eating a regenerative beef burger whilst listening to a Sunday Times best-selling author talk about regenerative farming with a farmer doing his best to improve his soils, to be a jolly good combination.

Plus, we’ve got a book & burger discount available for pre-orders.

The conversation will be in the Roundhouse, and there will be hay bales scattered around the yard to accommodate everyone, no matter the weather.

book now

A note on deliveries

We currently don’t have the capacity to deliver our beef, lamb or eggs but really appreciate you coming to the yard to pick up your orders from the farm on Saturdays.

There is an option for this on our website at the check-out which doesn’t add a shipping cost to your bill, but please get in touch if it is not clear.

You don’t need to pre-order as we will always have things to pick up on Saturdays, but it might be a more limited menu.

We’ve been a little light on steaks recently, but do email if there’s any specific cut you’re missing and I’ll get my hands on it for you.

We do have two additional shipping options for Silly Moo Cider -

1. Very local deliveries - £5

2. Nationwide courier - £12

online shop

Things to listen to

Today in Focus - Why is England so vulnerable to droughts?

How to Save a Planet - What’s the most climate-friendly way to use my land?

Things to watch

The Moo Man - an independent and award-winning film about Steve Hook and his dairy herd in East Sussex

Newsletter 11th August 2022

Good afternoon,

Starting this week’s email with an invitation to do a rain dance. I’m pretty sure any dance with the correct intention will work, but if you want maximise impact you could try this choreography.

Thank you, we’re getting a little parched over here.

Reverse-searing meat

Reverse-searing is a grilling technique that cooks the meat on a low temperature until perfectly medium-rare, and then finishes it on a high heat for a bit of surface charring. The benefit is a more evenly cooked, more tender and better browned piece of meat.

It does help to have a thermometer to keep an eye on the internal temperature, which should be no more than 55C for medium-rare.

This cooking method works well with steaks 1.5 inch or thicker, like tomahawks and joints like picanha and, my personal favourite, tri-tip.

Generously season tri-tip and leave to sit uncovered in the fridge for 24 hours.

Bring to room temp and pre-heat oven to 100C-130C.

Put fat-side up into oven until the internal temperature hits 46C for medium-rare.

Transfer to a plate and rest for 30 minutes.

Grill over high heat to create a sizzling crust and get the internal temp to 50-55C, which should take a couple of minutes on each side.

Transfer to a cutting board and thinly slice against the grain before immediately devouring. There is no need to rest a second time.

online shop

Low Carbon Business

Trenchmore Farm has been featured in a series called Low Carbon Business in West Sussex, and you can watch more content of Andrew showing off his soils again, below.

Newsletter 4th August 2022

Good afternoon,

Sidestepping the lack of rain topic on the tip of every farmer’s tongue, this week’s email is all about the things we have to look forward to at Trenchmore.

And this month there is plenty.

Saturday 6th Farmyard funk & soul

Join us in the yard for cold pints and Wagyu hot dogs, soundtracked by DJ Danny M who will be playing funk & soul records for us and the hens to enjoy.

Book here

Saturday 13th Clare’s Chilli chat

The Spice Queen of Sussex will be coming to talk about the different varieties she grows, give advice on how to keep your plants alive through the drought and sample her sauces & oils. We’ll be serving up Wagyu hot dogs & cold drinks to go with.

Book here

Saturday 20th Books & Burgers

Sarah Langford will be chatting with Andrew in the yard from 2-3pm. They will be talking about her new book and the farming revolution that is taking place across the country.

I enjoyed reading Sarah’s book on my holiday in Devon last week, and really recommend it for anyone who wants something evocatively written about how we farm in Britain.

Sarah’s warm and witty writing will raise your spirits and give you hope. This event is one we’re really excited about.

3Bros will be serving Wagyu burgers on the day, and we have a fantastic book & burger offer when you order online.

Book here

On offer this week - Wagyu bresaola

Buy one pack, get the second free.

order

Newsletter 21st July 2022

Good evening,

Omelette, poached, served on top of noodles or eaten hard boiled with a little sea salt - however you enjoy them, eggs are tasty and can be really good for us.

The term ‘free-range’ is often abused as it can simply mean allowing hens onto the same patch of over-pecked & muddy grassland for a number of hours each day. When the birds poop their nitrogen rich manure it makes the grass taste bitter, which they don’t want to eat. This means they tend to eat almost only grain, and so free-range doesn’t necessarily mean much by way of welfare or producing a more nutritious egg.

Our hens are properly pasture-raised. They live in a fenced paddock in the orchard, spanning a few rows of apple trees which gives them plenty to explore and peck. We move them to a new patch every few days, which means they don’t get the chance to over-eat the grass and bugs around the hen house, and their poop adds a bit of brilliant fertiliser to the ground without building up.

Eggs from hens that eat grass and insects contain higher levels of B Vitamins, considerably more omega-3 fatty acids and more vitamins A and E than those from grain-fed birds. So, not only is our system hard to beat in terms of welfare for the girls, but we’re getting nutrient rich eggs with delicious golden yolks, too. Pretty eggcellent, if you ask me.

Recipe for a very good tortilla made with very good eggs

Finely slice 2 onions and fry in a little olive oil until soft and slightly caramelised. Thinly slice 2 potatoes and cook in a substantial amount of oil until completely tender and cooked through.

Mix 6 orchard eggs with the onions, drained potatoes and a liberal amount of salt in a little olive oil, over a very low heat until creamy. Turn off the heat and allow to rest for 5 mins.

Heat up the tortilla pan with some olive oil and add the egg mixture. Cook until golden on the bottom, carefully flip and return to the heat to finish cooking. The inside should remain slightly runny. Serve warm or cold with flaky salt.

Newsletter 14th July 2022

Good evening,

News flash: it is warm outside. Very warm. And apparently it’s set to get warmer. Good news for summer vibes, bad news for lots of us (animals, plants and humans) who struggle with the heat, and more record breaking weather is needless to say alarming.

It can also be really harsh on our soils. One of the 5 principles of regenerative agriculture is to ensure our soils are protected from the elements. Being a grass farm, this is relatively easy for us to do. The density of our grass covers the soil across most of our land most the time, and even when we mow for silage and hay we leave enough to keep live roots in the ground and some green life on top.

It is much more of a challenge for arable farms.

The risk of leaving soils bare is that the heat from the sun cooks and kills the very important mycorrhizal fungi and soil bacteria that we need for healthy crops to grow without artificial fertiliser. Bare soils are also much more prone to run off in heavy rain and compaction from machinery. And then there is the very simple fact that if you don’t have plants growing above ground, you won’t have much by way of roots growing below ground, which is exactly what soil life and structure needs to thrive.

One way to protect arable soils from the elements is to sow companion crops or cover crops like oats, peas and clover in between the rows or after the harvest of the cash crops. It’s a little more work than leaving the soils bare until the next cash crop starts to grow, but it builds soil life, supports wildlife and improves the resiliency of our food system so is surely the right thing to do.

Here is a snap of Andrew showing off his soil structure yesterday evening.

This Saturday

We’re serving Wagyu hot dogs in the yard on Saturday, and have beef & lamb available to order online.

Newsletter 7th July 2022

Good afternoon,

We are having a glorious July in Sussex so far. It’s been great conditions for haymaking and silage making, and so that is what Andrew & Nev have spent most of this week’s energy doing. And the sunshine is forecast to stay a while, which is excellent news for Saturday’s yard event.

We have top Brighton chef Sam Lambert & our favourite shepherd Rosie Martin coming together to serve up Nuthurst lamb cooked over flames with crispy tatties, local salad & pickles.

Rosie will talk from 2-3pm about her experience of rearing a small flock of sheep in the Sussex countryside, whilst also working full-time at Barcombe Nurseries. She looks after everything from lambing to shearing to organising the butchery and supplying some local farm shops, almost single-handedly. We know both food & sheep chat will be fantastic so we hope to see lots of you in the yard.

We also have a couple of Nuthurst lamb boxes up for grabs on our website, which will be ready to pick up on Saturday.

Food, cider, & live music from 1-4pm.

pre-book here

Newsletter 30th June 2022

Good afternoon,

Just as I sat down to write this newsletter, another email landed in my inbox from one of our suppliers to notify me of their price rise. This one was from a food wholesaler, but recently we have also had cider keg rentals, pallet shifting, tap-room benches, egg boxes, cider cans and fresh apple juice. And that’s not mentioning the £1.20/L diesel Dad filled up with today, or the doubled price of chicken feed and tripled price of fertiliser.

Luckily, we don’t plough so don’t use as much diesel as some, our hens eat a lot of grass so we don’t feed them as many pellets as others and we’re weening our soils off artificial fertiliser so don’t need nearly as much as most. But the price hikes are being felt and our humble margins are being squeezed.

We’re hoping not to charge more to our own customers but farmers need support now more than ever.

Farmers who are trying to do right by their land, animals and communities. Farmers who work 15 hour days without taking much wage, or enough weekends off. Farmers who employ local people (sometimes even their daughters), and support local abattoirs, butchers & other growers. Farmers who are trying to improve the biodiversity on their land, who resist taking short cuts because they want to leave things better than they found them.

I know everyone is feeling the pinch at the moment but who we spend our money with determines which businesses will survive and who looks after our food system. So, let’s opt for a pint of the local beer at the pub, buy coffee from the independent cafe and where possible, source our fresh produce from farm shops.

It really does make all the difference.

Newsletter 23rd June 2022

Good morning,

It’s been another busy week on the farm this week - moving cattle, making hay and a little more progress on our farm kitchen. We unfortunately had some inconclusive TB results on 3 cows last week, which means they need to be kept separate from the rest of the herd and tested again in a few weeks. We’re confident they will come back clear as there is no sign of TB in our cattle, but it’s a little tense nonetheless.

If Glastonbury isn’t your idea of a good time, there has been another festival this week with arguably better food stalls and a less fraught ticket purchase. What it lacks in a Paul McCartney headline act it makes up for in compost demonstrations and the concentration of feet in Blundstone boots. This week saw the return of Groundswell, an annual festival in Hertfordshire that invites experts in soil health, conservation agriculture, the environment and food production to share ideas on how we can grow food in a more holistic and healthy manner. I managed to get up there on Wednesday and saw some really interesting talks. Naturally wearing a pair of muddy Blundstone boots.

Henry Dimbleby was one of the speakers and he talked about his National Food Strategy that was published last year, and his ideas on what needs to happen now. The government’s white paper response came out last week and frustratingly yet somewhat unsurprisingly seems to have missed a lot of the plan’s recommendations.

He talked about reducing diet inequality by improving food education in schools and improving access to healthier free school meals. We also need to escape the junk food cycle, which is difficult because 75-80% of food marketing is spent on low nutrition foods in the UK. Taxing salt and sugar is a start, but understanding the power of food on our health, and knowing how to prepare healthy foods at home is vital.

He suggested we need to produce food with less waste - not only food waste in manufacturing, retail and at home, but the inefficient land use of growing grain to feed livestock. He recommends a national meat consumption reduction of 30% and argues unprocessed vegetarian options need to become cheaper and more accessible to enable a shift. He agreed that there is a place for meat on our tables but this needs to come from thoughtful agricultural systems.

Dimbleby’s strategy has calculated that we can grow enough food to feed a growing population, make it more nutritionally dense, use land to carbon sequester and increase biodiversity but it is going to take a lot of effort from food growers, food consumers and the government. The powerful message that I took back to Trenchmore was that farmers have a massive role to play in the incoming global crisis. We have lots of work to do to improve the way the country eats and the way the environment is looked after, but I’m forever hopeful that we can do things better, fairer and with more regard for our land, animals and communities.

Pizza in the yard tomorrow

We’re serving up wood-fired Neopolitan pizza and cider in the yard tomorrow from 1-4pm. Lucas doesn’t take bookings but there will be plenty for walk-ins.

And the farm shop is open 11-4pm, with fresh steak, eggs & cider to pick up. Have a look at what’s available here.

Nuthurst Lamb on 9th July

Shepherd Rosie & Chef Sam are joining forces next weekend and are cooking one of Rosie’s lambs asado style.

Rosie will chat to us about her flock and business whilst Sam serves up barbecued lamb, crispy tatties, salad & pickles in a wrap. We can’t wait.

Book here

Newsletter 16th June 2022

Good afternoon,

This week we have been making hay whilst the sun shines. Andrew cut the rye grass on Saturday, Gareth turned it with the tedder on Sunday, Monday & Tuesday, Jack raked it into rows yesterday and Matt will bale it up today and store it in the yard for when the cows come in over the winter.

We’ve also had to TB test our herd this week, which is a routine but arduous job. It means bringing all the cows into the yard to be injected with tuberculin and seeing whether this causes a reaction or lump in the skin 3 days later. Even an inconclusive result can be very disruptive because all the cows will need to be brought back in agin 60 days later, so keep your fingers crossed for us all.

This Saturday

Andrew will be giving a talk in the yard about Trenchmore Farm from 2-3pm and we’d love you to join us.

Our burger boys are back serving up wagyu patties, burger sauce, applewood cheese & baby gem lettuce in brioche buns and the Moo Tap will be serving drinks from 1-4pm.

Spicy, vegan & kid size options also available. Please pre-book to save your spot.

Burgers