Fowlescombe Farm

This quietly luxurious rural retreat (a 450-acre regenerative farm) in Devon has welcomed talented chef Elly Wentworth to oversee a unique dining offering, which sees the journey of produce measured not in food miles, but in footsteps from garden and farm to kitchen.

Fowlescombe Farm is a place in which you find yourself eased into the rhythm of farm life amid the wild beauty of Devon, and nowhere is that clearer than in The Refectory. The restaurant sits within an original stone barn at the heart of the farm and is steered by soil and season. The four-course daily changing menu is decided mere hours before service depending on what’s abundant in the gardens and fields.

Evenings here begin with a walk around the kitchen garden (don’t be surprised to see chefs gathering handfuls of herbs). Then, diners take a seat at the oak feasting table, enjoying the view of the open kitchen where Elly and her team work with hyper-local ingredients such as own-reared meat (raised slowly with regenerative principles) and garden-grown veg.

Each dish tells a story of the land and the season. Try the likes of 45-day aged fillet of shorthorn beef with caramelised onion, horseradish buttermilk and farm cavolo nero, before ending the evening with cocktails (infused with garden botanicals) in the Farmhouse.

Trencherman’s tip

The charcuterie is handmade just up the lane, using meat from Fowlescombe Farm animals. The team believe in using every part of what’s grown and reared on the farm, in celebrating abundance without waste, and in bringing focus back to where real food comes from.